Connecticut Estate Accounting: An Executor's Guide

The PC-2407 inventory and the PC-246 financial report

Connecticut's word for the closing document is usually financial report, not accounting. Rule 36.1 of the Probate Court Rules of Procedure lets a fiduciary account by submitting a financial report instead of a full account, and the Probate Court Administrator's User Guide says at Step 8: "In most cases, the simpler financial report, Financial Report/Decedent's Estate, PC-246, can be used." The fuller alternative is PC-242, the Decedent's Estate Administration Account (Short Form).

The inventory comes first. Step 4 of the same guide: "File Inventory, PC-2407, within two months of appointment as fiduciary." It lists solely owned property at date-of-death fair market value, which is also your accounting's opening figure, since rule 36.14(a)(1) sets fiduciary acquisition value at that same number. Connecticut lists a second inventory form, PC-440, alongside PC-2407 with no deprecation notice on either — it is still a valid filing vehicle, and the two bodies are nearly identical. The User Guide names PC-2407 for decedents' estates, so that is the shape to work from.

A full account is required instead only when the court orders one, or when principal and income must be accounted for separately (rule 36.3). Rule 38.1(b) triggers that when the will funds a trust with differing income and principal interests, creates a life interest in intangible personal property, or the surviving spouse elects against the will (C.G.S. § 45a-436). Those are will-reading questions for the estate's attorney.

Connecticut probate deadlines, with the citation for each

The inventory is generally due within two months, and the court can extend it to four months from qualification for cause (§ 45a-341). The statute runs from acceptance of the bond or other qualification of the fiduciary; the form says date of appointment. Connecticut real estate also brings a land-records notice (PC-251) to the town clerk of each town where the property sits, generally within two months (§ 45a-322).

Creditors get 150 days from the appointment of the first fiduciary. After that, § 45a-356(a) generally lets you pay claims and make good-faith distributions without personal liability for claims presented later. It is typically a safe harbor rather than an absolute bar: a late claim can still reach beneficiaries under § 45a-368. Confirm the operative date, and whether it is safe to distribute, with the estate's attorney. Within 60 days after the period ends, you generally file the Return of Claims and List of Notified Creditors, PC-237 (§ 45a-361).

A Connecticut estate tax return is generally due six months after death for every estate, even when no tax is owed (§ 12-392): CT-706 NT to the Probate Court for nontaxable estates, CT-706/709 to the Department of Revenue Services for taxable ones, with a copy to the court. Probate court fees then start accruing 0.5% monthly interest 30 days after that due date if the return has not been filed (§ 45a-107).

The report itself has no fixed deadline, and three sources frame it differently. Rule 30.19(a) is event-triggered: it goes in when settlement of the estate is complete, or when you resign or are removed. Form PC-286 prints its own expectation, "The financial report or account is due within 15 months of the appointment of the fiduciary," which no statute or rule anchors, and the User Guide says usually within 12 months of death. With nothing filed, rule 30.21 generally wants a status update three months after your first appointment anniversary, then yearly.

What Connecticut pays an executor

There is no fee schedule. No executor percentage appears in Connecticut's statutes or the Probate Court rules. Executors get reasonable compensation under common law (Hayward v. Plant, 98 Conn. 374, 119 A. 341 (1923)), and rule 39 requires the court to decide whether fiduciary fees are reasonable when it reviews the report or account, whether or not anyone objects. You may ask the court to approve a fee arrangement before the work (rule 39.1). Percentages you hear locally are custom, not law. The court may ask for a task statement addressing the nine Hayward factors (rule 39.2), so keep a record of the work behind the number — and keep your fee separate from your costs: PC-246 prints "Fiduciary fees:" and "Fiduciary disbursements:" on separate lines.

How a Connecticut estate closes

You file the final report (PC-246) or account (PC-242), send a copy to every party and attorney, and certify on the form that you did. Each beneficiary is asked to sign a waiver of the right to a hearing, PC-244A for a report and PC-245 for an account; with waivers the court can approve without anyone appearing. After approval and the order of distribution, you distribute exactly as approved and keep proof. If the court directs it, the Affidavit of Closing of Estate (PC-213) follows within 30 days after the last assets go out.

Know what those waivers do not do: neither releases anyone. The release runs to you, not to them — and only by decree: when the court approves the report it may enter a decree releasing you and any bond sureties from further liability for the items shown (§ 45a-176). PC-246's request clause is where you ask for it. Beneficiaries stay liable up to the value of what they received for the estate's unpaid expenses, taxes and claims (§ 45a-368), within the limits of §§ 45a-369 and 45a-370, and generally until the earlier of two years from death or the claim's own limitation period (§ 45a-375).

What only you can supply

Real property is the one section Connecticut nets: address, the decedent's interest, fair market value, unpaid mortgage balance, and net value, reported as zero if the mortgage is higher. Attach a copy of the recorded deed. Everything else stays gross, so a car loan is not netted against the car. Only you can give each vehicle's year, make, model and VIN, each bank account's last four digits, and per-security detail for a brokerage account, where the honest move is to attach the date-of-death holdings statement. Leave off real property outside Connecticut, joint property with rights of survivorship, and beneficiary-designated assets. A tenant-in-common fractional share is included.

On the report, the will-section column, the fair market value of in-kind distributions on their distribution date (rule 37.4(a)) — unless every beneficiary in the class takes a proportionate share of each asset, when fiduciary acquisition value may be shown instead (rule 37.4(b)) — the PC-237 claims total, the reserve, the court name and district number, and the certification's recipient list are yours. The arithmetic is not. A financial report also need not balance the way an account must (rule 36.2(3)), while a PC-242 account foots section 1 against section 2 and carries a cash reconciliation that balances on its own (rule 38.5(b)).

Where ExecutorLedger fits

ExecutorLedger keeps the ledger and builds the documents from it. Recording is free for as long as the estate takes, and the Connecticut documents, an inventory shaped like PC-2407 and a financial report shaped like PC-246, preview free with your real numbers. $149 once per estate lifts the watermark. They are court-style documents, not court forms, laid out to be transcribed line for line onto the official PC forms the Probate Courts publish free at ctprobate.gov. The estate's attorney should read the report before it is filed.

Questions Connecticut executors ask