Can You Sell a House Before Probate?

You can put a house on the market and agree a sale before probate is granted, but exchange of contracts and completion wait for the grant in practice, because the buyer’s conveyancer needs it to see that the executors can transfer the house. Most of the work that makes a quick sale possible can still be done in the meantime.

The house is usually the largest asset in the estate, and it costs money every month it sits empty.

What Executors Can Do Before the Grant

GOV.UK’s probate guidance is plain about it: “You should not make any financial plans or put property on the market until you’ve got probate.” The risk is that a sale agreed too early falls apart while the family waits.

You will usually get probate within 12 weeks of applying, and longer if the registry needs more information, and that clock only starts once any inheritance tax account has gone to HMRC and the application is in. A buyer who has sold their own home, or whose mortgage offer has an expiry date, may not wait that long.

Some executors market the house anyway and tell every buyer the grant is still outstanding. That can work with a patient buyer who has no chain. Where I am involved, I usually suggest a different use of the waiting time, so the house can go on sale the week the grant arrives:

• clear the house and deal with the contents
• get the date-of-death value from an estate agent or chartered surveyor, which the official valuation guidance accepts for property, and ask two or three agents what they would list it at today
• find the title deeds and check the Land Registry title is in the name you expect
• choose the agent and the conveyancer, so the contract pack is ready
• order extra official copies of the grant when you apply, at £2 each with the application against £16 each afterwards, because the buyer’s conveyancer will want one

The date-of-death value goes on the probate application, and it is also the figure for inheritance tax and the starting point for any capital gains tax, so I would not settle for a rough figure. The probate valuation guide goes through how that figure is reached.

Why Exchange and Completion Wait for the Grant

When a house is owned by one person who has died, nobody can prove the authority to transfer it until the court confirms who the personal representatives are. GOV.UK’s guidance on updating property records says that on a sale to a third party the executors must provide the buyer with an official copy of the grant of probate, and send the original or an official copy to HM Land Registry with the transfer. Without it the buyer’s conveyancer cannot register the buyer as the new owner, and a lender will not usually release a mortgage without it.

So a buyer’s conveyancer will not exchange contracts, the point at which the sale becomes binding, until the grant has been seen.

How Long a Sale Takes Once the Grant Arrives

There is no waiting period once the grant is issued, and you can sell straight away.

How long it then takes depends almost entirely on where the sale stands. If a buyer is already agreed, with searches back and a mortgage offer in place, exchange can follow once the conveyancers have checked the grant.

If the house only goes on the market after the grant, you are looking at a normal sale from listing to completion: finding a buyer, their mortgage, their searches and any chain above or below them. There is no standard figure for that, and I would be wary of anyone who quotes you one before they have seen the house and the buyer.

An empty house with a clear title, a contract pack ready and copies of the grant in hand is about as simple a sale as a conveyancer sees.

Jointly Owned Houses Follow Different Rules

All of this assumes the person who died owned the house alone. Where they owned it with someone else, the type of ownership decides whether probate is needed for the house at all.

Where the owners were joint tenants, the house passes automatically to the surviving owners. It is one of the cases where probate may not be needed.

The survivor sends form DJP to HM Land Registry with an official copy of the death certificate to take the name off the register, and can then sell without any grant. The share still counts toward the estate’s value for inheritance tax.

Where the owners were tenants in common, the share does not pass to the other owner. It goes under the will or the intestacy rules, so that share is part of the estate and the executors need the grant before it can be sold or transferred. Usually the surviving co-owner and the executors sell together, and the executors’ share of the proceeds goes into the estate account.

Selling the House to a Beneficiary

Often the buyer is already in the family, and that can happen in two ways.

The first is a beneficiary taking the house as part of their share. No sale takes place: once the grant is issued the executors transfer it to the beneficiary by an assent, form AS1, sent to HM Land Registry with form AP1 and an official copy of the grant. If the house is worth more than that beneficiary’s share, they pay the difference into the estate.

The second is a beneficiary or relative buying the house from the estate. That is a sale like any other, and it should be at market value, supported by an independent valuation.

If another beneficiary later says the house went cheaply to a sibling, the executors who sold it are the ones answerable, and a written valuation is the answer to that complaint.

Where the buyer is also one of the executors, the sale can be set aside later by any beneficiary who did not agree to it, unless the will allows it or a court approves the sale, so I would want every other beneficiary to agree to the price in writing before anything is signed. The executor duties guide covers what executors are personally responsible for.

Looking After an Empty House Until It Sells

Insurance for an unoccupied property and the council tax exemption are both covered in who pays the bills while waiting for probate. Keep the house heated, secure and presentable, because a house that has been left shows it at a viewing. Do not let anyone move in without every executor agreeing, because an occupier can delay a sale for months.

Inheritance Tax Usually Comes Before the Sale

Where the estate owes inheritance tax, the tax cannot wait for the house. You cannot apply for probate until the IHT400 account is done, and you will normally start paying the tax before probate is granted.

Payment is due by the end of the sixth month after the death, as the 6-month rule for probate explains. That leaves families needing the house money to pay the tax, and the grant to sell the house.

The way out for the house is to pay its share of the tax in equal yearly instalments over 10 years. You choose this on form IHT400, the first instalment falls due at the usual six-month date, and interest is usually charged on the balance. Once the house is sold, the rest of the tax on it has to be paid in full, which is normally done from the proceeds.

Capital Gains Tax on the Sale

There is no capital gains tax on the death itself. HMRC treats the house as passing to the personal representatives at its market value on the date of death, and HMRC’s helpsheet HS282 calls that the “cost” for working out a later gain. That is normally the probate value.

If the executors sell for more than that value, the gain is taxed in the estate. Personal representatives pay 24% on gains from 6 April 2026, and the estate gets an annual allowance, £3,000 for the 2026 to 2027 tax year, in the tax year of death and the two years after.

Selling costs, including the estate agent’s and conveyancer’s fees, come off the gain. Where tax is due, the executors must report the sale within 60 days of completion using HMRC’s online service; HMRC then tells them how much to pay and how.

If the estate paid inheritance tax and the house sells for less than its probate value within 4 years of the death, the executors can claim relief for the loss on form IHT38.

Help With a House in the Estate

A house sale after a death touches every part of the administration: the valuation, the inheritance tax, the grant, the conveyancing and the capital gains return. Most of the delay I see comes from those pieces being started one after another, when they can run side by side.

My probate assistance service covers the full administration on a fixed fee of £1,880. I arrange the valuations, prepare the tax forms, apply for the grant and work alongside whichever conveyancer handles the sale, so the house is ready to sell when the grant arrives. If there is a house in the estate and you are not sure where to start, call me on 020 8669 1779 or leave your details and I will call you.