Oregon timeline
Oregon probate timeline: the 30-day wait and creditor deadlines
The simplified route starts 30 days after death.
Oregon creditor deadlines are set out below against the event each one runs from.
Sources reviewed August 9, 2026. Latest primary-source re-fetch October 3, 2026.
The one date this page can source
The simple estate affidavit route requires 30 days to elapse from the date of death. This is a precondition: the affidavit or petition cannot be presented before it runs, regardless of how straightforward the estate is.
Not more than $75,000 of the fair market value of the estate is attributable to personal property other than manufactured homesORS 114.505 to 114.560 — Oregon Legislature; 2025 EDITION.
Creditor deadlines
- From publication of notice to creditors
- Four months after the date of publication of notice to interested persons (ORS 115.005(2)(a)).
- From actual notice to a known creditor
- If the personal representative was required to deliver or mail notice under ORS 115.003(2), 45 days after a notice meeting ORS 115.003(3) is delivered or mailed to the last-known address of the person asserting the claim (ORS 115.005(2)(b)). A claim is barred only if not presented before the LATER of the publication and actual-notice periods, and within the statute of limitations applicable to the claim.
How these combine. Oregon bars a claim under ORS 115.005(2) if it is not presented within the statute of limitations applicable to the claim and before the LATER of (a) four months after the date of publication of notice to interested persons, or (b) 45 days after actual notice is delivered or mailed to a known claimant under ORS 115.003. There is no independent nonclaim period measured from death: the underlying limitations period on each claim continues to apply, so the four-month/45-day bars are the estate-specific clocks and cannot be collapsed into one figure.
(2) Except as provided in subsection (3) of this section, a claim is barred from payment from the estate if not presented within the statute of limitations applicable to the claim and before the later of: (a) Four months after the date of publication of notice to interested persons; or (b) If the claim was one with respect to which the personal representative was required to deliver or mail a notice under ORS 115.003 (2), 45 days after a notice meeting the requirements of ORS 115.003 (3) is delivered or mailed to the last-known address of the person asserting the claim.ORS 115.005 — Oregon Legislature; 2025 EDITION.
The four-month Oregon claims window is a floor, not a deadline — the real cut-off is the final account
Almost every summary of Oregon probate reduces the creditor period to one number: four months. ORS 115.005(2) does say four months, but it says it inside a “later of” test, and both halves of that test have to expire before anything is barred. A claim is barred only if it was not presented within the statute of limitations applicable to the claim and before the later of “Four months after the date of publication of notice to interested persons” or, where the representative was required to send an individual notice, “45 days after a notice meeting the requirements of ORS 115.003 (3) is delivered or mailed to the last-known address of the person asserting the claim.”
That second branch is what actually drives the schedule. Because the 45 days run from the individual notice rather than from publication, a creditor the representative discovers late can still have an open window months after the published four months have closed. Delaying the search does not shorten the estate’s exposure; it moves the finish line further out.
Subsection (3) then removes the idea of a hard bar altogether for a defined group. A claim presented after claims are barred “shall be paid from the estate” if it is presented before the applicable statute of limitations runs “and before the personal representative files the final account,” and if it comes from a person who did not receive a notice under ORS 115.003 mailed or delivered more than 30 days before the claim was presented. For an unnotified creditor, in other words, the operative deadline is the filing of the final account, not the four-month mark.
There is a procedural trap in how a claim is delivered. Under ORS 115.005(1)(a) claims are presented to the personal representative, and the statute says so in the negative as well: “Filing a claim with the court does not constitute presentation to the personal representative.” A creditor who files with the court and waits is not preserving anything. The addresses that do work are the one in the petition for appointment under ORS 113.035, the one provided for presentation of claims under ORS 115.003, and the one in the published notice under ORS 113.155 or 113.225.
A separate six-month mark decides when a creditor can involve the judge. Under ORS 115.185 a creditor whose claim has been allowed or established, “and who has not received payment within six months after the date of publication of notice to interested persons, may apply to the court for an order directing the personal representative to pay the claim to the extent that funds of the estate are available for that payment.” Allowance and payment are separate events, and the statute assumes a gap between them.
Read together, these sections explain why an Oregon estate that looks simple can still run past a year. The timeline estimate on this page reflects an ordinary administration where the representative searches diligently and notifies creditors early. Where the search is slow, the 45-day branch and the final-account rule in subsection (3) both push the safe closing date outward, and neither is visible in the four-month figure most guides quote.
Source: ORS 115.005, ORS 115.185, 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.
General sequence: first week, how long probate takes.
Oregon record: 6/6 verified, 26 matched checks, latest source re-fetch October 3, 2026. Source record · method · report a correction