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California Small Estate Affidavit: The $208,850 Limit

For deaths on or after April 1, 2025, California section 13100 permits collection of specified personal property after 40 days when the adjusted gross-value calculation does not exceed $208,850. Exclude section 13050 property and property in a section 13151 petition. Earlier deaths use the applicable prior limit.

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Not every estate needs a court. Whether yours does turns on one number and one date.

The threshold, the wait, and what it reaches

Probate Code section 13100 is the escape hatch from administration. Where the gross value of a decedent’s real and personal property in California does not exceed the section 890 adjusted amount — $208,850 for deaths on or after 1 April 2025, although the statute’s printed text still reads $166,250 — and forty days have elapsed since the death, a successor may act without procuring letters of administration and without waiting for the will to be probated. What it reaches is defined: collecting money due the decedent, receiving tangible personal property, and having transferred any item that is evidence of a debt, obligation, interest, right, security or chose in action. Two exclusions matter to the arithmetic. Property described in section 13050 does not count toward the threshold, and neither does property included in a petition filed under section 13151. Everything else is measured at gross value, so debts do not bring an estate under the line.

Sources: Probate Code s.13100 - Small estate affidavit, collection without administration · Maximum Amounts for Determining Eligibility for Summary Succession Procedures (Prob. Code s.890) · Form DE-300 - Maximum Values for Small Estate Set-Aside and Disposition Without Administration · Probate Code s.8400 - No power to administer until letters issue · Verified 2026-08-21.

Whether the affidavit route is open

QuestionAnswer that keeps you out of probate
Gross value of California propertyAt or under $208,850 for deaths on or after 1 April 2025, excluding §13050 property and property included in a §13151 petition
Time since deathAt least 40 days
What you need to collectMoney owed, tangible personal property, or evidence of a debt or security
Real property involvedHandled by a separate procedure, not this affidavit

The affidavit answers one part of a wider question. If you are not yet sure which assets need a court at all, work out whether the estate needs probate asset by asset first: trust assets, survivorship property and beneficiary-designated accounts ordinarily transfer without either route.

Which figure applies is decided by the date of death

This is the detail that catches people, including people who do this for a living. Probate Code section 890 requires the Judicial Council to adjust these amounts every three years, and section 890(d) provides that an adjustment does not apply where the death preceded it. So the operative number is fixed by when the person died, not by when you file.

Section 13100 threshold by date of death — Judicial Council, adjusted 1 April 2025
Date of deathGross value must not exceed
On or after 1 April 2025$208,850
1 April 2022 – 31 March 2025$184,500
Before 1 April 2022$166,250

Next adjustment 1 April 2028. The related thresholds move with it: §13200 real property of small value is $69,625, the §13050(c) exclusion is $20,875, and §§6602 and 6609 set-aside is $107,900.

Do not trust the code text on this

The published text of section 13100 on the Legislature’s own site still reads $166,250, because the adjustments are made by the Judicial Council rather than by amending the statute. Anyone reading the section cold — including a good many published guides — will take away a figure two adjustment cycles out of date and conclude an estate does not qualify when it comfortably does. The authoritative source is the Judicial Council’s published list, reproduced on form DE-300, which must be attached to the affidavit for deaths on or after April 1, 2022.

Related: what full administration involves if you exceed the limit, the statutory fees the affidavit avoids, and how to open probate if you must, and what to handle in the first weeks after the death, while the forty days run.

The Probate Code sections behind this page

Each section links to its official text at the California Legislature’s own site. The full index of sections covers the rest of the Code.

Probate Code section 13100
Small estate affidavit, collection without administration. Read section 13100
Probate Code section 13101
What the small estate affidavit must state. Read section 13101

Also cited above, explained elsewhere on this site

Probate Code section 13151
Petition to determine succession to a primary residence. Where section 13151 is explained

Before you call: What probate costs · How long it takes · Which court hears it

Find the court for the county where the person lived

Where a California decedent was domiciled in this state at the time of death, the proper county for administration proceedings is the county of domicile, regardless of where the decedent actually died. Where the decedent was not domiciled in California, section 7052 instead looks to the county of death if property is located there, and otherwise to any county where property is located. Check the venue rule.

Choose a California county court guide

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