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Probate, wills, estate administration, reseal grants, transmission to executors

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Land-registration fees to jump from $90 to $124 – act now to avoid the increase!!

Land-registration fees are increasing in early 2025

Act now to avoid the early-2025 increase. Transmission by survivorship? – do it now! Transmission to executor or estate administrator? – do it now! Put the land into the names of the beneficiaries? – find out more…. Repaid the mortgage but it’s still on the title? – get it discharged now!

It will cost $124 (instead of the current $90), to register a transmission by survivorship, transmission to executor/s or administrator/s, mortgage discharge, or transfer (to beneficiaries or to third party).

Those are the different transactions needed when someone dies and they own a house, flat, or other real estate.

The exact date of the increase is not yet known. It will be early 2025.

There’s more info on the Land Information New Zealand website here: https://www.linz.govt.nz/products-services/landonline/landonline-fees-and-charges

This does not apply to Māori freehold land.

Title searches will be $8 instead of $6

Title searches will be $8 instead of $6. Again, the exact date of the change is not yet known.

Act now, if you are:

  • the estate administrator of someone who has died, and who still has a house or other land in their name – you need a ‘transmission to personal representatives’ (which means to executor/s or to administrator/s), and then perhaps a transfer to beneficiaries; or
  • the surviving owner of two joint owners, where the house is still in both your names – you need a ‘transmission by survivorship’
  • the owner of a property where there is still a mortgage registered against the title and the loan has been repaid, and you want that mortgage off the title. – you need a mortgage discharge

Let Kiwilaw help with the land transactions you need:

If you don’t have any High Court paperwork, you need that paperwork first

Unless the land is Māori freehold land, OR you are the surviving owner from a ‘joint tenancy’, someone needs to get special permission from the High Court before anyone can change the land records after someone has died.

That special permission is ‘probate’ (if there’s a valid will and at least one executor) or ‘letters of administration’ (if there’s no will, or if there’s no available executor named in the will).

Kiwilaw can provide more information about that, and can help you get that special permission. See here: https://kiwilaw.co.nz/probate/

EXCEPT – if the land was originally ancestral land and became ‘general land’ in the 1960s-70s, and if it is still in the same whanau or hapu ownership, and if you don’t want to sell it on the open market, you have the option of changing its status to Maori freehold land and then getting succession orders in the Maori Land Court without getting the High Court paperwork first – more info here: https://kiwilaw.co.nz/2023/01/23/general-land-owned-by-maori-deceased/

If you want to sell the land, you need an IRD number

If you are the executor/administrator of the land owner’s estate (with or without a will), and you want to sell the property, you need to apply to Inland Revenue for an IRD number for the estate.

You also need an IRD number if there is anything different between what the will says (or what the law says should happen if there is no valid will) and what is actually going to happen.

Examples: If one beneficiary is going to buy the land from the estate, or if one beneficiary is going to be paid out instead of sharing in the land property, or there’s some other ‘family arrangement’, the estate will need an IRD number.

Do that before you put the property on the market!

More information here: https://www.ird.govt.nz/managing-my-tax/ird-numbers/ird-numbers-for-businesses-and-organisations

Cheryl Simes – 14 November 2024