What Happens to a Nevada House When the Owner Dies Without a Will

Trusts & Estates · Updated September 2026

Your parent died. There is no will. And everyone keeps telling you the house has to go through probate.

Sometimes that is true. Very often it is not, and the answer turns on one thing almost nobody thinks to check first: how the deed was written.

The deed decides, not the will

People assume a will controls what happens to a house. In Nevada, the way title is vested on the recorded deed usually decides it first — and it can pass the property outside a will entirely, or outside probate altogether.

So before anyone spends money on a court process, the sensible step is to read the recorded deed and see what it actually says.

The four situations, and what each one needs

1. Title was held with a right of survivorship

If the deed says joint tenants, or community property with right of survivorship, the surviving owner already owns it. Nothing passes through the estate. You record an Affidavit of Death of Joint Tenant with a certified death certificate and the record is cleared. $250, no probate.

2. A Deed Upon Death was recorded

If your parent recorded a Deed Upon Death naming a beneficiary, the property passes to that person outside probate. The beneficiary records a Death of Grantor Affidavit. $250.

3. The house was in a living trust

If the property was properly deeded into a trust, the trust controls it and probate does not apply. The successor trustee records an Affidavit of Successor Trustee to go onto title. $250. The catch is whether the funding deed was ever recorded — plenty of trusts hold nothing at all.

4. None of the above — the house is part of the estate

If title was in your parent’s name alone with no survivorship and no recorded Deed Upon Death, the property is part of the estate and a court process is required. That is a probate matter for an attorney, not a document preparer, and we will tell you so plainly.

What about the small estate affidavit?

Nevada has a small estate affidavit that lets someone collect a modest estate without probate — up to $25,000, or $100,000 for a surviving spouse. It is genuinely useful for bank accounts, final paychecks and vehicles.

But it cannot be used where there is real property. The person who died must leave no house, no land and no interest in one anywhere in Nevada. That single requirement rules it out for most families asking about a parent’s home, and it is the most common misunderstanding we hear.

Without a will, who inherits?

Where the property genuinely is part of the estate, Nevada’s intestate succession rules decide who receives it — generally the spouse and children, in proportions set by statute. How that applies to a particular family is a legal question, and it is one for an attorney rather than for us.

What it costs to find out

• Retrieve the recorded deed and read the vesting — $30
• Affidavit of Death of Joint Tenant — $250
• Death of Grantor Affidavit — $250
• Affidavit of Successor Trustee — $250
• Small estate affidavit, where no real property is involved — $500

Thirty dollars is usually the difference between guessing and knowing. It is worth spending before anyone says the word probate.

TruPoint LLC is not a law firm and does not give legal advice. We prepare documents at your direction. Probate, contested estates and questions about who inherits are matters for a Nevada attorney.