If you are serving as the personal representative of a Florida estate than you will have to serve known or reasonably ascertainable creditors with something called a notice of administration. What happens if you forget one? That is the question the Florida Supreme Court addressed in a semi-recent case,Jones v. Golden. How long do creditors in Florida have to file a notice of a claim on the estate?
Notice to Creditors
- Florida personal representatives need to give notice to known reasonably ascertainable creditors.
- How do Florida probate lawyers know an estate’s creditors?
- Some parts of it are just common sense.
- Relatives know what credit cards the decedent used and other debt is relatively easy to find.
- Estate attorneys Florida also know it is not uncommon for utility companies and others to post claims on the docket of the estate.
- How long do creditors have to make a claim?
- Florida probate attorneys know this depends on a few factors.
- Personal representatives in Florida should make sure to serve known creditors with a notice of administration.
- Then what is the time limit?
- Read the notice!
- So what happens when someone does not get served with the notice?
- How long do they have to make a claim?
Jones v. Golden
- This was an interesting probate case that made it all the way to the Florida Supreme Court in late 2015.
- The guardian for the estate’s former wife made a statement of claim against his estate claiming that the estate owed money for the guardian fees.
- Did you know Florida guardians can charge fees for their services?
- The guardian was claiming entitlement to fees pursuant to a marital settlement agreement that were due to the wife.
- The personal representative was able to strike that claim at the trial court for not being served timely.
- The problem with that was the guardian was not served with the notice of administration.
- So what did the Supreme Court have to say about this?
- The Supreme Court of Florida held that claims of known or reasonably known ascertainable creditors of an estate who were not served with a copy of the notice to creditors are timely if filed within two years of the decedent’s death.
- What does that mean?
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