Cottle County, TX Probate Information

Before you file anything in Paducah, know what is actually in the estate and what it owes. Which Texas route fits, and whether an administration is needed at all, turns on whether there is a will, who the distributees are, what the assets are worth, and whether there are unpaid debts. Those routes are set by state statute and are identical in all 254 Texas counties; they are explained on the Texas state page. Doing that work first matters more than usual in Cottle County, because the county publishes no probate instructions, no forms and no fee schedule to correct a wrong assumption for you, and the person at the counter can explain procedure but cannot tell you which route to take.

Identify every bank and credit union account, retirement plan, brokerage holding, life insurance policy, vehicle, mineral interest and parcel of Cottle County or out-of-county real property, along with every debt, before you apply. How each asset is titled decides whether it passes through the estate at all: survivorship accounts, accounts with a named beneficiary and land covered by a recorded transfer on death deed pass outside the estate and never reach the county court. That question is worth settling early in a county like this one, where ranch and mineral interests often outweigh the bank balances. Sunset's asset-discovery work, searching more than 2,300 financial institutions, exists for exactly this step, so that the application filed with the Cottle County Clerk describes the estate accurately the first time.

The Cottle County Courthouse at 815 9th Street in Paducah is the single probate filing location for the whole county. There is no branch, satellite or annex counter for estates, and no second window: the County Clerk who takes the filing is the same officer who keeps the records of the 50th District Court. The court serves every part of Cottle County, including Paducah and the farming and ranching country around it. How centralized the county is shows in its own election paperwork, which consolidates all four county precincts into one polling place inside the courthouse and identifies the Clerk's Office as Room 108 of that building.

Venue is straightforward for a Cottle County resident: you file in the county where the decedent lived, if the decedent had a domicile or fixed place of residence in Texas (Estates Code § 33.001(a)(1)). If the person lived in Cottle County, the case belongs in the Cottle County Court, even if they died in a hospital in Childress, Lubbock, Wichita Falls or Amarillo. For a decedent with no Texas domicile or fixed residence, venue depends on where the death happened and where the estate or the nearest of kin are (§ 33.001(a)(2)).

Which court hears the case is the fact most often gotten wrong on a small Texas county page. Cottle County has no statutory probate court and no county court at law: Government Code Chapter 25, which creates every statutory county court and statutory probate court in the state, contains no Cottle County entry. So the Cottle County Court, the constitutional county court, has original jurisdiction of probate proceedings (Estates Code § 32.002(a)), and the elected County Judge presides. The Office of Court Administration's 2025 county clerk directory records the same thing from the clerk's side, listing probate among the case types filed with the Cottle County Clerk for the county court and listing no county court at law at all. The other trial court seated in the county is the 50th District Court, which under Government Code § 24.152(a) is composed of Baylor, Cottle, King and Knox counties; the county names the Honorable Jennifer Habert as District Court Judge (verified July 2026).

Cottle County has a district-court provision of its own that most Texas counties do not, and it is worth knowing about before a dispute starts. Government Code § 24.152(b) provides that "the district court in Baylor, Cottle, King, and Knox Counties has the civil and criminal jurisdiction of a county court", in addition to its other jurisdiction, and § 24.152(d) provides that "In matters of concurrent jurisdiction, the judge of the county court in Baylor, Cottle, King, or Knox County may transfer a case to the judge of the 50th District Court with the approval of the district judge", after which every process, writ, bond and witness summons is returnable to the court receiving the case as if originally issued there. Section 24.152(c) adds that the terms of the 50th District Court in each county begin on the first Mondays in January and September. None of that changes where an estate starts: original probate jurisdiction is in the county court under Estates Code § 32.002(a) and the application goes to the Cottle County Clerk.

If a matter in the proceeding becomes contested, the case does not stay with the County Judge by default. Under Estates Code § 32.003(a), in a county with no statutory probate court and no county court at law exercising original probate jurisdiction, when a matter in a probate proceeding is contested the judge of the county court may, on the judge's own motion, or shall, on the motion of any party to the proceeding, either request the assignment of a statutory probate court judge to hear the contested matter (Government Code § 25.0022) or transfer the contested matter to the district court, which may then hear it as if originally filed there. Three details matter in practice. A party's motion for the assignment of a statutory probate court judge beats a transfer: if it is filed before the county judge transfers the matter, the county judge shall grant it and may not transfer the case unless the motion is withdrawn (§ 32.003(b)). A party may file that motion before anything becomes contested, and it takes effect if the matter later does (§ 32.003(c)). And the county court keeps the rest of the case: if only the contested matter is assigned out or transferred, the county court continues to exercise jurisdiction over the management of the estate until the contested matter is finally disposed of (§ 32.003(g)), and the matter returns to the county court when it is resolved.

One step further out, an appeal from a Cottle County probate order does not go to the district court either. A final order issued by a probate court is appealable to the court of appeals (Estates Code § 32.001(c)), and Cottle County lies in the Seventh Court of Appeals District (Government Code § 22.201(h)). That court sits in Amarillo, names Cottle in its own list of counties served, and is linked from the Cottle County Clerk's own page as the court serving the county.

One officer, two clerkships, one counter. This is the defining local fact in Cottle County and it removes a warning that applies almost everywhere else in Texas. The county publishes Vickey Wederski as County Clerk and as District Clerk, at the same address, the same phone and the same fax, and the Office of Court Administration's directory records the office as a combo clerk. Government Code § 51.501(a) is the provision behind it: a county with a population of less than 8,000 elects a single clerk to perform the duties of the district clerk and the county clerk, unless a majority of the qualified voters choose at an election to keep the offices separate (§ 51.501(b)). In practice that means you cannot go to the wrong window in Paducah. It does not change which court has your case: an estate is filed in the Cottle County Court and is taken by the same officer acting as clerk of that court (Texas Constitution article V, § 20).

The room numbers come from the county's election paperwork, not from a court page, and one address on the county's own site is wrong. The county's Notice of Special Election for November 4, 2025 places early voting in the Clerk's Office, Room 108 of the Cottle County Courthouse at 815 9th Street, and puts all four county precincts, 101, 201, 301 and 401, in Room 101 of the same building; the county's 2023 consolidated precinct notice names that room the Commissioner's Courtroom. So Room 108 is the counter and Room 101 is the county's courtroom, though the county does not publish where a probate hearing is held and this page does not assert that it is held there. On the address, the county's Elections page gives the clerk at 815 Richards St; the County Clerk page, the District Clerk page, the courthouse block repeated on every page of the site and both election documents all give 815 9th Street. File at 815 9th Street and mail to P.O. Box 717.

Nothing about probate is published, and that is itself the local condition to plan around. Cottle County has no probate page, no probate fee schedule, no probate forms or checklists, no e-filing notice, no published local rules, no docket information, no online case search and no published counter hours, and it publishes no email address for the clerk. The county is not doing anything wrong: nothing requires a county of this size to publish any of it. But it means the statewide rules do the work here. Attorneys must e-file (Misc. Docket No. 13-9164), an unrepresented party may but need not (Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 21(f)(1)), the original will goes to the clerk within three business days (Rule 21(f)(12)), the base fee is $360.00 by statute (Local Government Code § 135.102(a)(1) and § 133.151(a)(1)), and everything genuinely local has to be confirmed on 806-492-3823.

Watch the closure notices, because they are the only calendar the office publishes. The County Clerk page carries a "Notice of Closure" link, and at the time of this review it read: "The Clerk's office will be CLOSED Wednesday and Thursday July 8 & 9, 2026 For Election Training." In a joint clerk's office that also runs the county's elections, closures of that kind are routine, and there are no published hours to fall back on. That matters for one deadline in particular: the original will must reach the clerk within three business days of the application (Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 21(f)(12)). Check the link and call before you drive to Paducah.

Cottle County sits in a four-county district with a transfer provision written for it by name. Beyond the general contested-matter route in Estates Code § 32.003, Government Code § 24.152 is written for this district specifically. It provides that the 50th Judicial District is composed of Baylor, Cottle, King and Knox counties (§ 24.152(a)); that "the district court in Baylor, Cottle, King, and Knox Counties has the civil and criminal jurisdiction of a county court" in addition to its other jurisdiction (§ 24.152(b)); that the terms of the 50th District Court in each county begin on the first Mondays in January and September (§ 24.152(c)); and that "In matters of concurrent jurisdiction, the judge of the county court in Baylor, Cottle, King, or Knox County may transfer a case to the judge of the 50th District Court with the approval of the district judge", with every process, writ, bond and witness summons then returnable to the receiving court as if originally issued there (§ 24.152(d)). Original probate jurisdiction still sits in the county court (Estates Code § 32.002(a)) and the application still goes to the Cottle County Clerk. The statute reaches a probate matter only to the extent the two courts actually share concurrent jurisdiction over it, and only with the district judge's approval, so if anyone proposes moving part of the case, ask early which judge is handling what. A practical point about the district court's own calendar: its terms in each of the four counties begin on the first Mondays in January and September, and the judge sits across four counties.

An appeal goes to Amarillo, not to the district court. A final order issued by a probate court is appealable to the court of appeals (Estates Code § 32.001(c)), and Cottle County is one of the counties in the Seventh Court of Appeals District (Government Code § 22.201(h)). The Seventh Court of Appeals names Cottle in its own counties-served list, has its offices in Amarillo at 350 SE 6th Avenue, Suite 2C, mails to P.O. Box 9540, Amarillo, TX 79105-9540 and answers on (806) 342-2650. The Cottle County Clerk's own page links that court as "serving Cottle County", which is a useful piece of orientation on a site that otherwise says nothing about courts.

One court, one counter, and the district court enters on a contest. Because Government Code Chapter 25 contains no Cottle County entry, there is no question of choosing a court: the Cottle County Court hears the estate (Estates Code § 32.002(a)) and the County Clerk takes the filing. The 50th District Court reaches a Cottle probate matter only if the County Judge requests the assignment of a statutory probate court judge or transfers a contested matter under § 32.003(a), or transfers a matter of concurrent jurisdiction with the district judge's approval under Government Code § 24.152(d), and even on a § 32.003 transfer the county court keeps the management of the rest of the estate (§ 32.003(g)).

Uncontested estates are settled without a lawyer in counties like this one every year, but Cottle County gives a self-represented filer less to work from than most. Counsel earns its keep when a will or an appointment is likely to be challenged, when there is no will and the heirs have to be determined, when real property or a mineral interest has to be sold or divided, when the estate is insolvent or a creditor is pressing, when a business or out-of-state property is involved, or when a guardianship has to run alongside the estate. Three local factors weigh in favor of an attorney more than they would in a metro county. The county publishes no probate forms, no instructions, no hours and no fee schedule, so every document is drafted from scratch and every local cost and deadline has to be established by telephone. The contested-matter route matters: if a matter becomes contested, the County Judge may on the judge's own motion, and shall on the motion of any party, request the assignment of a statutory probate court judge or transfer the contested matter to the district court (Estates Code § 32.003(a)), and a motion for assignment filed before a transfer must be granted (§ 32.003(b)), which is a timing point that is easy to miss. And Cottle County sits in a district with its own transfer provision, under which the county judge may move a matter of concurrent jurisdiction to the 50th District Judge with that judge's approval (Government Code § 24.152(d)). County Clerk staff can explain procedure but cannot give legal advice. Sunset can connect families to a vetted Texas probate attorney serving Cottle County and the surrounding Rolling Plains counties.

Find the accounts and assets. Sunset searches more than 2,300 financial institutions and public records to surface bank and credit union accounts, retirement plans, brokerage holdings, life insurance, Cottle County real property and mineral interests, and unclaimed property, so you know what the estate holds and which route fits before anything is filed in Paducah.

Generate the probate packet. Sunset assembles the paperwork for your estate settlement route, captioned for the Cottle County Court, the constitutional county court that actually has the case, and ready to file with the Cottle County Clerk at 815 9th Street. That matters more in a county that publishes no forms and no instructions of its own.

Find a local probate attorney. When a matter is contested or otherwise calls for counsel, Sunset connects families to a vetted Texas probate attorney serving Cottle County.

Sunset is free for families. Revenue comes from bank partners that pay Sunset while estate funds sit in an FDIC-insured estate account ($3M coverage).