I’ve spent many years as a probate solicitor answering one question more than any other: do I actually need probate? It’s the first thing most families want to know after losing someone. Depending on the circumstances, I can normally give a quick answer, while other times it genuinely varies. Some estates go through the entire administration process without ever needing a Grant of Probate. Others can’t move forward without one. Knowing which situation you’re in will save you time, money, and a great deal of anxiety. It’s a common misconception that probate is not required if the deceased left a will. In fact, the existence of a will does not determine whether probate is needed; probate may still be required regardless of whether a will is in place.
I’ve put this guide together to explain precisely when probate is required in England and Wales, and when it’s not. We’ll be looking at the size and type of the estate and what that has to do with it, and looking at individual thresholds of main street banks and institutions. If you want a quick answer before reading on, use our free probate checker to find out in under two minutes whether your situation is likely to need a Grant.
I should also say that if you are dealing with this for the first time, the uncertainty about whether probate is even needed is usually the thing that causes the most anxiety. Once you know the answer, the process becomes considerably clearer.
Please note: this guide covers England and Wales only. The rules in Scotland (where the process is called “confirmation”) and Northern Ireland are different.
Probate application fee – £300 for estates over £5,000
HMCTS processing time – 8 to 16 weeks
Required for sole-name property – Almost always
Bank threshold (typical) – Around £50,000, varies by bank
Can you apply yourself – Yes, in England and Wales
Probate is the legal process of proving that a Will is valid. It gives the named executor(s) the official authority to deal with the deceased’s estate. That authority comes in the form of a document called a Grant of Probate. Basically, it legally allows you to close bank accounts, give beneficiaries any money or possessions left to them in the will and sell properties if required.
Without that Grant, many institutions, including banks, building societies, HMRC, and the Land Registry, will refuse to release or transfer assets. Annoying as it may sound, this is not just bureaucracy for the sake of it! It is a legal safeguard designed to ensure that only the right person can access and distribute an estate. The person trusted by the deceased.
Since probate is not something you have to (thankfully) do everyday, the process, at first, seems very complex confusing. And the first hurdle is understanding whether you need probate or not. Whether you need it depends almost entirely on what assets the deceased held, how those assets were owned, and whether those assets were held jointly with someone else.
There’s no single rule that catches every situation. In my experience, the question of whether probate is needed comes down to three things:
This is the most common trigger for probate. If the deceased owned a property in their sole name, a house, a flat, or land, the Land Registry will almost always require a Grant of Probate before the property can be sold or transferred to a beneficiary. The only exception is where the property was held as “joint tenants” with another person. In that case, ownership passes automatically to the surviving owner by what is called the right of survivorship, and probate is not needed for that asset specifically.
If, however, the property was held as “tenants in common”, meaning each person owned a defined share, the deceased’s share is considered separate and will then have to be considered as part of the estate. This will therefore need to be dealt with through probate.
Wondering how to find out? The Title Deeds for the property which will either be in the deceased paperwork, with their bank, with the solicitor or conveyancer, will indicate ownership. Joint tenants will not include specifics about shares, while tenants in common will have a restriction in the proprietorship register.. You can also search property information on the Land Registry.
Each bank and building society sets its own threshold for releasing funds without a Grant of Probate. Having said that, many high-street banks will release up to approximately £50,000 without a Grant. For premium Bonds and ISAs the limit tends to be much lower, at £10,000 or even £5,000 and a small number will insist on a Grant regardless of the amount.
This means the same estate could require probate at one bank but not at another. I always recommend contacting each institution individually as early as possible to notify them of the death. Thresholds aren’t always publicly advertised and can change without notice. At least if you tell them early, they’ll ensure all payments (in and out) are cancelled and they can begin the process of providing the final balance and notifying you if probate is going to be needed. On many occasion, I’ve seen estates where accounts came to light weeks into the process that nobody in the family knew about. This is another reason why contacting institutions early and methodically matters more than most guides suggest.
Our guide on what happens to bank accounts when someone dies goes into the bank-bank process in much more detail if you need it.
Investment platforms and share registrars also apply their own thresholds. Premium bonds, for example, are held by NS&I, which will consider releasing up to £5,000 to the executor without a Grant. Above that, you’ll need probate.
If the estate includes a share portfolio or ISA in the deceased’s sole name, you will almost certainly need probate to transfer or liquidate those holdings.
When someone dies without a Will, the legal term is dying “intestate”. In this situation no executor has been appointed. Instead, an administrator must apply to the Probate Registry for a document called Letters of Administration.
The Letters of Administration serve the same practical function as a Grant of Probate: they give the administrator the legal authority to deal with the estate. Whether you need a Grant or Letters of Administration, the application process through HMCTS is broadly the same. I cover this in full in our guide on letters of administration. Some people believe that if there is a will in place then probate won’t be required, but this isn’t the case. Take a look at our guide to find out why you may still need probate even when there is a will.
According to HMCTS, there are currently around 300,000 probate applications made in England and Wales each year. The application fee is £300 for estates valued over £5,000. Once submitted, HMCTS typically processes a straightforward application within 8 to 16 weeks.
Probate is not always necessary. In my experience, a surprising number of families discover that the estate they are dealing with does not require a formal Grant at all. The main situations where probate can be avoided are as follows.
When assets are held as joint tenants, the surviving co-owner automatically inherits the whole asset. Those assets pass outside of the estate entirely and don’t need probate because it’s an automatic process. This is the most common example with jointly owned property and joint bank accounts.
To transfer a jointly held property into the sole name of the surviving owner, the Land Registry requires only a death certificate and you’ll need to complete a simple form called DJP. This removes their name from the register. No Grant is needed.
Certain assets pass directly to a named beneficiary and do not form part of the probate estate at all. These include life insurance policies written in trust, some pension death benefits (paid at the discretion of the pension trustees), and some savings products. If these exist, always check whether there is a named beneficiary on record.
If the deceased held only small amounts in bank accounts and had no property in their sole name, it may be possible to deal with the entire estate without probate. The executor simply contacts each institution with a death certificate and a letter of authority, and the banks will decide whether to release the funds on that basis.
This only works for small/modest estates. If the total estate is worth less than £10,000 to £15,000, it is often possible to avoid the formal probate process entirely.
Assets held in a trust structure do not typically form part of the estate for probate purposes. If the deceased was a beneficiary of a discretionary trust, for example, those assets would not be included in the probate estate and would need to be dealt with by the trustees separately.
A family I worked with recently had sadly lost their father. He and his wife had owned their home as joint tenants. As well as a joint current account, he had a life insurance policy which left £235,000 to his wife who was the named beneficiary. The life insurance was written into trust, so it didn’t form part of his estate when he died.
In this situation, the house passed automatically to his wife by survivorship. The joint account was transferred into her sole name with a death certificate. The life insurance policy did not require probate because it was written into trust and was passed directly to his nominated person. There was a small savings account in his sole name with a balance of £18,400, but his bank agreed to release it without a Grant.
Probate was not needed at all. The entire administration was resolved within 7 and half weeks.
Compare that with a different case: a widower who owned his property in his sole name, had bank accounts totalling £230,000, and a small ISA. In that situation, probate was essential before any of those assets could be moved.
If you’re unsure which situation applies to you, use our free probate checker before doing anything else. It takes less than two minutes and will give you a clear steer on whether you are likely to need a Grant.
You are entirely entitled to apply for probate yourself. The process involves completing the PA1P form (if there is a Will) or PA1A form (if there is no Will), valuing the estate, completing any required Inheritance Tax forms, and paying the application fee.
The fee is £300 for estates over £5,000. Additional sealed copies of the Grant cost £16 each, and I recommend ordering between 4-6, as banks and other institutions will each want a copy of the original.
Our DIY Probate Portal guides you through the entire process step by step at a cost of £39.99. It is designed precisely for executors dealing with estates where a solicitor is not genuinely necessary.
For complex estates, including those involving Inheritance Tax above the nil-rate band (£325,000 as of 2026), contested Wills, foreign assets, or trust structures, professional legal advice is genuinely valuable. A solicitor can manage the process end to end, though fees typically range from £1,500 to £5,000. Sometimes it can be more depending on the complexity of the estate.
For the majority of estates, the additional cost is not necessary. Probate is a manageable process for most executors who are prepared to invest some time and follow the steps carefully.
If you’ve determined that you’re likely to need probate and you want to handle it without paying solicitor fees, our DIY Probate Portal walks you through every stage in plain English at your own pace. And it only costs £39.99 at the moment! It is built for executors dealing with clear, manageable estates, and it is the same process I have guided clients through for over two decades. Or, if you’re still unsure whether you need probate at all, start with our free probate checker to confirm before you take any further steps.
Probate isn’t always needed. It will entirely depend on the type and value of assets in the estate, and how those assets were owned. Assets owned jointly as joint tenants pass automatically to the surviving owner without probate. Small estates where the deceased held only modest bank balances in sole accounts may also be dealt with without a formal Grant, depending on each bank’s internal threshold. Property held in the deceased’s sole name, however, will almost always require a Grant of Probate before it can be sold or transferred.
In England and Wales, probate is typically required when the deceased owned property in their sole name. It will also be needed by banks if the deceased has accounts with more than the bank’s set threshold. Our most recent research suggest that this is currently around £50,000, although banks are still entitled to request a Grant before releasing funds. If the estate includes any of these, you will almost certainly need to apply to HMCTS for a Grant of Probate. The application fee is £300 for estates valued over £5,000.
Having a Will doesn’t unfortunately remove the need for probate. Whether probate is required depends entirely on the assets in the estate and how they were owned, and not on whether or not there was a will. If the deceased owned property in their sole name, probate will be needed regardless of whether a Will exists.
There’s is no single national threshold for probate in England and Wales. Each bank and financial institution sets its own limit for releasing funds without a Grant of Probate. Many high-street banks set this at around £50,000. Some set it much lower. For property held in a sole name, there is effectively no threshold. The Land Registry will require a Grant regardless of the value.
Once a completed application is submitted to HMCTS, a Grant of Probate typically takes between 8 and 16 weeks to be issued. This is HMCTS’s current standard processing time for straightforward applications. For more complex estates, particularly those involving Inheritance Tax reporting, it can take much longer. The full estate administration process, from the date of death through to distributing the estate to beneficiaries, usually takes between 6 and 12 months in total. Take a look at our guide on how long does probate take for more details.
If you’re dealing with a straight forward estate you can do probate yourself. In fact, we encourage it. In England and Wales, executors are fully entitled to apply for probate without using a solicitor. This is called a personal application. You complete the relevant forms, value the estate, submit the application to HMCTS, and pay the £300 fee. The process requires patience, strong admin skills and attention to detail, but it is manageable for most executors providing you’re not dealing with an estate that involve complex tax issues, contested claims, or unusual asset structures. Our DIY Probate Portal provides step-by-step guidance for £39.99.
If you do not obtain a Grant of Probate when one is required, you will not be able to sell or transfer the deceased’s property, access their bank accounts above the relevant threshold, or transfer investments and savings held in their sole name. The estate will be in a kind of legal limbo until probate is obtained. There is no legal time limit for applying for probate in England and Wales, but significant delays can cause practical difficulties with property maintenance, utility bills, and distributing the estate to beneficiaries.
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