By Milan Chatterjee | Founding Attorney, Milan Legal |
Most of what is written about Nevada estate planning would apply to any state. Six provisions would not. Nevada recognizes a will typed on a phone, a will written entirely by hand with nobody watching, a trust that becomes creditor-proof on a two-year clock, and a trust that can run for three and a half centuries. Three probate thresholds also changed in 2025, and much of the published material has not caught up.
1. A Handwritten Will Needs No Witnesses
Nevada estate planning starts with the ordinary rule, so the exception makes sense. Under NRS 133.040, a will executed in Nevada is not valid unless it is in writing and signed by the testator, or by an attending person at the testator’s express direction, and attested by at least two competent witnesses who subscribe their names to the will in the presence of the testator.
NRS 133.090 then sets that aside for one form. A holographic will is a will in which the signature, date and material provisions are written by the hand of the testator, whether or not it is witnessed or notarized. It is subject to no other form, and may be made in or out of this State. Any person of sound mind over 18 may dispose of their whole estate this way, with the estate remaining chargeable with the testator’s debts.
Three things carry the weight: signature, date and material provisions, all in the testator’s hand. A printed form with handwritten blanks filled in is not a holographic will, because the material provisions are not handwritten. That is the commonest way these fail.
2. Nevada Recognizes an Electronic Will
Nevada was the first state to authorize electronic wills, and the requirements are more specific than the concept suggests.
Under NRS 133.085, an electronic will must be created and maintained in an electronic record, must contain the date and the electronic signature of the testator, and must include at least one of three further things.
The first is an authentication characteristic, which the section defines as a characteristic unique to the testator and measurable and recognizable in an electronic record, and which may include a fingerprint, a retinal scan, or voice or facial recognition. The second is the electronic signature and electronic seal of an electronic notary public, where the testator signed in the notary’s presence and the notary applied the seal in the testator’s presence. The third is the electronic signatures of two or more attesting witnesses, where the testator signed in their presence and they signed in the testator’s.
The section does not apply to trusts, except a trust contained in an electronic will, and validity and interpretation are decided as for a will under NRS 133.040, subject to NRS 133.085 to 133.088.
Two of those surrounding provisions matter in practice. Under NRS 133.086 an electronic will is self-proving only if it designates a qualified custodian to maintain custody of the electronic record, and was at all times under that custodian’s custody before being reduced to a certified paper original. The document and its chain of custody are one question rather than two, and an electronic will nobody can produce in the required form after death is a will that does not work.
Under NRS 133.088, people count as present even when in different locations if they can communicate by means of audio-video communication, defined as communication by which a person can see, hear and communicate with another person in real time, and any requirement that a document be signed may be satisfied by an electronic signature. That is what makes a remotely witnessed signing possible at all.
3. The Spendthrift Trust Runs on a Two-Year Clock
This is the provision that draws out-of-state money into Nevada estate planning, and the number is the whole of it.
NRS 166.170(1) limits when a creditor may bring an action with respect to a transfer of property to a spendthrift trust. A person who was already a creditor when the transfer was made must commence the action within the later of two years after the transfer, or six months after the person discovers or reasonably should have discovered it. A person who becomes a creditor after the transfer is made must commence the action within two years after the transfer.
Subsection 2 matters as much as subsection 1: discovery is treated as the date a public record of the transfer is made. So recording, where recording is possible, starts the six-month clock running rather than leaving it open.
So a transfer that survives two years is largely beyond reach, and the planning only works before a claim is on the horizon. A transfer made with a dispute already brewing is the fact pattern these actions are brought on.
Check the Dates Before Anything Is Signed
The date of a transfer, the date it was recorded, and the date a claim arose are the three facts that decide whether the two years in NRS 166.170 are doing any work.
4. A Trust Can Last 365 Years
Most states limit how long a trust may hold property through some version of the rule against perpetuities. Nevada’s version is unusually generous.
Under NRS 111.1031(1), a nonvested property interest is invalid unless, when the interest is created, it is certain to vest or terminate no later than 21 years after the death of a natural person then alive, or the interest either vests or terminates within 365 years after its creation.
Three and a half centuries is long enough that the constraint stops being legal and becomes a drafting problem: who administers it, how beneficiaries are defined across generations nobody can name, and what happens when the original purpose stops making sense. A template does not do that work.
5. Three Probate Thresholds Changed in 2025
If you have read anything about Nevada probate limits, check the date on it. Nevada estate planning advice goes stale here faster than anywhere else in the subject: SB404 in the 2025 session raised three thresholds, and much of the published material still shows the old figures.
The smallest procedure is the affidavit of entitlement under NRS 146.080, available 40 days after the death. The applicable amount is $25,000 for most claimants and, as amended, $150,000 where the claimant is the surviving spouse. Certain assets sit outside the calculation.
Next is setting aside an estate without administration under NRS 146.070, now available where the value of the estate does not exceed $150,000, raised from $100,000. A petition cannot be filed until 30 days after the death. Where the decedent is survived by a spouse or minor children the court must set the estate aside for their benefit, and may do so without the payment of creditors except as it finds necessary to prevent a manifest injustice.
Above that is summary administration under NRS 145.040, where the gross value of the estate after deducting encumbrances does not exceed $500,000, raised from $300,000. Beyond that, general administration applies.
Some property never reaches any of those procedures. Under NRS 111.671 the owner of an interest in property may create a deed which conveys that interest and becomes effective upon the death of the owner, known as a deed upon death, and the statutory form prescribed by NRS 111.695 states on its face that the deed is revocable. Real property passing that way does not go through probate, although NRS 146.070(5) shows that nonprobate transfers can still bear on a set-aside calculation.
So these thresholds are not merely procedural conveniences. The difference between an estate that clears the $150,000 line and one that does not is months of court process, and how assets are titled changes the answer.
6. Nevada Estate Planning and the Choice of Entity
The sixth difference is a consequence of the first five rather than a single statute. Nevada’s trust and entity law are usually used together, because a trust holding an interest in an entity is a different proposition from a trust holding the underlying assets.
Which means the decision about how a business is held belongs in the estate plan rather than beside it, and the entity’s own characteristics, including what a creditor of an owner can reach, bear directly on it. Those are set out in LLC versus corporation for Nevada business owners.
The Milan Legal Perspective
Milan Chatterjee is licensed in Nevada and California, a UCLA School of Law graduate and former Associate Compliance Counsel at Las Vegas Sands Corp. He has served on the Nevada Supreme Court’s Access to Justice Commission and is Founding President of the South Asian Bar Association of Las Vegas.
The pattern worth naming about Nevada estate planning is that the state’s advantages are all time-sensitive and the documents are not. A two-year creditor period under NRS 166.170 only helps someone who started it two years ago. A holographic will fails on handwriting nobody checked. A 365-year trust under NRS 111.1031 is only as good as the administration provisions drafted into it on day one. None of that is fixable afterwards, which is the opposite of how most people treat estate documents.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, if it is genuinely handwritten. NRS 133.090 recognizes a holographic will in which the signature, date and material provisions are written by the hand of the testator, whether or not it is witnessed or notarized, and says it is subject to no other form. Any person of sound mind over 18 may use one. A printed form with handwritten answers filled in does not qualify, because the material provisions are not in the testator’s hand.
Two. Under NRS 133.040 a will executed in Nevada is not valid unless it is in writing and signed by the testator, or by an attending person at the testator’s express direction, and attested by at least two competent witnesses who subscribe their names in the presence of the testator. Holographic and electronic wills are the exceptions.
Yes, and the requirements are specific. NRS 133.085 requires an electronic record containing the testator’s date and electronic signature, plus one of three things: an authentication characteristic unique to the testator, such as a fingerprint, retinal scan, or voice or facial recognition; the electronic signature and seal of an electronic notary public, with the testator signing in the notary’s presence; or the electronic signatures of two or more attesting witnesses signing in the testator’s presence. Under NRS 133.086 it is self-proving only if a qualified custodian held the electronic record at all times before it was reduced to a certified paper original.
Two years in most cases. Under NRS 166.170(1), a creditor who already existed when a transfer to a spendthrift trust was made must sue within the later of two years after the transfer or six months after discovering it, and a creditor whose claim arises after the transfer must sue within two years of the transfer. Subsection 2 treats discovery as the date a public record of the transfer is made, so recording starts the shorter clock.
Up to 365 years. NRS 111.1031(1) validates a nonvested property interest that is certain to vest or terminate no later than 21 years after the death of a natural person alive when the interest was created, or that vests or terminates within 365 years after its creation.
An affidavit of entitlement under NRS 146.080 is available 40 days after death where the applicable amount is not exceeded: $25,000 for most claimants, or $150,000 for a surviving spouse as amended in 2025. Above that, NRS 146.070 allows a court to set aside an estate without administration where its value does not exceed $150,000, on a petition no earlier than 30 days after death. Real property can also pass outside probate through a deed upon death under NRS 111.671.
It is a shortened court process. Under NRS 145.040 the court may order summary administration where the gross value of the estate, after deducting encumbrances, does not exceed $500,000. That figure was raised from $300,000 by SB404 in the 2025 session, so older guidance showing the lower number is out of date. Estates above the limit go through general administration.
Yes. SB404 in the 2025 session raised the NRS 146.070 set-aside threshold from $100,000 to $150,000, the surviving-spouse figure in NRS 146.080 from $100,000 to $150,000, and the NRS 145.040 summary administration limit from $300,000 to $500,000. Several widely used public statute databases still display the superseded figures, so check the Legislature’s own site before relying on a number.
Start With What You Already Have
In Nevada estate planning the useful first step with existing documents is checking which form each one takes and whether it still meets the section it was drafted under, because that decides whether anything needs redoing at all.
Conclusion
Nevada estate planning is worth doing in Nevada rather than generically, and the reasons are specific.
NRS 133.090 accepts a will in your own handwriting with no witnesses, and rejects a filled-in form. NRS 133.085 accepts an electronic will on terms that include a fingerprint, a retinal scan or an electronic notary. NRS 166.170 makes a transfer to a spendthrift trust largely unassailable two years on, which only helps if the two years have run. NRS 111.1031 allows 365 years, which turns the question into how it will be administered. And the 2025 amendments moved three probate thresholds to $25,000, $150,000 and $500,000.
Each of those is a date or a number, and every one of them is easier to get right before the documents are signed than afterwards.
