Maryland Register of Wills Estate Accounts: Schedules, Balancing, and Filing

To file an estate account with the Maryland Register of Wills, a personal representative prepares a schedule-based accounting of every dollar that moved through the estate during the reporting period, backs each entry with a voucher, signs and serves the document on interested persons, and submits it to the Register of Wills within nine months of appointment and at set intervals after that until the estate closes.

When This Process Applies

Formal accounts are a regular-estate requirement. If the decedent’s property subject to administration is $50,000 or less — or $100,000 or less when the surviving spouse is the sole heir — the estate qualifies for small estate procedures under Maryland Code, Estates and Trusts § 5-601, which carry fewer requirements and generally no court involvement.¹² Everything that follows applies to regular estates above those thresholds.

Deadlines You Need to Pin Down First

The initial account is due within nine months of the date you were appointed personal representative.³ Each subsequent account is due at the earlier of six months after the prior account is approved or nine months after the prior account was filed, and the cycle continues until a final account closes the estate.⁴

Put these dates on a calendar the day you’re appointed. Delinquent estates get referred to the Orphans’ Court, which can issue a show cause order and, in serious cases, remove the personal representative.⁵

What to Gather Before You Start the Form

The starting point for every account is paperwork you already have. Maryland Rule 6-417 requires the initial account to report the total value of property shown on all inventories filed before the account date, so pull your filed inventory first.⁴ Assets discovered after that inventory go into the account as additional receipts rather than triggering a fresh appraisal.

For every payment the estate made, you need a voucher. That’s any written proof the debt was paid: a funeral home receipt, a utility invoice marked paid, a bond premium statement, a cancelled check. The Register of Wills audits each disbursement against these documents and the figures have to match exactly.

Pull monthly bank statements for every estate account and keep cancelled checks where you can get them. Then check the claims docket at the Register of Wills office to confirm which debts have been filed against the estate, since the account needs to show that valid claims were satisfied before any beneficiary received a distribution. Organizing all of this before you open the form is what keeps the audit short.

Filling In the Account

Maryland does not use a single pre-printed account form. The Register of Wills publishes a Sample Guide for Filing Accounts that serves as the working template, available from the Publications section of the Register of Wills website or at the courthouse where the estate was opened.⁶⁵ The account is organized into numbered schedules, each covering a different category of financial activity.

Schedule 1: Beginning Balance

Schedule 1 establishes what the estate started with. On a first account, that’s the date-of-death value of assets solely owned by the decedent, or held as a tenant in common, as reported on all inventories filed with the Register of Wills.⁶ On a subsequent account, Schedule 1 carries forward the balance retained from the previous account’s Schedule 7.

Receipts: Income, Gains, and After-Discovered Assets

The account must itemize all receipts during the accounting period. Rule 6-417 breaks them into three categories: principal receipts not included in the inventory, gains or losses from sales and other transactions involving estate assets, and income such as rent, dividends, and interest.⁴ Verify every figure against bank records. Small discrepancies in interest or dividends are a common reason accounts stall at audit.

Schedule 5: Disbursements

Schedule 5 lists every payment the personal representative made during the period. Allowable expenses include funeral costs, family allowance, debts owed by the decedent at death, bond premiums, publication costs, bank service charges, federal and state estate taxes, fiduciary income taxes, expenses from selling estate assets, court costs and probate fees, attorney’s fees, and personal representative commissions.⁶ Each entry needs a corresponding voucher or receipt number so the Register of Wills can verify it.

If the estate doesn’t have enough assets to pay all claims in full, Maryland law sets a strict payment priority. Register of Wills fees come first, then administration costs, funeral expenses, personal representative and attorney compensation, family allowance, unpaid child support, taxes, last-illness medical expenses, and then all other claims.⁷ Your disbursements should reflect that you followed that order.

Schedule 6: Distributions to Beneficiaries

Schedule 6 covers all distributions made to beneficiaries during the accounting period, plus any proposed distributions that will go out within 30 days after the order approving the account becomes final.⁶ Each distribution must be itemized with the beneficiary’s name and the assets distributed, and the account must state the inheritance tax due on each one.⁴

Schedule 7: Assets Retained

If the account is not a final account, Schedule 7 reports the value of assets still held in the estate for the next accounting, with a brief explanation of why they’re being retained.⁴ On a final account, this balance must be zero, since every asset should be distributed or disbursed.⁶

Making the Numbers Balance

The total of all receipts, meaning the beginning balance plus income and gains, must equal the total of disbursements, distributions, and assets retained. Rule 6-417 requires the account to show both the total gross value of the estate’s assets to be accounted for and the total amount of the estate accounted for, and those numbers must match.⁴ If they don’t balance, work back through the bank statements transaction by transaction until you find the gap. A common culprit is interest or bank fees that accrued but weren’t recorded.

Signing, Serving, and Submitting

Once the account is ready, all personal representatives must sign it, along with the estate’s attorney if one is involved. The filing package includes a verification signed by all personal representatives and a certificate of service confirming that notice of the account was sent to all interested persons.⁶ Submit the completed package to the Register of Wills office by mail or hand delivery.

What Happens After You File

The Register of Wills audits the figures against your supporting vouchers. If the audit is successful, the court issues an order approving the account, and interested persons receive notice that they may file exceptions.

An interested person who disagrees with the account has 20 days after the court’s approval order is docketed to file formal exceptions. Exceptions must lay out specific grounds in reasonable detail; a vague complaint that the numbers “look wrong” won’t suffice. A copy must also be served on the personal representative. The court then schedules a hearing and notifies the personal representative and other relevant parties of the date, time, and place.⁴ If no exceptions are timely filed, the approval order becomes final and the account is closed.

Closing the Estate With a Final Account

When all debts are paid and assets are ready for distribution, file a final account. Title it clearly, typically “First and Final Account” if only one account is needed, or “Second and Final Account” if an interim account was previously filed.⁸

Before filing, review the claims docket at the Register of Wills office to confirm that every claim against the estate has been paid, settled, or formally disallowed.⁶ An unresolved claim will prevent the estate from closing. Schedule 7 should show a zero balance. Once the court approves the final account and no exceptions are filed within the 20-day window, the estate closes permanently and no additional filings are required.⁸

1
Maryland General Assembly. Maryland Code Estates and Trusts 5-601
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The Office of the Register of Wills. Small Estates
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The Office of the Register of Wills. Deadlines and Time Limitations
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New York Codes, Rules and Regulations. Maryland Rules, Rule 6-417 – Accounts
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The Office of the Register of Wills. Administration of Estates
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Maryland Register of Wills. Sample Guide for Filing Accounts
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New York Codes, Rules and Regulations. Maryland Code Estates and Trusts 8-105 – Priority of Claims
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Maryland Register of Wills. Sample Guide for Filing Accounts