The Administration of Estates Act is crucial in protecting the wishes and the interests of the surviving spouses, children and relatives of the deceased persons. The Act regulate the rights of beneficiaries under mutual wills made by any two or more persons and also provides procedures that need to be followed before liquidation and distribution of the deceased estates to beneficiaries.
When someone dies within the borders of the Republic of South Africa and the deceased person had a valid Will, even if the deceased person had no Will, his/her death need to be reported to the Master of the High Court by the surviving spouse or spouses if he/she had more than one spouse, if he/she had no surviving spouse/s, by his/her nearest relatives residing in the area of the court where the deceased lived, within 14 days after the death.
Even if the deceased person died outside the borders of the Republic of South Africa, and the deceased had property or document purporting to be a Will death notice must be reported to the Master of the High Court where the deceased lived within 14 days after the death occurred.
Any person who signs a death notice and was not present at the death or did not identify deceased after death, must provide any information required by the Master of the High Court to prove the death.
Usually most Wills contain a clause in which an executor is nominated. The fact that the person has been nominated in a Will by the testator does not automatically become the executor upon the testator's death, he/she must be formally be appointed in terms of the letter of executorship which are only issued by the Master of the High Court after submitting:
If these requirements are met, the Master issues letters of executorship to the nominated person, provided the Master accepts the Will as valid and that the nominated person is capable of acting as executor.
If the gross value of an estate is R250 000 or less, the Master has a choice. He can either appoint an executor to administer the estate in accordance with the provisions of the Administration of Estates Act, or give directions to a person or persons of his choice to finalise the estate in a fast and simple manner. Such directions are known as a section 18(3)-appointment and may be given even if an executor has been nominated in the will.
The Master of the High Court must grant a letter of executorship on the written application of any person, who has been nominated as executor by any deceased person's Will which has been registered and accepted in the office of the Master and is not incapacitated from being an executor of the estate of the deceased and has complied with the provisions of the Act.
Immediately after letters of executorship have been granted to an executor, the executor must place a notices in terms of section 29, in the Government Gazette and in a local newspaper circulating in the district in which the deceased resided at the time of his death. If he also resided in another district during the twelve months preceding his death, the notice must also appear in a newspaper circulating in that district.
In the notice all estate creditors are requested to submit their claims to the administrator’s given address within 30 days after the last publication of the notice. It is customary in the same notice to request debtors to pay their debts to the estate.
A surviving spouse’s claim for accrual against the estate of the deceased spouse must, like any other claim, be lodged with the executor and proved by the creditor, eg by the surviving spouse, her-/himself. A claim for accrual in favour of a deceased spouse’s estate against the surviving spouse should of course be taken care of by the executor.
An executor must, as soon as he or she has in hand moneys in the estate in excess of R1 000, open a cheque account in the name of the estate with a bank in the Republic and shall deposit therein the moneys which he or she has in hand and such other moneys as he or she may from time to time receive for the estate and may open a savings account in the name of the estate with a bank and may transfer thereto so much of the moneys deposited in the account as is not immediately required for the payment of any claim against the estate.
The executor may place so much of the moneys deposited in the account, as is not immediately required for the payment of any claim against the estate on interest-bearing deposit with a bank.
Every executor shall whenever required by the Master to do so, notify the Master in writing of the bank and the office or branch thereof with which he or she has opened an account, and furnish the Master with a bank statement or other sufficient evidence of the position of the account.
If any person dies within the Republic or if any person ordinarily resident in the Republic at the time of his or her death dies outside the Republic leaving any property therein, the surviving spouse of such person or more than one surviving spouse jointly, or if there is no surviving spouse, his or her nearest relative or connection residing in the district in which such person was ordinarily resident at the time of his or her death, shall, within fourteen days after the death or within such further period as the Master may allow make an inventory in the prescribed form, in the presence of such persons having an interest in the estate as heirs as may attend, of all property known by him to have belonged, at the time of the death to the deceased; or in the case of the death of one of two or more spouses married in community of property, to the joint estate of the deceased and such surviving spouse; or in the case of the death of one of two or more persons referred to in section thirty-seven, to the massed estate concerned;
Any person required to make an inventory shall include therein a list specifying all immovable property registered in the name of the deceased or in which he knows that the deceased had any interest at the date of his death and all particulars known to such person, concerning any such property or interest.