Iowa small-estate limit: $200,000

Filing in Iowa

Filing in Iowa: the 40-day affidavit or the small-estate petition

The $200,000 limit above belongs to Iowa’s court route. An estate made up only of personal property worth $100,000 or less may not need the court at all: it can be collected by affidavit. Real estate, or personal property worth more than that, means a court filing.

Collecting personal property by affidavit (Iowa Code 633.356)

When the decedent’s probate assets are personal property only, with no interest in real estate, and their gross value is $100,000 or less (or has been at any point since the death), a successor may collect them by affidavit once 40 days have passed since the death. The affidavit goes to whoever holds the property, such as a bank or a broker, not to the court, and no letters of appointment are issued. A successor is the person entitled under the will or, where there is none, under Iowa’s intestacy law; when the decedent received Medicaid, the Iowa Medicaid agency is a successor too.

Sworn under penalty of perjury, the affidavit states, among other things:

• The decedent’s name, Social Security number, and date and place of death, with a certified copy of the death certificate attached to show that the 40 days have run.
• That the probate assets are personal property only, with no real estate interest, within the $100,000 limit.
• What is to go to whom, with each successor’s name, address, tax identification number and relationship to the decedent, and whether any of them is under a legal disability.
• Where there is a will, that the attached copy is the last will and has been delivered to the clerk of the district court.
• That any Medicaid reimbursement owed to the Department of Health and Human Services, and any creditors, will be paid out of what the affidavit collects.

The holder can ask to see the decedent’s own evidence of ownership, such as a share certificate, and can require a bond if it is missing; it can also ask for reasonable proof of each successor’s identity.

The limit was $50,000, with no real property, until House File 2660 (2026 Iowa Acts, signed April 16, 2026) raised it to $100,000 from July 1, 2026. The printed Iowa Code 2026 edition, published before that session, still shows the old figure, and the act names no date-of-death cutoff.

The small-estate petition and what it states (Iowa Code 635.2)

An estate that owns Iowa real estate, or holds more personal property than the affidavit allows, can use the court route when the gross value of its Iowa probate assets is $200,000 or less. A petition opens it in the District Court (Probate), and the clerk then issues letters to the personal representative. The Iowa Judicial Branch keeps its forms in one court-forms index; filter it to the Probate category for the current Iowa packet, and ask the clerk of the county where the estate is opened how it takes the filing. Neither Iowa route takes a small-estate affidavit form written for another state’s law. The petition states:

1. Who died: the decedent’s name, domicile and date of death.
2. The surviving spouse’s name and address.
3. Where there is no will, each heir the petitioner knows of, by name and relationship.
4. Whether there is a will, and if so the date it was signed.
5. That the gross value of the decedent’s probate assets under Iowa jurisdiction is not over the section 635.1 limit, with a rough figure for the personal property and income, which the court uses to set the bond.
6. The proposed personal representative’s name and address.

The inventory can move the estate from one route to the other (Iowa Code 635.7)

Once appointed, the personal representative files the report and inventory that section 633.361 calls for. It covers probate and nonprobate assets alike, but it must also pick out the Iowa probate assets and give their gross value as a separate total. That separate total is the figure held against $200,000: not the whole inventory, and not a number reduced by the debts.

The test keeps working after the estate opens. A small estate whose inventory shows more than the limit carries on as a regular chapter 633 administration, and a regular administration whose inventory shows the limit or less becomes a small estate once the personal representative files a statement saying so. On either report the clerk makes the switch without a court order; anyone else who wants the estate moved has to apply to the court and show good cause.

Read on November 3, 2026 at the Iowa Legislature’s site: Iowa Code 633.356, 635.2 and 635.7 (Iowa Code 2026), and House File 2660 as enrolled. Of the sections cited here, that act amended only 633.356; neither 635.2 nor 635.7 was amended in the 2026 session.

How the Iowa screen is measured

Chapter 635 imposes no fixed post-death waiting period before the clerk issues letters; eligibility turns on the gross-value cap, not on elapsed days. Section 635.1 states no waiting period. Before submitting the paperwork, confirm whether a waiting period applies and which event starts it. Check: Iowa Code 635.1

The Iowa caveats that can change this answer are listed once, on the Iowa overview.

The official Iowa path

• Iowa Judicial Branch - Court Forms — Iowa Judicial Branch
• Iowa Judicial Branch - Representing Yourself — Iowa Judicial Branch

What a small-estate screen can and cannot decide, and which assets never enter it, is explained once in small-estate affidavit or probate and what counts as a probate asset.