What happens to the deceased's bank account that is a joint account to the executor of the will?

Igloo572, I did not receive any money from my uncle and did not ask to be paid, I did it cause they wanted her to move out and she did not want to... Cause my gram had that right and once I moved in. they could not make her.... Yes I did keep copies of her bank statements.....

Final free - if account was not POD then grannie share of the bank account should have been listed as an asset of the estate.

I hope you have the bank statements and other items to prove this. If you do, then you will have to hire your own probate atty who does litigation to challenge your uncle & before probate is closed. Time is of the essence if you do this. Like get an atty ASAP. It pretty well needs to be one who does probate litigation. Will cost. Estate under 100k is pretty low value to warrant a challenge IMO, but if you have the $ go for it.

If probate has closed out and distribution done, it's going to be much harder. My experience is that for any distribution there will be paperwork sent to beneficiaries with w-9 and a statement that they accept the terms of the distribution. If others have accepted their check, they are accepting how the estate has been handled; how probate was done. There will be judges orders for approval all this too.

Really look at all the items in the docket. Probate is open court with public access to items filed. Could be all $ was spent on Grans house, bills, funeral, taxes. Etc.

So those 7 years you lived with grannie, were you paid for caregiving? Did you receive $ from gran or your uncle for caregiving? all done with taxes filed? I ask this cause if all was not done on the up & up, your uncle, if he wanted to go all nuclear on you, well he could file a w-2 on you for those payments. You could find yourself owing the IRS.
So think carefully.......

I just went through this last fall.

My parents held their banking account in joint account...(WROS....meaning: with rights of survivorship).

So, when Dad passed....I notified the bank (I am POA for mom and was for Dad too). The account was frozen for about a week while they did the paperwork and removed my Dad from the account. I waited till the last check I was expecting for Dad...then let the bank do it. New checks were issued. Ta Da .. done

Mom and I have set this whole thing up between the two of us...both ways. She is joint on my accounts, I am joint on hers. That way (god forbid) if I go first, my assets will continue to help Mom.

freqflyer,My gram told my mom my uncle(POA and then EXC) and my aunt sell the house cause she was alone and she was afraid they would make her. So my mom asked me if would want to live with her and of course I did not want my gram to worry. I moved in with her and then I started to take care of her (7yrs) and my uncle just had to pay the bills and drop off money ever month for food shopping and that is all he did. I do know the account was not a POD My grandparents wanted everything to be equal beside my uncle getting a little more for being a POA and EXC. I know also what was in account cause my gram had me open all mail...... I could not understand why everything was paid from the sale of the house(no mention of any other account) and my uncle gets 2x from that.

finalfree369, did Grandmother live at home or in Assisted Living? If she lived at home, did she have caregivers come in to help her? If yes to any of those questions, money can go quickly as those invoices are quite expensive. And those bills would probably be paid from that joint account.

I had a joint account with my Dad, so I could write check for him. I never co-mingled any of my own money into said account nor did I take any money out for myself. My Dad had caregivers, and Independent Living/Assisted Living which took big bites out of the balance in that account.

Unless the will says to, it might not be wise for your uncle to split the money from the sale of the house with the kids if he ever needs medicaid and they look back 5 years and see where that money went which would disqualify him from medicaid.

How the bank account was set up is going to be the determining factor.

If it was joint and POD (pay on death) to the other, then when grannie died the balance of 30k passed ownership to your uncle and the 30k passed outside of probate, so it was NOT a part of her estate.

It it was not POD, then her share of ownership would be a part of her estate.

You can easily find out which it is by looking at the probate court docket of documents submitted. It would be in the "Assets of the Estate" document which is submitted to the court and signed off by probate judge. If you are not in agreement with the asset listing, you kinda need to hire your own probate atty who does litigation to challenge the orders signed off by the judge...... it will cost to do this both $ and the goodwill of the court.