Selling a home from a deceased person’s estate

As a rule, you can sell the home from the estate once the probate court (skifteretten) has decided how the estate is to be administered, and it has been documented who has the authority to bind the estate. The estate does not have to be fully wound up before you sell the house.

As a rule, until the probate court has made its decision, the deceased’s assets may not be sold or moved without its approval. This also applies to the home.

A probate court certificate (skifteretsattest) is not a title deed and does not make you the registered owners of the house. The certificate shows who has control of the estate, and therefore who can act on its behalf.

The purchase price belongs to the estate until the administration of the estate has established what is left for the heirs. Before anything can be distributed, you must allow for paying off mortgages, the estate’s other debts, the costs of the sale and entries in the estate’s final accounts (boopgørelse).

Forms of administration and who can sign

The probate court chooses the form of administration under chapters 12-16 of the Danish Administration of Estates Act (dødsboskifteloven). The choice determines who may act and sign on behalf of the estate, so start by finding out which form the estate is being administered under before you begin to talk about selling.

• Private administration (privat skifte) means that the heirs draw up the estate’s final accounts themselves and are responsible for making sure they are correct.

• With simplified private administration (forenklet privat skifte), the estate is dealt with under lighter rules: no final accounts have to be submitted, but the heirs file a statement of assets and liabilities when the estate is released to them. Among other things, this requires that no estate tax (boafgift) is payable, that the estate is not liable to tax and that the deceased was not self-employed in the year of death.

• A small-estate transfer (boudlæg) means that an estate of very little value is handed over without a formal administration, typically to the deceased’s next of kin or to whoever pays for the funeral.

• An undivided estate (uskiftet bo) lets the surviving spouse remain in possession of the estate for as long as they live, without the heirs receiving their share now.

• A transfer to the surviving spouse (ægtefælleudlæg) means that the surviving spouse receives the entire estate without an administration when its value is so small that there would be nothing left for other heirs. At the same time, the spouse takes on responsibility for the deceased’s debts.

• With administration by an estate administrator (bobestyrerskifte), the probate court appoints a professional administrator, usually a lawyer specialising in estates, to run the case.

With private administration, responsibility for the estate’s final accounts lies with the heirs, even if you get a lawyer to help with the work. In an estate handled by an estate administrator, it is the administrator who draws up the accounts and takes the formal steps.

With private administration, the heirs have joint control of the estate’s assets. Being registered as the contact person therefore does not give you the right to accept an offer or sign the purchase agreement on your own. All the heirs must take part, even if one of you has handled the practical contact along the way.

A power of attorney that only covers post, bills or day-to-day contact does not necessarily give the right to sell a property. Nor can an ordinary power of attorney for the estate (skiftefuldmagt) automatically be used for registering the deed (tinglysning). If someone else is to sign for you when the home is sold, the power of attorney must therefore expressly cover the sale of the home and be usable for the registration of the deed.

The probate court certificate and the sale of the home go hand in hand. The certificate shows who controls the estate, but it does not replace a power of attorney if one of you is to sign the purchase agreement and the deed on behalf of the others. Make sure the certificate and any power of attorney are in place before you put your names to a purchase agreement.

Rules for selling a home from an estate: creditors and the public notice

Unless the estate is closed by a small-estate transfer (boudlæg) because its value is very low, the probate court publishes a notice to creditors (proklama) in Statstidende, the Danish official gazette. This is a public notice in which the estate calls on anyone who believes they have a claim against the deceased to come forward. The aim is to get an overview of what the estate owes before anything is distributed.

The deadline is eight weeks. From publication in Statstidende, creditors have eight weeks to calculate and file their claims, which must be done through Skifteportalen, the courts’ self-service portal. If the deceased died after 15 November 2022, Skifteportalen is the mandatory route.

As a rule, claims that are not filed in time lose the right to payment from the estate. There are exceptions, including certain tax and duty claims and debts secured by a mortgage, but the main rule is strict and worth knowing, both for heirs and for anyone buying a home from an estate.

The deadline in the notice to creditors gives an overview of the estate’s debts, but in itself it does not give the estate the authority to sell the house. It is the form of administration and the people who can bind the estate that decide whether you can go ahead, not whether eight weeks have passed.

Nor is there a general ban on selling that always lasts until the deadline for creditors has expired. Depending on the circumstances, a sale can go through while the deadline is running, provided the right people can bind the estate and the deal can be justified financially. You should not sell without an overview, but you do not have to wait eight weeks to move forward either.

If the estate is insolvent, there is reason to be extra careful. In that case, an heir can ask for the estate to be handed over to an estate administrator. The heirs are then not personally liable for the deceased’s debts, provided they return what they have received from the estate. If you sell the home while the deadline for creditors is running, you should therefore be clear about how the purchase price will cover mortgages and other claims before you sign anything.

In practice, this means you should clarify two things before you talk to a buyer: who can sign on behalf of the estate, and whether the agreed price will hold all the way through the estate’s final accounts. The notice to creditors tells you which claims are in play, but it is not the document that gives you the right to sell.

Deadlines and timetable for a sale under private administration

With private administration, fixed deadlines run from the date of death, and you need to keep track of them. If the deadlines are not met, the whole administration can be transferred to an estate administrator, with a lawyer taking charge.

• A statement of the estate’s assets and liabilities as at the date of death, known as an opening statement (åbningsstatus), must be submitted to the probate court no later than 6 months after the death and no later than 2 months after the estate has been released to you.

• With private administration, the 1-year anniversary of the death is the latest cut-off date for the estate’s final accounts. As a rule, the property must therefore be sold, or taken over by an heir, by the 1-year anniversary at the latest.

• If the property cannot be sold within a year, one of the heirs can take it over, or you can ask for the estate to be handed over to an estate administrator, where the deadline is longer. If the deadline for the final accounts is not met, the probate court will decide that the estate must be transferred to an estate administrator.

• For a privately administered estate, the final accounts must be submitted no later than 15 months after the death, whereas the cut-off date for an estate handled by an estate administrator can be as late as 2 years after the death.

That is why it pays to get started early when you are selling an inherited home. A year sounds like plenty of time, but clearing out, the valuation and the sale itself take weeks. A property that is not put up for sale until the last minute can end up pushing the estate into administration by an estate administrator.

Valuing the home and getting a sales valuation

As a rule, all assets must be valued at their open-market value in the current market, cf. section 12 of the Danish Estate Tax Act (boafgiftsloven). In other words, the home must be valued at what it could realistically sell for, not at a randomly guessed price.

When the estate tax is calculated, the rules are more generous. The valuation circular (værdiansættelsescirkulæret) allows a property to be transferred at the public property valuation, with up to 15% deducted from or added to the valuation. If the property has received a new property valuation under the new rules, the limit is 20% instead.

In a ruling of 8 March 2016, the Supreme Court (Højesteret) established that, as a rule, Skat (the Danish tax authorities) must accept a valuation within the circular’s limit. Only in special cases can Skat set it aside and demand an expert valuation. This gives you reasonably safe room for manoeuvre when you decide what value the home should be entered at in the estate’s final accounts.

If the heirs want to value the property as low as possible to avoid paying extra estate tax, they will usually use the public property valuation less 15%, or 20% if the property has had a new valuation. Many choose this combination precisely because it falls within the range that Skat has to accept.

Which value is used depends on what happens to the home. If the property is sold to a third party, the sale price less the costs of the sale must be used. If, on the other hand, an heir wants to take over the property, the transfer price can be set under the valuation circular, based on the public property valuation. The circular allows +/- 15% of the public property valuation, or +/- 20% with a new valuation, unless special circumstances suggest otherwise.

A sale to an outside buyer ties the value to the price you actually achieve, whereas an heir who takes over the home can start from the valuation and move within the circular’s range. You should therefore decide whether the home is to be sold on or taken over by one of you before you decide how to value the home in the estate.

Get a free, no-obligation valuation from Brikk

Once the form of administration is settled and you know who can sign, the next step is to get a realistic picture of what the home can sell for. This is where an estate agent can help you move forward. At Brikk, it starts with a free, no-obligation valuation, where a local agent visits the home and assesses what it can sell for.

Brikk handles the whole process: valuation, marketing, viewings and negotiation. You can bring the process together and manage it online around the clock and follow interest in the home directly on your phone, so you always know how many people have seen the listing and how buyers rated the home after each viewing. That way you can keep the estate informed, and several heirs can follow along without ringing each other every other day.

Brikk sells at a fixed price: 34.500 kr. when a local Brikk agent handles the whole process, including the viewings, and 22.500 kr. if you hold the viewings yourselves. The energy label, condition report and other reports are paid for separately. Brikk has sold more than 4.000 homes across Denmark.

If you want to move ahead with the sale, the free valuation is the most concrete first step you can take. Book a valuation with Brikk, choose a date and time directly online, and remember that the valuation does not commit you to using Brikk for the sale itself. You get a professional assessment of the home’s value and potential, and you can make your decision afterwards without any pressure.