Probate Fees by Province (and Legal Ways to Reduce Them)
The estate is the last step of how much you need to retire only in the sense that a plan which ignores it spends money twice. The working plan is the seven-step retirement plan. The retirement calculator does not subtract probate. It ends with an account balance. What happens to that balance, and which assets never enter the estate, is the point of this page and of wills and powers of attorney.
- Ontario, reviewed on ontario.ca October 3, 2026: no Estate Administration Tax at $50,000 or under. Above that, the published example is $15 per $1,000 on the value over $50,000, estate rounded up to the next $1,000.
- British Columbia’s Probate Fee Act: no fee at $25,000 or under. Then $6 per $1,000, or part, of the slice above $25,000 up to $50,000, plus $14 per $1,000, or part, above $50,000. The Supreme Court Civil Rules add a $200 fee to start the proceeding, waived at $25,000 or under.
- Alberta’s court-fee page, Surrogate Matters: $35, $135, $275, $400, and $525 as the net value of property in Alberta crosses $10,000, $25,000, $125,000, and $250,000. The top row is a cap, not a percentage.
- Saskatchewan’s Administration of Estates Regulations, 2020, Table 1, charges $200 for the grant application. Manitoba’s court-fee page lists a $250 notice of application and does not publish a percentage of the estate. Neither page is a rate you can scale to a million dollars.
- Ontario’s own page is also the reduction list: no certificate means no tax, and named beneficiaries and joint property with survivorship are excluded from the value. Other provinces define the estate in their own statutes.
What did each loaded page actually charge?
| Place | What the official page charges | Source reviewed |
|---|---|---|
| Ontario | $0 at $50,000 or less. Over that, $0 on the first $50,000 and $15 per $1,000 of the remainder, after rounding up to the next $1,000. Published example: $240,000 pays $2,850. | Estate Administration Tax |
| British Columbia | Probate Fee Act: $0 if the estate does not exceed $25,000. Above that, $6 per $1,000 or part from $25,000 to $50,000, plus $14 per $1,000 or part above $50,000. Civil Rules item 1: $200 to commence, and no fee under that item if the estate does not exceed $25,000. | Probate Fee Act and Supreme Court Civil Rules |
| Alberta | Grant of probate or administration, net value in Alberta: $35 at $10,000 or less; $135 over $10,000 to $25,000; $275 over $25,000 to $125,000; $400 over $125,000 to $250,000; $525 over $250,000. | Alberta court fees, Surrogate Matters |
| Saskatchewan | Table 1 of the regulations: $200 to apply for letters probate or administration. $300 for an application under section 7 of the Act. This is a registrar tariff. A separate percentage tax was not in the PDF. | Administration of Estates Regulations, 2020 |
| Manitoba | Court fees page, probate section: notice of application $250, caveat $30, application to pass accounts $150, search $20 or $40. No percentage of estate value is printed there. | Manitoba Court Services fees |
| Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador, Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut | Not loaded. Do not borrow another province’s percentage. | Check that province or territory’s court tariff before you estimate. |
Table as of October 2026. Fees can be owed in more than one province when property sits in more than one province. Ontario says real estate outside Ontario is not included in its tax. British Columbia’s Act charges the value of the estate that falls under that Act. Alberta’s schedule says “property in Alberta.” A cottage in a second province is not free just because the will was probated at home.
Ontario: $1,000,000 is already a round thousand. The slice above $50,000 is $950,000, which is 950 thousands. At $15 per thousand, that is $14,250. British Columbia’s Act: 25 thousands in the band above $25,000 and up to $50,000, times $6, is $150, plus 950 thousands above $50,000 times $14, which is $13,300. The Act fee is $13,450. The Civil Rules $200 is on top if that item applies, for $13,650. Alberta: the row “over $250,000” is $525, so $1,000,000 is $525 on that schedule, not a percentage. Saskatchewan’s $200 and Manitoba’s $250 are the application fees those pages state. They are not a claim that a $1,000,000 estate in those provinces costs $200 or $250 in total, because a charge outside those pages was not reviewed. Every dollar in this box is arithmetic on a loaded schedule, or a refusal to invent one.
What does Ontario leave out of the estate?
Ontario’s page is specific, and it should not be copied onto another province as if the exclusions were national. For the Estate Administration Tax, Ontario says the value includes real estate in Ontario net of a mortgage or lien, bank accounts, investments including a TFSA, RRSP, and RRIF, vehicles, property held in another person’s name, and other property wherever situated, including insurance if the proceeds are left to the estate. It then lists what not to include. Insurance paid to a named beneficiary is out. Assets held jointly that pass automatically to the other owner are out. Real estate outside Ontario is out. The CPP death benefit is out. A registered pension plan, RRSP, RRIF, or TFSA with a beneficiary designation or beneficiary declaration is out. A TFSA or RRSP with no beneficiary is in the list of investments that are included. The designation is the difference, not the account type.
Ontario also says that if no estate certificate is applied for, or none is issued, no tax is owed. A certificate is something a bank or the land registry may still demand. “No certificate” is not a plan if the asset cannot move without one. If the court issues a certificate limited to the assets referred to in a particular will, only those assets go into the value. That is the multiple-will point, and it is Ontario’s wording. It is a drafting job for a lawyer, not a second will you write to hide a house.
Joint ownership can keep an asset off Ontario’s tax, and it can also gift the asset, expose it to the other person’s creditors, and change the tax cost. A beneficiary designation on an RRSP keeps it off Ontario’s estate value and does not, by itself, stop the RRSP from being income of the deceased or of a beneficiary who is not a rollover spouse. The tax at death is tax-efficient wealth transfer and retirement income planning. Probate is the court fee. Income tax is the larger bill on a registered account with no rollover.
Which reductions are legal because a statute already excludes the asset?
- Name a beneficiary on the RRSP, RRIF, TFSA, pension, and life insurance where the contract and the province allow a designation. Ontario’s page treats that designation as an exclusion. Confirm the other province before you rely on it. A designation in a will and a designation on the contract can conflict. The institution will follow the one its form recognizes.
- Use joint ownership only when you mean the other person to own the asset. Ontario excludes property that passes automatically by survivorship. It does not exclude a house you merely hoped would skip probate. A resulting-trust fight is more expensive than the tax.
- Do not probate assets nobody needs a certificate to transfer. Ontario charges the tax only if a certificate is applied for and issued. Small accounts, and some jointly held accounts, move without one. A lawyer in the province is who tells you which asset is which.
- Keep property out of a second province if you do not want a second grant. The schedules above are territorial. A recreational property is the usual surprise. The cottage article on the real-estate side is the lifestyle version. The fee version is this table.
- Do not use an insurance illustration as a probate number. A life insurance death benefit paid to a named beneficiary is outside Ontario’s estate. The premium and the coverage are a different decision, in the insurance guide.
Frequently asked questions
Is Ontario 1.5% of the whole estate?
Not on the example Ontario publishes. $15 per $1,000 is 1.5%, and the example applies it to the value above $50,000, after rounding up, with $0 on the first $50,000. An estate of $50,000 or less pays no Estate Administration Tax, and still files an Estate Information Return within 180 days if a certificate was issued. Estates that applied before January 1, 2020 used $5 per $1,000 on the first $50,000 and $15 above that. That older schedule is not the one for a certificate you apply for now.
Does British Columbia charge $14 per $1,000 on the entire estate?
No. The Act charges nothing at $25,000 or under. The $6 rate applies only to the band between $25,000 and $50,000. The $14 rate applies only to the value above $50,000. Partial thousands count as a full thousand. The $200 commencement fee in the Civil Rules is a separate item, waived when the estate does not exceed $25,000.
Is Alberta really capped?
On the court-fee page reviewed October 3, 2026, a grant where the net value of property in Alberta is over $250,000 costs $525. A larger estate does not move into a higher row, because there isn’t one. Other filings on that page, such as $300 to open certain estate files, can still apply. The $525 is the grant line, not a promise that the estate’s legal bill is $525.
Why is Quebec missing?
The Quebec page requested on October 3, 2026 did not load. Quebec succession is not the common-law grant these other statutes describe, and this article will not state a fee, or state that a notarial will skips every fee, without that page. Read the current Quebec source before you plan as if probate were $0.
Do RRSPs always avoid probate?
Not as a category. Ontario includes RRSPs and RRIFs in the estate, and then excludes them when there is a beneficiary designation or declaration. No designation, and the account is in the value. A designation to the estate puts the proceeds back in. A designation to a spouse can also be an income-tax rollover. Those are two different statutes. One saves the Estate Administration Tax. The other defers income tax. You can have either without the other.
Should I put my adult child on the house title to save the fee?
Only if you intend them to own it now, with the creditor, marital, and tax consequences that follow. Ontario’s exclusion is for joint property that actually passes by survivorship, not for a name added as a shortcut. The tax on a disposition you did not mean to make can exceed the fee. Get advice in the province before you change title. The retirement housing decision, while you are alive, is housing in retirement.
Sources
- Ontario: Estate Administration Tax, reviewed October 3, 2026
- British Columbia: Probate Fee Act
- British Columbia: Supreme Court Civil Rules, Schedule 1, item 1
- Alberta: court fees, Surrogate Matters
- Saskatchewan: The Administration of Estates Regulations, 2020, Table 1
- Manitoba: Court Services fees, probate section
The court fee is a tariff. The registered account is income.
A beneficiary designation can do both jobs, or only one. The 2026 tax guide is the income-tax half of an estate.
Get the 2026 Tax Guide — $49 CAD
