Minnesota

Minnesota estates are heard in the District Court of the county where the deceased lived.
Minnesota has adopted the Uniform Probate Code, so the structure will look familiar to anyone who
has dealt with an estate in Colorado, Michigan or Arizona.

Informal or formal, supervised or not

• Informal proceedings are handled by the registrar on the paperwork, without a hearing.
  This is the normal route for an uncontested estate.
• Formal proceedings go before a judge, and are needed where the will is unclear or missing,
  an heir cannot be located, or someone objects.
• Administration is then unsupervised by default; supervised administration must be requested.

You may not need probate at all

As a rule of thumb, no probate case is needed where the deceased owned no real estate in their
sole name and their solely-owned personal property was worth less than $75,000. In that
case an affidavit collects the assets. Confirm the current threshold before assuming.

The Minnesota estate tax, and the portability trap

Minnesota is one of the minority of states with its own estate tax. The exemption is $3 million
— far below the federal figure — and, critically, Minnesota does not allow portability between
spouses.

That last point does the damage. Federally, a surviving spouse inherits their late spouse's unused
exemption automatically. Minnesota does not permit that, so a couple who simply leave everything
to each other waste one $3 million exemption entirely. Credit shelter trust planning remains
routine here for exactly this reason, long after it became unnecessary federally. Confirm the
current exemption with the Department of Revenue.

Before distributing

Publish the notice to creditors, let the claim period run, settle the Minnesota and federal
returns, and close with a final account or verified statement.

A Minnesota will must be in writing, signed by the testator (or in the testator's name by
someone else in their conscious presence and at their direction), and signed by at least two
witnesses, each of whom signed within a reasonable time after witnessing the signing or the
testator's acknowledgement of it. The testator must be 18 or older and of sound mind.

Minnesota does not accept holographic wills

This surprises people, because Minnesota adopted the Uniform Probate Code — and the UPC contains a
provision validating holographic wills. Minnesota left it out. The execution statute requires
two witnesses in every ordinary case and contains no handwriting exception.

So a handwritten, unwitnessed will is not valid in Minnesota, however clearly it expresses
what the person wanted. Minnesota sits with Massachusetts here rather than with the other UPC
states, and someone moving from North Dakota, Michigan or Colorado with a handwritten will in a
drawer needs to know that it stopped working when they crossed the border.

Minnesota does permit electronic wills executed to the statutory standard, which is a better
modern option.

Make it self-proving

Attach a self-proving affidavit signed before a notary, so no witness need be located later.

Plan around the $3 million exemption

Because the Minnesota estate tax exemption is not portable between spouses, leaving everything
outright to the survivor can waste one exemption completely. For a couple with a lake place, a
house and retirement accounts, that is a real cost. Take advice.

Also

• Name an alternate personal representative and ask for unsupervised administration.
• A surviving spouse has an elective share whatever the will says.
• Review after a marriage, divorce, birth or a move to Minnesota.

Yes. A Minnesota personal representative is entitled to reasonable compensation for
services performed. There is no statutory percentage.

What the court weighs

The size and nature of the estate, the time actually required, the complexity and difficulty of
the work, the skill and any special expertise it demanded, the responsibility assumed, and the
results achieved.

Records decide it

Without a percentage to fall back on, contemporaneous time records are the whole argument.
Keep dated entries from the first week. Reconstructing eighteen months of work from memory, in
front of a beneficiary who thinks the fee is too high, is a position nobody wins from.

Unsupervised means unreviewed, not approved

Under Minnesota's default unsupervised administration, nobody examines the fee as you take it.
Any interested person can still petition the court afterwards, and the representative carries the
burden of justifying the amount. Agree it in writing with the beneficiaries before taking it.

If the will fixes the figure

A will provision governs. Under the UPC framework the representative may also renounce the
will's provision before qualifying and take reasonable compensation instead — useful where the
figure was set decades ago and no longer bears any relation to the work.

The estate tax angle

Compensation is taxable income to the representative but a deductible administration
expense against the Minnesota estate tax. Where the estate is over the $3 million exemption,
taking a fee can reduce estate tax while creating income tax; where it is comfortably under, a
family representative who is also a beneficiary usually gains nothing at all by taking one. Which
side of that line you are on changes the answer — ask an accountant rather than guessing.

A Minnesota personal representative is reimbursed from the estate for the reasonable expenses
of administration, separately from compensation. Where the estate approaches the $3 million
estate tax exemption these are also deductible against it, so recording them has a cash value.

Normally claimable

• Funeral, burial or cremation, the headstone, and a reasonable reception.
• District Court filing fees, certified letters, certified death certificates, and publication of
  the notice to creditors.
• Attorney's fees, and accountant's fees for the final Form 1040, any Form 1041, and the
  Minnesota estate tax return where one is due.
• Appraisals — the valuation decides whether the estate crosses the $3 million line at all,
  so it matters more here than in a no-estate-tax state.
• Carrying costs on estate property until sale: insurance, property tax, utilities, security,
  maintenance, lawn care and snow removal.
• Winterising a property — keeping heat on, draining lines, and closing up a lake place for
  the season. A Minnesota house left cold through January is a burst-pipe claim, and prevention
  costs a fraction of the repair.
• Cleaning, clearing, storing, moving and shipping contents, including a cabin up north.
• Travel on estate business at a reasonable rate.
• Bond premiums where bond was not waived.

Normally not claimable

• The representative's lost wages, meals near home, or personal spending.
• Costs run up for one beneficiary's convenience rather than the estate's.
• Improvements beyond preparing a property for sale as it stands.
• Anything without a receipt.

The rule that decides it

Open an estate bank account and run everything through it. Under unsupervised administration
your ledger is the only record — and it supports both the estate tax deductions and your own fee.

Minnesota's informal, unsupervised default makes most estates here manageable for a family member
with a lawyer's help. The state estate tax creates the main case for something more.

Consider a professional when

• The estate is near or above the $3 million exemption. This is the Minnesota case, and the
  lack of spousal portability means the planning has to be right at the first death, not the
  second. A house, a cabin and two retirement accounts get there more easily than families expect.
• The estate holds farmland, an operating business, or rental property. Minnesota farmland
  brings its own valuation and family-succession questions, and there is a qualified small
  business and farm property deduction worth getting right.
• A cabin is to be divided among siblings — the same recurring problem cottages create in
  Michigan and Wisconsin, and better solved by a plan or an LLC than by leaving the personal
  representative to referee.
• There is conflict among the beneficiaries, which moves the estate from informal to formal
  proceedings.
• A beneficiary is a minor or incapacitated, so a trust runs for years.
• The named representative lives out of state and cannot attend to property through a
  Minnesota winter.

What it costs

Corporate fiduciaries charge a negotiated percentage with a minimum annual fee. Attorneys
generally bill hourly. Ask for either in writing.

Middle ground

Appoint a family member, ask for unsupervised administration, and let them retain a probate
attorney and an accountant at the estate's expense. If the estate might be taxable, bring the
accountant in during the first month — the valuation and deduction decisions are made early.

A named representative who does not want the job can decline before appointment.