Louisiana Small Succession: Affidavit, Limits, and Filing

A Louisiana small succession affidavit lets a family transfer a deceased person’s property without opening a court-supervised succession when the estate’s gross value is $125,000 or less, or when the death occurred more than 20 years ago. The affidavit is sworn before a notary, filed with the parish clerk of court, and, if real estate is involved, recorded in the parish conveyance records. No judge signs off. Banks, title companies, and other third parties are authorized by statute to release property to the heirs named in the document.¹

Who Can Use the Affidavit

Article 3421 of the Code of Civil Procedure recognizes three kinds of small successions:

A person domiciled in Louisiana at death who left property with a gross value of $125,000 or less as of the date of death.
A person domiciled outside Louisiana who left Louisiana property with a gross value of $125,000 or less at the date of death.
A person who died at least 20 years before the affidavit is executed, with no dollar cap on the property left.²

The 20-year rule is the one most people miss. If a parent or grandparent died decades ago and no succession was ever opened, the affidavit can clean up title regardless of what the property is worth today.

The dollar threshold is only half the test. Under Article 3431, the affidavit is available only when the successors are the decedent’s descendants, ascendants, siblings or their descendants, a surviving spouse, or legatees under a will.³ If property passes to anyone outside those categories, the family has to open a judicial succession even if the estate is small.

The process works for both intestate estates and estates with a valid will. When there is a will, a certified copy is attached to the affidavit; if the will was probated in another state, a copy of that probate order goes in as well.⁴

Which Assets Count Toward the $125,000

The cap looks at gross value, meaning the total before subtracting debts, and it counts only assets that would actually pass through the succession. That distinction changes the answer for many families.

Included: real estate titled solely in the decedent’s name, bank accounts without a joint owner or payable-on-death beneficiary, vehicles titled in the decedent’s name alone, and personal belongings like furniture, jewelry, and tools.

Excluded: life insurance with a named beneficiary, retirement accounts with a designated beneficiary, jointly held property with rights of survivorship, and property in a trust. Those assets pass outside the succession and do not count toward the threshold.

What the Affidavit Has to Say

The affidavit replaces the court judgment that would ordinarily transfer property to heirs, so it has to contain enough information to stand on its own.

Intestate Estates

Article 3432 requires the affidavit to include:

The decedent’s date of death and domicile at the time of death.
Marital status, last residence, the surviving spouse’s name and address if any, and the names and addresses of all heirs.
A description of every asset, marked as community or separate property. Real estate descriptions must be detailed enough to transfer title.
The value of each item and the total aggregate value at the date of death.
Each heir’s percentage interest, and whether the surviving spouse holds a usufruct.⁵

At least two people must sign. When a surviving spouse exists, the spouse signs along with at least one competent adult heir. With no surviving spouse, two heirs sign. If only one heir exists, a second person with firsthand knowledge of the facts also signs.⁵

Testate Estates

Article 3432.1 asks for the same information, plus the names and addresses of all legatees and a certified copy of the will. Any legatee who does not sign must be given ten days’ notice by U.S. mail of the intent to execute the affidavit, and the affidavit must state that the legatee did not object.⁴ Each signer swears under penalty of perjury that the information is true, correct, and complete.

Either version has to be sworn before a notary or another officer authorized to administer oaths.

Filing and Recording

The completed affidavit is filed with the clerk of court in the parish where the decedent was domiciled or where the property is located. No judge reviews it. If real estate is involved, a copy of the affidavit also has to be recorded in the conveyance records of the parish where the property sits, and that recording is what puts the world on notice that the property belongs to the heirs.¹

Filing fees vary by parish. Expect several hundred dollars depending on the parish clerk’s schedule and whether immovable property is involved; recording fees in the conveyance records are separate from the initial filing fee.

What the Affidavit Actually Does

A properly executed affidavit carries real weight. Banks, financial institutions, corporations, and anyone else holding the decedent’s property are authorized to release money or deliver assets to the heirs or legatees named in it, and those third parties are legally protected for doing so. No creditor, heir, or succession representative can sue them for honoring it.¹

For real estate, a recorded affidavit is admissible in any later property dispute and serves as presumptive proof of the facts inside it, including the identity of the heirs and their shares. Anyone who claims to be a successor but was not named in the affidavit has only two years from the date it was recorded to challenge a good-faith purchaser of the property.¹

Debts, Forced Heirship, and Shares

Using the affidavit does not erase the decedent’s debts. Universal successors are liable to creditors in proportion to their share of the inheritance, but only up to the value of the property they received, measured at the time they received it.⁶ An heir who receives nothing cannot be pursued at all. If the decedent owed $80,000 and an heir received $50,000 in property, creditors can reach that heir for up to $50,000 of the debt.

Forced heirship is the other trap. Louisiana guarantees a share of the estate to children who are 23 or younger at the time of the parent’s death, and to children of any age who cannot care for themselves or manage their affairs due to a permanent mental or physical condition.⁷ One forced heir is entitled to one-quarter of the estate; two or more collectively receive one-half.⁸ A will that tries to cut a forced heir out without legal justification invites a challenge, and a contested estate cannot use the affidavit process.

Shares also trip up families in intestate cases involving community property. The surviving spouse already owns half of the community property outright. The decedent’s half passes to descendants if there are any, with the surviving spouse holding a usufruct over that half until death or remarriage. If the decedent left no descendants, the surviving spouse inherits the decedent’s community share in full ownership.⁹ A surviving spouse does not automatically inherit the decedent’s separate property when the decedent left children, parents, or siblings, and this is the point where affidavits most commonly misstate who inherits what.

When the Affidavit Won’t Work

Several situations rule the process out even when the dollar threshold is met:

Heirs disagree about who inherits what. The affidavit depends on cooperation. Disputes have to be resolved in a judicial succession.
A court-supervised succession has already been opened. Once that happens, the affidavit is off the table.
The will does not meet Louisiana’s formal requirements, or its terms would not produce a clear distribution among legatees.
The gross value of succession assets exceeds $125,000, and the death was not more than 20 years ago.

Families who start the affidavit and then discover the estate is more complicated can still switch to a judicial succession. In the other direction, if a judicial succession has been opened and the estate turns out to qualify as small, the court may allow it to continue under the simplified rules. Accuracy is the risk factor: an affidavit with wrong heir information or an incomplete property description can create title defects that cost more to fix later than a full succession would have cost up front.

Taxes

Louisiana repealed its inheritance tax effective January 1, 2012, so no state tax is owed on property passing through a succession.¹⁰ Federal estate tax is also irrelevant at this level; the 2026 federal exemption is $15 million per individual.¹¹

Capital gains are the one area where an heir may owe something later. Inherited property gets a stepped-up basis equal to its fair market value at the date of death, so a subsequent sale is measured against that value rather than what the decedent originally paid.¹² That benefit applies to property passing through a small succession the same way it applies to any other inheritance.

1
Justia. Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure Art. 3434 – Endorsed Copy of Affidavit Authority for Payment or Delivery of Property
2
Justia. Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure Art. 3421 – Small Successions Defined
3
FindLaw. Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure Art. 3431 – Small Successions Judicial Opening Unnecessary
4
FindLaw. Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure Art. 3432.1 – Affidavit for Small Succession for a Person Domiciled in Louisiana Who Died Testate
5
Justia. Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure Art. 3432 – Affidavit for Small Succession for a Person Who Died Intestate Contents
6
Louisiana State Legislature. Louisiana Civil Code Art. 1416 – Liability of Universal Successors to Creditors
7
Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Art. 1493 – Forced Heirs
8
Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Art. 1495 – Amount of Forced Portion
9
Louisiana State Legislature. Louisiana Civil Code Articles 889-890
10
Louisiana Department of Revenue. Inheritance and Estate Transfer Taxes
11
Internal Revenue Service. What’s New Estate and Gift Tax
12
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 U.S. Code 1014 – Basis of Property Acquired From a Decedent