Robertson County, TX Probate Information

Before you file anything in Franklin, 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. The answer matters more than usual in Robertson County, because the County Judge's Administrative Order 2023-4 requires an applicant for letters testamentary, letters of administration, a determination of heirship or a guardianship to be represented by a licensed attorney, while naming probate of a will as a muniment of title (Estates Code chapter 257) as the example of what a self-represented applicant may do. Knowing the route before your first call decides whether you are hiring counsel or not.

Identify every bank and credit union account, retirement plan, brokerage holding, life insurance policy, vehicle and parcel of Robertson 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. Robertson County's own small estate affidavit checklist makes the same point in its own way, telling applicants to list every asset with a full description and to state the value of each as precisely as possible. Sunset's asset-discovery work, searching more than 2,300 financial institutions, exists for exactly this step, so that what you file with the Robertson County Clerk describes the estate accurately the first time.

Franklin is the single probate filing location for the whole county. The Robertson County Clerk takes estate, will and guardianship filings at 103 E. Morgan Street, and there is no branch or satellite counter for probate. The court serves every part of the county, including Franklin, Hearne, Calvert and Bremond and the rural areas between them; the county runs Justice of the Peace precincts in Calvert, Hearne, Franklin and Bremond, but those courts do not handle estates.

Venue is straightforward for a Robertson 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 Robertson County, the case belongs in the Robertson County Court, even if they died in a hospital in Bryan, Waco or Temple. 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)). Note that Robertson County is not Franklin County, Texas, a separate county whose seat is Mount Vernon in northeast Texas; the shared name of the town and the county trips up mail and search results, so address filings to Robertson County and to Franklin, TX 77856.

Which court hears the case is the fact most often gotten wrong on a small Texas county. Robertson County has no statutory probate court and no county court at law, so the Robertson 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 82nd District Court, which under Government Code § 24.184 covers Falls and Robertson counties and whose judge the county lists with an office in Marlin. It does not open estates.

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 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. Robertson County's own fee schedule prices this event: "Contesting Will w/Order to Transfer 120.00".

There is a written pro se policy, and it is the first thing to read. Most small Texas counties publish nothing on the subject. Robertson County's Administrative Order 2023-4, signed January 1, 2023, sets out the county's position in its own words: "Under Texas Law, only a licensed attorney may represent the interests of third-party individuals or entities, including guardianships wards and probate estates", and so "individuals applying for letters testamentary, letters of administration, determinations of heirship, and guardianships of the person or estate must be represented by a licensed attorney. The only time a 'pro-se' applicant may proceed in court is when truly representing only himself or herself." The order is explicit that you can still serve as executor without being a lawyer: "One need not be a lawyer to serve as an executor, administrator or guardian. However, the executor, administrator or guardian must be represented by counsel." Its one worked example of a self-represented filing is a muniment of title "when he or she is the sole beneficiary under the will, and there are no debts against the estate other than those secured by liens against real property" (Estates Code chapter 257), with three conditions attached: the applicant must be able to swear on personal knowledge that there are no debts other than those secured by liens against real estate, all beneficiaries under the will must be applicants and must testify at the hearing, and the will offered must be the signed original.

Settings are by appointment, not on a docket day. Robertson County publishes no probate docket, no docket day and no docket start time. Its County Judge page states that probate, guardianship and other civil cases are set by appointment and directs you to call the Judge's office at 979-828-3542. That means there is no published filing-to-hearing interval to plan around; ask what the next available appointment looks like when you call, and confirm the room, because the county's own pages give the County Judge's office as 102 E. Decherd, Room 103 while the site footer prints the courthouse as 102 W Decherd St.

Proposed hearing documents go in a week early. Administrative Order 2023-3 orders that all attorneys shall e-file all proposed hearing documents one week before court proceedings in probate, guardianship and civil matters. Several Texas counties do the reverse and ask that proposed orders be carried into the hearing; in Robertson County they are filed in advance, and a setting can be lost by missing the week.

The county has a mandatory form, and it is the small estate affidavit. Administrative Order 2023-1 makes the court's own approved small estate affidavit form compulsory for any affidavit filed after January 1, 2023, and the county publishes it with a checklist. Robertson County also requires proof of death to be filed with all probate applications, not just with an application to probate a will, which is a local addition worth catching before your filing is bounced.

The county has orders for the two hard fact patterns. If the original will cannot be produced, Administrative Order 2022-1, which the county also publishes refiled as Administrative Order 2023-5 on identical terms, governs an application to probate a copy of a lost will or a lost will without a copy: the clerk must attach the court's own notice of the right to object to every citation, heirs and devisees must be personally served or execute a waiver affidavit that spells out that notice in full rather than referring to an attachment, and where a full or partial intestacy would follow if the will were not admitted, the court appoints an attorney ad litem under Estates Code § 53.104. If the will is offered late, Administrative Order 2023-6, effective January 1, 2023, does the same job for an application to probate a will more than four years after the testator's death (Estates Code § 256.003(a)): notice or waiver affidavits for the testator's heirs, specific content those documents must carry, and an attorney ad litem for unknown heirs or heirs with a legal disability.

Posted citations are published online. In Texas a probate citation is served by posting at the courthouse (Estates Code § 51.053), which normally means an interested person has to be standing in front of the courthouse door to see it. The Robertson County Clerk posts its probate and guardianship citations on its own website as well, organized by year and going back several years, which is an unusually open practice for a county this size and a genuinely useful way to check whether a citation in an estate has gone up.

One vocabulary note. Some of the county's own documents caption cases "In the Probate Court of Robertson County, Texas" and others "In the County Court of Robertson County, Texas". Both are correct usage under Texas law, because the Estates Code provides that the terms "county court" and "probate court" are synonymous (§ 22.007(b)). Robertson County does not have a separate institution called a probate court: the court is the Robertson County Court, the constitutional county court (§ 32.002(a)), and the County Clerk is its clerk.

Robertson County answers this question more directly than most Texas counties, and the answer is usually yes. Administrative Order 2023-4, signed by the County Judge on January 1, 2023, states that individuals applying for letters testamentary, letters of administration, determinations of heirship and guardianships of the person or estate must be represented by a licensed attorney, on the reasoning that an executor or administrator acts for beneficiaries and creditors rather than only for himself or herself. You do not have to be a lawyer to serve as executor, but under the county's policy the executor has to be represented by one. The order's single worked example of a filing a person may make alone is probate of a will as a muniment of title (Estates Code chapter 257) where the applicant is the sole beneficiary and there are no debts other than those secured by liens against real property, and the same order says that whether a muniment of title is the right procedure is itself a legal decision best made by a lawyer. Beyond the county's own rule, 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, when the estate is insolvent or a creditor is pressing, when the original will cannot be produced or is being offered late, and when a contested matter may be assigned to a statutory probate court judge or transferred to the district court (Estates Code § 32.003). County Clerk staff can explain procedure but cannot give legal advice. Sunset can connect families to a vetted Texas probate attorney serving Robertson County and the wider Brazos Valley.

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

Generate the probate packet. Sunset assembles the paperwork for your route, prepared to Robertson County's own requirements, including the proof of death the county requires with every probate application and the court's approved small estate affidavit form where that is the route, ready to file with the Robertson County Clerk.

Find a local probate attorney. Robertson County requires a licensed attorney for most probate applications, so this step is not optional for many families. Sunset connects families to a vetted Texas probate attorney serving Robertson 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).