{"id":18135,"date":"2023-10-20T03:27:01","date_gmt":"2023-10-20T10:27:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/?p=18135"},"modified":"2025-12-01T00:39:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T08:39:12","slug":"how-long-does-executor-have-to-sell-a-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/how-long-does-executor-have-to-sell-a-house\/","title":{"rendered":"Is There a Time Limit for an Executor to Sell a House?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If you\u2019ve been designated as the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/advisor\/mortgages\/real-estate\/executor-of-estate\/\">executor of an estate<\/a> that includes an inherited home, you probably have some questions. First and foremost, you may be wondering: How long does an executor have to sell a house? Is there a time limit?<\/p>\n<p>As a named executor, you\u2019re tasked with making sure that the deceased person\u2019s property is liquidated and\/or distributed according to what is outlined in the will. On top of all that, you\u2019re likely dealing with the emotional strain that comes with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/selling-parents-home-after-death\/\">losing a family member<\/a> or close friend.<\/p>\n<p>To help minimize extra stress during an already challenging time, we\u2019ve gathered all the essential details from experienced probate attorneys and a top real estate agent. Our goal is for this guide to help you navigate the process of<a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/i-inherited-a-house-and-want-to-sell-it\/\"> selling an inherited house<\/a> within the designated time frame.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n<div class=\"geo-cta widget-cta widget-cta--content     widget-cta--dark widget-cta--dark-blue-gradient\">\n    <div class=\"widget-element--content\">\n        <div class=\"widget-element--content-header\">\n            <img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"homelight logo\" class=\"widget-element--logo\" src=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/wp-content\/themes\/ccprototypev5\/images\/logo-small-cta.png\" width=\"106\" height=\"25\" \/>\n        <\/div>\n        \n                <h3 class=\"cta-headline widget--bold\">Connect with a Top Agent<\/h3>\n                        <p>Selling a home can be a difficult process under the best of circumstances. Partnering with a top agent experienced in probate can help when selling a home after the death of a loved one.<\/p>\n        \n                <div class=\"widget-element--buttons\">\n            <a data-type=\"In Content CTA\" href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/find-agent\/quiz\/seller?#\/qaas=0\/\" class=\"cta-click-track widget-element--button\">Find Agent<\/a>\n        <\/div>\n                    <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div id=\"section--1\" data-toc-header=\"How long do you have to sell a house as an executor?\" data-toc-type=\"head\"><\/div>\n<h2>How long do you have to sell a house as an executor?<\/h2>\n<p>According to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/agents\/matthew-harber-wa-97689\">Matthew Harber<\/a>, a top real estate agent in Tacoma, Washington who regularly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/probate-realtor\/\">handles probate sales<\/a>, there\u2019s no universal timeline for executors. If probate has been opened for a property, the timing has to do with getting the house sold before probate has been closed \u2014 and that will be different for every estate.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe sale of the home needs to be done before <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/what-happens-to-a-house-in-probate\/\">probate<\/a> is closed, but there\u2019s no fixed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.homelight.com\/blog\/probate-timeline\/\">timeframe<\/a> \u2014 <strong>it could be two months, six months, or a year.<\/strong> It\u2019s dependent on what is going on with the estate and whether people are contesting things,\u201d Harber explains. \u201cUltimately, when all of the outcomes have been decided upon, the court will set a date for the end of probate, and the house should be sold prior to that date.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How long does an executor have to sell a house? There\u2019s really no set time frame \u2014 it could be two months, six months, or a year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":280,"featured_media":38637,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[326,319],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-inheritance","category-selling-advice"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.0 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>How Long Do You Have to Sell a House as the Executor?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"How long does an executor have to sell a house? 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