Probate & Estates

How much will probate cost on this estate?

Compute it from the province''s schedule on the probated estate''s value: Ontario — nothing on the first $50,000, then $15 per $1,000 (a $500,000 estate pays $6,750; a $1M estate $14,250); BC — 0.6% between $25,000 and $50,000, 1.4% above, plus $200 (a $500,000 estate roughly $6,650); Alberta charges modest flat-tier fees by comparison; Quebec''s notarial wills avoid the exercise. Add professional fees where retained. Assets passing outside the estate — joint, designated-beneficiary — never enter the calculation, which is precisely why planning matters.

How long does probate take — and can we do anything meanwhile?

Registry processing runs weeks to a few months depending on province and backlog, with complex or contested files longer. Meanwhile the executor can and should act: secure property and insurance, locate assets, open the estate account, handle the funeral (those costs come first from the estate), and start the tax file. What can't happen early is distribution — and beneficiaries pressing for advances are asking the executor to take personal risk. Full administration to final distribution commonly runs a year for ordinary estates ("the executor's year" is the traditional benchmark).

Do all the accounts freeze when someone dies?

Sole-name accounts freeze once the bank learns of the death — releasing funds then follows probate or the bank's small-balance indemnity process, though banks routinely pay funeral invoices directly from frozen accounts. Joint accounts with survivorship continue for the survivor (subject to later resulting-trust questions where the joint holder was added for convenience). Designated-beneficiary assets (insurance, RRSPs/RRIFs/TFSAs) pay on claim with a death certificate, outside the freeze entirely. Practical triage in week one: list every account by how it''s held, and ask each institution its exact release requirements.

Is there tax on what I inherit?

Not on the inheritance itself — Canada has no inheritance or estate tax on beneficiaries. The system collects at the estate level instead: the deceased is deemed to have disposed of capital property at death, and the terminal return pays tax on accrued gains (deferred where assets roll to a spouse; the family home usually sheltered by the principal-residence exemption), while RRSPs/RRIFs collapse into income unless rolled to qualifying survivors. Provincial probate tax sits on top where probate is needed. What beneficiaries inherit, they inherit at stepped-up cost — future growth is theirs to account for.

The executor has done nothing for a year. What can beneficiaries do?

Escalate in enforceable steps. Write formally asking for a status report and an accounting — executors owe beneficiaries information, and the request creates the record. Persisting silence: apply to court to compel an accounting (a "passing of accounts" in Ontario practice), seek directions, or — for genuine dereliction, conflict or incapacity — removal and replacement of the executor, with costs consequences for misconduct. Courts respect the executor''s year for ordinary administration, but respect runs out where nothing moves and no explanation comes. An estates lawyer''s letter often unsticks in one page what frustration couldn''t in twelve months.