Maine Intestate Succession Laws
If any part of a Maine decedent's estate is not effectively disposed of by will, the intestate share will be distributed in the following order and manner:
1. Surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner. A surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner is generally first in line to get any assets from the intestate estate. However, the amount a surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner is entitled to varies as follows:
- If there is no surviving issue or parent of the decedent, the surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner gets the whole estate.
- If the decedent leaves surviving issue (all of whom are also issue of the surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner) or parents, the surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner gets the first $50,000, plus one-half of the remaining intestate estate.
- If the decedent leaves surviving issue one or more of whom are not also issue of the surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner, the surviving spouse's or surviving registered domestic partner's share is entitled to one-half of the intestate estate.
2. Heirs other than surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner. Any part of the intestate estate not passing to the surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner as indicated above, or the entire intestate estate if there is no surviving spouse or surviving registered domestic partner, passes as follows to:
- Decedent's surviving issue, distributed per capita at each generation.
- Decedent's parent or parents equally.
- Issue of decedent's parents, distributed per capita at each generation.
- Decedent's grandparents, with half of the estate going to the paternal grandparents and the other half going to the maternal grandparents. If both of the grandparents on either side are deceased, their share goes to their issue on a per capita basis. If there are no surviving heirs on either the maternal or paternal side, the side with any surviving heirs gets the entire estate.
- Decedent's great-grandparents and their issue, as distributed for grandparents above.
3. State of Maine. If there is no taker under any of the above provisions, the intestate estate passes by default to the state of Maine.
Maine Intestate Succession Law Fun Facts
- Relatives of the decedent who are conceived before decedent's death, but born afterwards, inherit as if they were born during decedent's lifetime.
- Any person who fails to survive the decedent by 120 hours is deemed to have predeceased the decedent for purposes of intestate succession (which means that the person generally doesn't get a share of the decedent's estate). If it cannot be established by clear and convincing evidence that the person who would otherwise be an heir has survived the decedent by 120 hours, it is considered that the person failed to survive for the required period. However, these rules don't apply if the end result is that the state of Maine gets the intestate estate.
- Relatives of the half-blood inherit the same share as relatives of the whole blood.
- Maine's intestate succession laws, as well as other related laws, can be found in Title 18A of the Maine Revised Statutes Annotated.
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