Executor
Also called: personal representative
The person responsible for carrying out a will and settling the estate.
The person who does the actual work after a death: finding the accounts, valuing the property, paying the debts and taxes, and distributing what remains as the will directs.
It is a real job, not an honour. It commonly takes months and sometimes years, involves institutions that are slow and unsympathetic, and happens while the person is grieving. Naming someone without asking them is a considerable imposition.
Two decisions matter more than most people expect. Choose someone organised and willing, rather than automatically the eldest child or the closest relative — competence and availability serve everyone better than seniority. And name a substitute, since executors sometimes die first, fall ill, or decline.
The kindest preparation costs an afternoon: one findable page listing accounts, policies, where the will is kept, and any recurring payments — and one person told where that page lives. Executors routinely spend months simply discovering what exists.
In some countries a professional can be appointed instead, paid from the estate. Worth considering where the estate is complicated or the family is not.
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This term appears in the glossary of The Quiet Fortune, Volume III.