Define Heir

Show Table of Contents

EstateExec generically uses the term heir for someone who will inherit from the estate (see Determining Heirs for more information, and note that heirs may include charities or other organizations).

Create an Heir

To record information about an heir,

On the Heirs tab, click the "Create Heir" button to add a row to the table.
Click each cell in a given heir's row to record relevant information. The key items to enter are Name, Relationship, and Residuary % (if applicable - see Residuary Distribution Details below).
Tip: For now, ignore the Estimated $ column, which calculates the value of a given heir's share of the residuary estate. EstateExec will automatically keep this updated as you enter more information about assets, debts, transactions, etc.

Heir Distribution Columns

After you have defined some estate distributions (you can create distributions on the Assets, Cashflow, or Distributions Tabs... whatever is easiest for you), you will see summaries of those distributions in the Heirs table, partitioned for each heir into 3 main categories:

Bequests: Grants listed in the will of specific property, such as the grant of a vehicle or a house to one or more heirs, or the grant of a particular sum of money.
Automatic Transfers: Assets which by law transfer automatically to the new owner(s), such as life insurance policies or retirement funds with named beneficiaries, real estate owned with right of survivorship, transfer-on-death bank accounts, etc.
Residuary Distributions ("Allocated"): Distributions of the residuary estate (the residuary estate is what remains of the estate after all debts have been resolved, bequests fulfilled, and automatic transfers performed).

To see the individual distributions for any of these distribution types for a particular heir (e.g., Bequests to Sally), click on the corresponding table cell, and a popup dialog will take you to the Distributions Tab with filters appropriately set to see just those distributions.

Residuary Distribution Details

The Residuary % column allows you to specify the percentage (if any) of the residuary estate that a given heir should inherit. This percentage should come directly from the will, or if there is no will, from the estate province's intestate succession statutes.

Once you specify a Residuary % an heir is entitled to receive, EstateExec will automatically calculate the Expected $ implied by that percentage. For example, if an heir is entitled to 25% of the residuary estate, and the residuary estate is worth $100K, then the Expected $ would be $25K.

It's important to note, however, that Expected $ does not attempt to predict the future, accounting for administration expenses not yet recorded, future market value fluctuations, or any other factors still to be determined — it's just a "simple" calculation using the inputs you have entered. See details ↧

As the preceding example shows, it's easy to calculate an expected residuary amount at the end of the settlement process, when everything is known, and all financial activities completed: just calculate the residuary estate by summing the current values of the remaining assets, and multiply that sum by an heir's residuary percentage.

Earlier in the process, however, in order to calculate the residuary estate it's necessary to sum the current values of estate assets, subtract any remaining debts (assuming these will be paid), subtract any planned future non-residuary distributions, and add back in any residuary distributions that may have already been made. Don't worry, though: EstateExec does all that for you automatically.

If you are early in the process and want to try to refine these residuary estimates, you can, for example, temporarily create a Debt to represent anticipated future estate expenses, which EstateExec will then automatically account for in its residuary calculations.

Once you have defined some distributions, the Allocated $ column will show the amount you have allocated to this heir from the residuary estate (i.e., the distributions you have created for this heir with the Reason "Residuary")

You can compare the Expected $ and Allocated $ columns to help you plan your asset distributions, to ensure everyone gets the correct amounts. You can also see graphical representations of this information on the Overview Tab.

Heirs Table Notes

Here are a few helpful things to know about the Heirs table :

Allocated $: EstateExec will show the amount you have allocated to this heir via distributions with Residuary listed as the reason. We label this "Allocated $" because there's not really room in the table to more precisely call it "Value of Defined Residuary Distributions".
Automatic Transfers: EstateExec will show the amount you have allocated to this heir via distributions with Automatic listed as the reason (typically, for distributions of life insurance or retirement funds with named beneficiaries).
Bequest: EstateExec will show the amount you have allocated to this heir via distributions with Bequest listed as the reason (for specific grants listed in the will).
Estimated $: EstateExec will automatically calculate and show the estimated amount an heir should receive from the residuary estate, based upon estate details and the Residuary % specified for that heir (see Residuary Distribution Details above).
Relation: The relationship between the decedent and an heir is important in certain jurisdictions, where it can impact taxes that may be associated with the inheritance (and which the estate may have to pay).
Residuary %: Enter the percentage of the residuary estate that a given heir is supposed to inherit (if any).
SIN: You will likely need heir social insurance numbers for various government filings, but it is not required that you enter them here if you would prefer not to. You can optionally choose to display the SIN column by checking "SIN" in the menu in the top right of the table.

See Making Distributions for a discussion of estate distributions in general, and EstateExec Reference: Manage Distributions for details on defining distributions when using EstateExec.

See also Using Tables for an illustration of many things you can do with EstateExec tables in general.