North Carolina route screening
Count personal property after liens.
Sources reviewed August 7, 2026. Latest primary-source re-fetch October 3, 2026.
The limit is $20,000, or $30,000 when the surviving spouse is the sole heir. G.S. 28A-25-1 is the intestate route: it applies when the decedent died without a will.
Threshold evidence and currency
Currency: No later session-law supersession is recorded in the reviewed source set for this threshold. The edition/currentness label below is the basis for the published figure.
Controlling citation: N.C. Gen. Stat. § 28A-25-1 — Section history through 2021-71, s. 2.3.
Verbatim threshold text from that source:
(a) When a decedent dies intestate leaving personal property, less liens and encumbrances thereon, not exceeding twenty thousand dollars ($20,000) in value, at any time after 30 days from the date of death
| Procedure | Affidavit for collection of personal property |
|---|---|
| What counts | Personal property only; real property is outside this route |
| Value basis | Value less enforceable liens and encumbrances |
| Waiting period | 30 days after death |
| Surviving-spouse ceiling | $30,000 |
The North Carolina caveats that can change this answer are listed once, on the North Carolina overview.
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.
G.S. § 28A-25-1 opens the collection-by-affidavit route where a decedent dies intestate leaving personal property, less liens and encumbrances, not exceeding twenty thousand dollars ($20,000) in value, at any time after 30 days from the date of death. The affidavit is filed with the clerk and a certified copy is what the holder of the asset is shown.
Where the affiant is the surviving spouse and sole heir, and is not disqualified under G.S. § 28A-4-2, the property collectable under the section may exceed $20,000 but must not exceed thirty thousand dollars ($30,000) — measured after reduction for any spousal allowance already paid under G.S. § 30-15. The allowance therefore consumes part of the headroom rather than sitting outside it, which is the detail most often missed when the two figures are quoted side by side.
The spouse-and-sole-heir affidavit has its own recital list. It must state that the affiant is the surviving spouse and is entitled, under the Intestate Succession Act, to all of the property of the decedent, and that the value of all the personal property owned by the estate, less liens and encumbrances, does not exceed $30,000.
Two structural limits apply throughout. The section is written for a decedent who “dies intestate,” so a will takes the estate outside it, and the measured pool is personal property — the affidavit does not reach real property owned by the decedent at death. Persons entitled to receive payment include the public administrator appointed under G.S. § 28A-12-1, and heirs and creditors who are not disqualified.
Source: N.C. G.S. § 28A-25-1, read from the enacting state’s own published code on 2026-09-17. Quoted wording is the statute’s; the surrounding explanation is this site’s reading of it and is not legal advice.
Reviewed source note: (a) When a decedent dies intestate leaving personal property, less liens and encumbrances thereon, not exceeding twenty thousand dollars ($20,000) in value, at any time after 30 days from the date of death
North Carolina record: 5/5 verified, 21 matched checks, latest source re-fetch October 3, 2026. Source record · method · report a correction