Work it out on your own number

Tennessee sets no percentage on either professional fee, so there is no schedule to work. What the calculator can give you is the clerk’s side, which Tennessee prints on a three-year escalating table.

What each part costs

Every row is one figure, one source, one date. Where Tennessee fixes no price, the row says so instead of guessing.

What can change the bill — allowances, waivers and one-off charges

What changes YOUR number in Tennessee

You can be charged with money the estate never received

When the account is stated, the clerk charges the accounting party with every sum received or that could have been received by using due and reasonable diligence. A Tennessee representative who lets a debt go uncollected can be charged with it anyway. No other state in this database writes the duty that way.

Compensation is settled at the account, not agreed in advance

Reasonable compensation is credited when the account is stated, and disbursements are credited only where a lawful voucher supports them. Any interested person has thirty days from the stating of the account to except, and a further thirty days to appeal the clerk’s ruling to the court. The clerk must mail copies of exceptions to the representative and the representative’s attorney within five days.

There is no Tennessee attorney-fee statute

No section specific to attorney fees in a decedent’s estate was located. Attorney fees reach the estate as a disbursement on the account and are allowed if the clerk finds them reasonable and the voucher supports them. Anyone quoting you a Tennessee statutory attorney percentage is quoting another state.

The clerk publishes, and the statute does not say who is billed

Tennessee is alone here in making publication the clerk’s duty rather than the representative’s. The clerk places two consecutive weekly notices within thirty days of letters issuing. The statute fixes no rate and does not state how the cost is passed on, so ask your clerk what the office charges. Your own duty is separate and survives: mail a copy to every creditor you know of or can reasonably find.

Open the estate more than a year after the death and the notice requirement falls away

Where letters are issued more than one year after the date of death, the publication requirement does not apply at all.

A bond that cannot exceed double the estate

Tennessee is the first state in this database to cap the bond as well as floor it: not less than the value of the estate subject to administration, not more than double it. Four exemptions come first and cover most family estates — a will that excuses bond, a sole beneficiary who is also the representative, unanimous written consent of adult beneficiaries, or a bank as representative.

The filing fee rises on a date you can plan around

$275.00 today, $300.00 from 1 January 2027, $325.00 from 1 January 2028. Where an estate can properly be opened either side of a new year, that is a real difference of $25.00 at the counter.

Three tools, in the order most people need them

Tennessee probate cost questions

How much does an executor get paid in Tennessee?

There is no percentage. The clerk credits the personal representative with reasonable compensation when the account is stated, and charges the representative with every sum received or that could have been received by using due and reasonable diligence. Compensation is settled at the accounting rather than agreed in advance, and any interested person can except to the account within thirty days.

Does Tennessee set probate attorney fees by statute?

No, and there is no section in the Code specific to attorney fees in a decedent’s estate. Fees paid to the estate’s attorney reach the account as a disbursement and are allowed where a lawful voucher supports them and the clerk finds them reasonable. The check on the bill is an objection to the account rather than a cap on the fee.

What does it cost to file for probate in Tennessee?

Two hundred and seventy-five dollars for an estate opened during 2026. That figure is on a published escalating table: it becomes three hundred dollars on the first of January 2027 and three hundred and twenty-five dollars on the first of January 2028. The same standard fee covers general administrations, small estates, insolvent estates and muniment of title. Later steps are charged one by one, including seventy-five dollars for filing and entering an accounting.

Does an executor need a bond in Tennessee?

Often not. No bond is required where the will excuses it, where the representative is also the sole beneficiary and the court approves, where all adult beneficiaries consent in a sworn statement and the court approves, or where the representative is a bank excused from bond. Where a bond is required, the amount must be at least the value of the estate and no more than double it, and the court can adjust it by order at any time.

Does Tennessee have a small estate affidavit?

Not an affidavit — a lighter probate. Where the probate personal property is worth no more than fifty thousand dollars, an heir or the person named in the will can petition for limited letters forty-five days after the death. The striking feature is that no notice to creditors may be published and no creditor may file a claim at all. A corporate surety bond equal to the value of the property is normally required even if the will waived bond, and the route reaches no real property.

Sources & verification

Every figure on this page was checked against the official source on the date shown. The Tennessee Code Commission publishes the Code through a free public access site with no stable address for an individual section, so each citation below prints the section number to search for once the code is open.