UPC_Definitions

Question 1

Agent

Answer 1

Includes an attorney-in-fact under a durable or nondurable power of attorney, an individual authorized to make decisions concerning another’s health care, and an individual authorized to make decisions for another under a natural death act.

Question 2

Beneficiary

Answer 2

Includes a person who has any present or future interest, vested or contingent, and also includes the owner of an interest by assignment or other transfer; refers to a beneficiary of an insurance or annuity policy, or other nonprobate transfer at death.

Question 3

Beneficiary designation

Answer 3

Refers to a governing instrument naming a beneficiary of an insurance or annuity policy, of an account with POD designation, or other nonprobate transfer at death.

Question 4

Child

Answer 4

Includes an individual entitled to take as a child under this Code by intestate succession and excludes a stepchild, foster child, grandchild, or any more remote descendant.

Question 5

Claims

Answer 5

Includes liabilities of the decedent or protected person, arising in contract, in tort, or otherwise, and liabilities of the estate which arise at or after the death of the decedent.

Question 6

Court

Answer 6

Means the court or branch in this State having jurisdiction in matters relating to the affairs of decedents.

Question 7

Descendant

Answer 7

Means all descendants of all generations, with the relationship of parent and child at each generation determined by the definition of child and parent in this Code.

Question 8

Devise

Answer 8

A testamentary disposition of real or personal property; when used as a verb, it means to dispose of real or personal property by will.

Question 9

Devisee

Answer 9

A person designated in a will to receive a devise; in the case of a devise to a trust or trustee, the trust or trustee is the devisee.

Question 10

Distributee

Answer 10

Any person who has received property of a decedent from their personal representative other than as a creditor or purchaser.

Question 11

Estate

Answer 11

Includes the property of the decedent, trust, or other person whose affairs are subject to this Code as originally constituted and as it exists during administration.

Question 12

Fiduciary

Answer 12

Includes a personal representative, guardian, conservator, and trustee.

Question 13

Foreign personal representative

Answer 13

A personal representative appointed by another jurisdiction.

Question 14

Formal proceedings

Answer 14

Proceedings conducted before a judge with notice to interested persons.

Question 15

Governing instrument

Answer 15

A deed, will, trust, insurance or annuity policy, account with POD designation, or similar instrument creating or exercising a power of appointment.

Question 16

Guardian

Answer 16

As defined in Section 5-102.

Question 17

Heirs

Answer 17

Persons, including the surviving spouse and the state, who are entitled under the statutes of intestate succession to the property of a decedent.

Question 18

Incapacitated person

Answer 18

An individual described in Section 5-102.

Question 19

Informal proceedings

Answer 19

Those conducted without notice to interested persons by an officer of the Court acting as a registrar for probate of a will or appointment of a personal representative.

Question 20

Interested person

Answer 20

Includes heirs, devisees, children, spouses, creditors, beneficiaries, and others having a property right in or claim against a trust estate or the estate of a decedent.

Question 21

Issue

Answer 21

Means descendant.

Question 22

Joint tenants with the right of survivorship

Answer 22

Includes co-owners of property held under circumstances that entitle one or more to the whole of the property on the death of the other or others.

Question 23

Lease

Answer 23

Includes an oil, gas, or other mineral lease.

Question 24

Letters

Answer 24

Includes letters testamentary, letters of guardianship, letters of administration, and letters of conservatorship.

Question 25

Minor

Answer 25

As defined in Section 5-102.

Question 26

Organization

Answer 26

A corporation, business trust, estate, trust, partnership, joint venture, association, government or any other legal or commercial entity.

Question 27

Parent

Answer 27

Includes any person entitled to take as a parent under this Code by intestate succession from the child whose relationship is in question.

Question 28

Payor

Answer 28

A trustee, insurer, business entity, employer, government, or any other person authorized or obligated by law to make payments.

Question 29

Person

Answer 29

An individual or an organization.

Question 30

Personal representative

Answer 30

Includes executor, administrator, successor personal representative, special administrator, and persons who perform substantially the same function under the law.

Question 31

Petition

Answer 31

A written request to the Court for an order after notice.

Question 32

Proceeding

Answer 32

Includes action at law and suit in equity.

Question 33

Property

Answer 33

Includes both real and personal property or any interest therein and means anything that may be the subject of ownership.

Question 34

Protected person

Answer 34

As defined in Section 5-102.

Question 35

Protective proceeding

Answer 35

A proceeding under Part 4 of Article V.

Question 36

Record

Answer 36

Information inscribed on a tangible medium or stored in an electronic medium and retrievable in perceivable form.

Question 37

Registrar

Answer 37

Refers to the official of the Court designated to perform the functions of Registrar as provided in Section 1-307.

Question 38

Security

Answer 38

Includes any note, stock, treasury stock, bond, debenture, evidence of indebtedness, certificate of interest or participation in an oil, gas, or mining title or lease.

Question 39

Settlement

Answer 39

In reference to a decedent’s estate, includes the full process of administration, distribution, and closing.

Question 40

Sign

Answer 40

With present intent to authenticate or adopt a record, to execute or adopt a tangible symbol, or to attach to the record an electronic symbol.

Question 41

State

Answer 41

A state of the United States, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, or any territory or insular possession under US jurisdiction.

Question 42

Successor personal representative

Answer 42

A personal representative, other than a special administrator, appointed to succeed a previously appointed personal representative.

Question 43

Successors

Answer 43

Persons, other than creditors, who are entitled to property of a decedent under the will or this Code.

Question 44

Survive

Answer 44

That an individual has neither predeceased an event, including the death of another individual, nor is deemed to have predeceased an event.

Question 45

Testacy proceeding

Answer 45

A proceeding to establish a will or determine intestacy.

Question 46

Testator

Answer 46

An individual who makes a will.

Question 47

Trust

Answer 47

Includes an express trust, private or charitable, and also includes a trust created by judgment under which the trust is to be administered in the manner of an express trust.

Question 48

Trustee

Answer 48

Includes an original, additional, or successor trustee, whether or not appointed or confirmed by court.

Question 49

Ward

Answer 49

An individual described in Section 5-102.

Question 50

Will

Answer 50

Includes codicil and any testamentary instrument that merely appoints an executor, revokes or revises another will, nominates a guardian, or expressly excludes or limits an individual’s right to inherit.