Selling an inherited house without the second job.

People land on this page after typing "sell inherited home" into a phone at eleven at night, which is usually the hour the question arrives. So here is the part nobody explains at the funeral.

Whether selling a house in probate is even the situation you are in depends on how the house was titled, not on what the will says. If your parent held it in a living trust, or owned it in joint tenancy with a spouse who is still living, or signed a transfer-on-death deed naming you, the house usually passes outside probate and the paperwork is comparatively short. If it sat in one name alone, it usually has to go through the district court in the county where they lived before anybody can sign a deed.

We're not lawyers and none of this is legal advice. We sit across the table from Utah probate attorneys most weeks, so we know the shape of it, and the shape is what most families want on day one.

The words you're about to hear

Personal representative. The person the court appoints to act for the estate. Where there's a will naming an executor, that's usually who gets appointed.

Letters testamentary. The document from the court proving the personal representative can act. Title companies ask for it, and until it exists an inherited house generally can't be sold to anybody.

Informal probate. The routine version, handled largely on paperwork, used when nobody's fighting and the will is clear. Most of the estates we see run this way.

Formal probate. What happens when somebody objects, the will is unclear or missing, or the court has to decide something. It costs more and it takes longer.

Small estate affidavit. Utah has an affidavit procedure for small estates that skips probate, but it's aimed mainly at personal property such as bank accounts and vehicles rather than at real estate, so it usually won't move a house on its own. Your attorney can tell you in one phone call whether it reaches your situation.

Notice to creditors

A Utah estate generally publishes a notice to creditors and then waits out a claim window set by statute, usually about three months from the first published notice, before the estate can be wound up. That's one reason a probate everybody agrees on still takes months rather than weeks. An inherited house can often be sold during that window. What doesn't happen during it is the money reaching the heirs, because the estate settles its debts first.

If it's the sale rather than the court part you want, our cash offer page sets out every line of the offer document, and sell my house fast walks the whole thing end to end.

Probate is the part families expect. The house is the part that wears them down, because a house doesn't pause while paperwork moves.

What it costs to hold

The mortgage keeps going out. So do the property taxes, the utilities you keep on so the pipes don't freeze, and the yard somebody has to mow so the neighbors stop calling. Insurance is the one people miss: many policies change or limit what they cover once a house has stood empty for a while, so call the insurer and ask, because finding that out after a burst pipe is an expensive way to learn it. Add up six months of an inherited house sitting empty and it's usually thousands of dollars, paid by whichever family member has the cash to pay it.

The contents

Forty years of belongings, none of it sorted, and every box a decision. You don't have to make those decisions. We buy inherited houses with the furniture still in them, the garage full, the basement full, and the shed nobody has opened since 2011. Take the photographs, the documents, the jewelry, and anything with a name attached to it. Leave the rest, and clearing it is our cost, already inside the number.

Two things are worth doing first. Walk the house once with every sibling who wants to, before anything moves, so nobody is left wondering later. And if you think there's real value in the furniture or the garage, have somebody who does that for a living look at it, because our offer prices the house and not the contents.

Siblings who don't agree

This is the hard one, and it comes up more often than the tax question. Three heirs: one who wants it sold this month, one who wants it kept in the family, one who hasn't returned a call since March.

We don't buy an inherited house from one heir over another heir's objection, and we won't lean on the hesitant one on your behalf. Everybody with an interest signs, or nothing happens. If the family can't get there, that's a conversation for the attorney and occasionally for a court, and we're not lawyers, mediators or counselors. The offer stays open while you work it out, at the same number.

Heirs who live out of state

Common, and not a problem. Most out-of-state heirs sign with a mobile notary who comes to them, or remotely where the title company accepts that, and the funds are wired. Plenty of the inherited houses Property Seller Solutions buys haven't had an heir set foot in Utah in years. Ask the title company early what kind of signing they'll take, because that decision is theirs rather than ours.

Start the clock the day the personal representative has letters in hand. Here's what each route looks like from there.

Selling a house in probate to us

• Day one. A phone call, or the form at the top of this page. We ask for the address, the rough condition, and where the estate has got to. Nothing else.
• Day two. A written cash offer, with the three figures behind it: what comparable Utah homes actually sold for, what the repairs cost, and what it costs us to hold the house and resell it.
• Day three to seven. One walkthrough. The title company opens escrow and starts the title search, which on an estate often turns up a lien or a second name nobody remembered.
• Closing. 7 days after the estate can sign, or any later date that suits the court and the family. The proceeds go to the estate rather than to any one heir, and they're distributed from there.

Listing it with an agent instead

• Clear the house first. That's usually a dumpster, a weekend crew and the better part of a month.
• Then the repairs. Agents ask for paint, carpet and whatever an inspector will write up, because a retail buyer is borrowing money and their lender will look.
• Then 60 to 120 days of showings and offers, with financing that can still collapse in week ten.
• The whole time, every carrying cost above keeps running.

Which route wins depends on the house. If the property is in decent shape, the family isn't under pressure, and the estate can carry it for three or four months, listing it will usually net more even after the commission. We say that on the phone before anybody asks. Where a cash sale wins is an inherited house that needs real work, a family spread across three states, or an estate that can't carry the payments while everyone waits.

If you'd rather compare buyers before you commit to any of us, companies that buy houses sets out the questions to ask all of them, ours included. If you got here from somewhere harder, foreclosure covers a house that's behind on payments, and homeowner relief options in Utah covers the rest. We've bought 1,300+ houses in Utah since 2016, hold an A+ BBB rating, and average 4.9 across 520 Google reviews. When you're ready, get your cash offer and we'll call you back within one business day.