Lamb County, TX Probate Information

Before you file anything in Littlefield, 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 the same in all 254 Texas counties; they are explained on the Texas state page. Getting the answer before your first filing matters here because Lamb County's costs are itemized per document and per service: each citation issued and posted is $83.00 on the county's own schedule, and an application filed under the wrong route means paying to start again.

Identify every bank and credit union account, retirement plan, brokerage holding, life insurance policy, vehicle and parcel of Lamb 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. Sunset's asset-discovery work, searching more than 2,300 financial institutions, exists for exactly this step, so that the application filed with the Lamb County Clerk describes the estate accurately the first time. While you are gathering documents, order the certified death certificates you will need: Lamb County's schedule prices a Lamb County death certificate at $21.00 with each additional copy ordered at the same time at $4.00.

The Lamb County Courthouse at 100 6th Drive in Littlefield is the single probate filing location for the whole county. There is no branch, satellite or annex counter for estates: the County Clerk takes filings in Room 103. The court serves every part of the county, including Littlefield, Olton, Earth and Sudan and the rural areas between them, each of which the county staffs with its own Justice of the Peace or County Commissioner precinct office while keeping every estate filing at the courthouse in Littlefield.

Venue is straightforward for a South Plains 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 Lamb County, the case belongs in the Lamb County Court, even if they died in a hospital in Lubbock, Plainview 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. Lamb County has no statutory probate court and no county court at law, so the Lamb County Court, the constitutional county court, has original jurisdiction of probate proceedings (Estates Code § 32.002(a)), and the elected County Judge presides. The only other trial court of general jurisdiction seated in the county is the 154th District Court, and Lamb County is the whole of that district: Government Code § 24.253 provides that "The 154th Judicial District is composed of Lamb County" and that its terms begin on the first Mondays in January and July. The district court does not open estates. An appeal from a Lamb County probate order goes to the Seventh Court of Appeals, which sits in Amarillo and whose district includes Lamb County (Government Code § 22.201(h)); the County Clerk's own page links it as the court of appeals serving Lamb County.

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. In Lamb County that district court is the 154th. Three details matter in practice. A party's motion for 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.

The county says original probate filings are electronically filed, and it says it in the fee schedule rather than in an e-filing notice. The probate page of the Lamb County Clerk's schedule is headed "Original filing of Probate of Will, Guardianship, Muniment of Title, Foreign Wills, Small Estates EFILED ONLY" (emphasis the county's) That is the county's only published statement on the subject: there is no separate e-filing notice, no instructions page and no stated exception for a person without a lawyer. The statewide rule is that attorneys must e-file and that an unrepresented party may e-file but is not required to (Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 21(f)(1)). Because the two do not obviously line up, a self-represented filer should call the County Clerk at (806) 485-0053 and ask what the office will accept before preparing anything on paper. Either way the wet-ink original will has to reach the clerk in Room 103 within three business days of the application (Rule 21(f)(12)).

Costs here are itemized per citation, and that is where a Lamb County budget goes wrong. Most counties quote one all-in figure. Lamb quotes $360.00 to open the case and then $83.00 for each citation, being $8.00 to issue it and $75.00 for the sheriff to post or serve it. One citation makes the first filing $443.00; a matter that needs citation on several people, or citation by publication as well, multiplies that line. The county also charges the County Judge's own statutory fees, $2.00 on an order and $2.00 to administer the oath, which is a reminder that in a constitutional-county-court county the elected County Judge is personally the judge hearing your estate.

Lamb County's schedule is unusually honest about the inventory fee, and it is worth understanding because it is the fee most often misdescribed. The row reads "Inventory, Appraisement and list of Claims (Filed late after 90th day after Qualification Date)". Filing the inventory or the affidavit in lieu of it within the statutory deadline costs nothing at the counter; the $25.00 clerk fee, plus the $2.00 judge's fee, is a late charge and the statute says so expressly (Local Government Code § 118.056(d)). The deadline itself is state law: before the 91st day after the personal representative qualifies, unless the court grants longer (Estates Code § 309.051(a)).

Two clerks share one building, and only one of them opens estates. The Lamb County Clerk is in Room 103 and the Lamb County District Clerk is in Room 212 at the same street address, with different phone and fax numbers. Estates, wills and guardianships are County Clerk business (Texas Constitution article V, § 20). Lamb County is above the population line at which the two offices merge into a single elected clerk (Government Code § 51.501(a)), and the Texas Secretary of State's county clerk roster accordingly lists Lamb under County Clerk rather than as a joint clerkship, so do not assume one counter handles both.

The county publishes closure dates but not counter hours. Lamb County's site gives the County Clerk's address, direct line and fax but no office hours, no lunch closure and no filing cutoff, and third-party courthouse directories that publish hours for this office are not the county speaking. What the county does publish is a 2026 Holiday Schedule, which closes the courthouse on New Year, Martin Luther King Day, Presidents Day, Texas Independence Day, Good Friday, Memorial Day, Independence Day observed on Friday July 3, Labor Day, Columbus Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving on November 26 and 27, and Christmas on December 24 and 25. Call (806) 485-0053 before you drive to Littlefield.

A free legal aid clinic sits inside the courthouse once a month, with one caveat. The Legal Aid Society of Lubbock publishes a Lamb County Courthouse location in the 1st Floor Conference Room at 100 6th Drive, open the 4th Thursday of every month by appointment only, and it lists Lamb among the counties it serves. Its published practice areas, however, are family and elder law, and the estate work in its own list is simple wills, which is planning done before death rather than settling a decedent's estate. Ask whether it can take a probate matter before you rely on the clinic. Legal Aid of NorthWest Texas' Plainview office also covers Lamb County and takes calls on weekdays.

The district court only enters the picture on a contest, and in Lamb County there is exactly one. Government Code § 24.253 makes the 154th Judicial District coextensive with Lamb County, with terms beginning the first Mondays in January and July. That court reaches an estate only if the County Judge transfers a contested matter to it under Estates Code § 32.003(a)(2), and even then the county court keeps the management of the rest of the estate (§ 32.003(g)). If a matter does land there, the 154th publishes local administrative rules effective January 15, 2023 which state that the court "will be available for settings from 9:00 a.m. through 4:00 p.m., Tuesday through Thursday", route settings through a court coordinator, and allow video conferencing for some civil matters. Those are the district court's rules, not the county court's, and the same is true of the county's "Information for Pro-Se Litigants" sheet, whose worked example names the 154th District Court.

Plenty of uncontested Lamb County estates are handled without a lawyer, and nothing the county publishes suggests otherwise. Counsel earns its keep here 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 has to be sold or divided, when the estate is insolvent or a creditor is pressing, when a business or out-of-county land 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. First, Lamb County publishes no probate forms and no procedure sheet at all, so every document is drafted from scratch. Second, the county's fee schedule says original probate filings are electronically filed and publishes no exception for a person without a lawyer, which leaves a self-represented filer needing to negotiate the mechanics with the clerk. Third, 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 154th 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 without counsel. County Clerk staff can explain procedure but cannot give legal advice, and the county's own self-help notice points residents to legal aid and to the State Bar referral service rather than to the counter. Sunset can connect families to a vetted Texas probate attorney serving Lamb County and the surrounding South Plains.

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, Lamb County real property and unclaimed property, so you know what the estate holds and which estate settlement route fits before anything is filed in Littlefield.

Generate the probate packet. Sunset assembles the paperwork for your route, drafted for a county that publishes no probate forms of its own and styled for the Lamb County Court, ready to file electronically with the Lamb County Clerk.

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 Lamb 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).