Our lawyers have years of experience providing services to clients in the Ottawa area for probate applications, notifications of death, transfers of ownership, survivorship applications, letters to beneficiaries, and consultations regarding executor rights and beneficiaries rights.
Estates: Legal Assistance for Executors (Estate Trustees)
If someone you know has died and you have been appointed Executor of the Estate, you are likely faced with many decisions to make.
An Executor is legally responsible to carry out all of his or her legal duties until the administration of the Estate is complete. The role of an Executor involves personal liability. For example, the Executor is personally responsible to ensure all of the taxes of the Estate owing to the Canada Revenue Agency are paid in full. It is the Executor that is held personally liable, not the beneficiaries.
Generally, it takes over a year for an Executor to complete the administration and the accounting of the Estate before he or she can render a final report to the beneficiaries of the Estate. Carrying out the legal duties of an Executor and accepting the inherent personal liability is a very serious undertaking which should not be taken lightly. Executors are compensated for rendering this service and given the seriousness of their role, it is justified.
We are able to assist you if you are an Executor and you are administering an Estate. We have structured our services so that an Executor can have the choice to retain us to fulfill all of his or her duties, or just some of those duties. We are able to tailor our legal services to suit your needs. Our commitment is to assist the Executor to fulfill his or her legal duties in accordance with the Will of the deceased and to protect the Executor from personal liability.