Texas Estates Code · Chapter 114
Transfer on Death Deed
A transfer on death deed is the one probate alternative that is not a court procedure at all. The owner signs a deed, records it with the county clerk while still alive, and at death the house passes to the named beneficiary with no application, no executor, and no court order. When it works it is the cheapest transfer in Texas law. When it fails, and the usual reason is that nobody recorded it, the family finds out months later from a title company. Below is Chapter 114 in plain English, a validator that walks the statutory conditions in order, and how the recording actually works in Harris County.
What it is
A deed the owner signs and records during life that moves Texas real property to a named beneficiary at death, outside probate. Added by the Legislature effective September 1, 2015.
The one requirement that fails
It must be recorded before the owner dies (Sec. 114.055(3)). An unrecorded deed has no effect on title, no matter how properly it was signed.
A will does not override it
Sec. 114.057(b): a will may not revoke or supersede a transfer on death deed. Only a recorded instrument can.
Harris County
Recorded with the Harris County Clerk’s Real Property Records, not the District Clerk and not the probate court. After death the beneficiary records an affidavit of death, with no court order needed when the deed is valid.
Survival rule
The beneficiary must outlive the owner by 120 hours (Sec. 114.103(a)(1)). Short of that, the share lapses.
Creditor window
Two years from death for a proceeding to reach the property for estate claims and allowances (Sec. 114.106(e)).
Did the Transfer on Death Deed Actually Take Effect?
Chapter 114 imposes its conditions in a fixed order, and a deed that fails any one of them passes nothing. This walks them in that order. It is general information, not legal advice about your relative’s deed.
Was the deed recorded in the county deed records before the owner died?
Logic follows Tex. Est. Code §§ 114.003, 114.054, 114.055, 114.057, 114.102 and 114.103. Read the text of each below.
Why This Deed Is Both the Cheapest Transfer in Texas and the Easiest to Get Wrong
Every other route in this resource layer runs through a courthouse. A muniment of title needs an application and a hearing. An administration needs an executor, an oath, and an inventory. Even a small estate affidavit is filed with the clerk and approved by a judge. Chapter 114 is the one instrument that asks nothing of the court: the owner records a deed during life, and at death the property is simply the beneficiary’s. There is no filing fee at the probate court, no notice to creditors, no executor, and no waiting on a docket.
That is also why it fails so often. A court procedure has a clerk who rejects an incomplete application and a judge who asks questions. A transfer on death deed has nobody checking anything until the owner is dead and a title company pulls the chain. By then the three or four facts that decide whether it worked are fixed and unfixable: whether it was recorded before death, who signed it, whether the beneficiary outlived the owner by five days, and what else hit the deed records in between. Section 114.055(3) is the one that catches most families. Recording is not paperwork cleanup to be done eventually. It is a condition of the deed existing as a legal instrument at all.
The second misconception is about control. Because the deed is recorded years before death, people treat it as settled, and a named beneficiary often believes they own something. Section 114.101(7) says otherwise: the deed creates no legal or equitable interest in the beneficiary during the owner’s life. The owner can sell the house, mortgage it, or record a new deed naming someone else the next morning, and the beneficiary has no standing to object and no right to notice. Section 114.056 confirms the beneficiary need never even be told the deed exists.
A Transfer on Death Deed Against the Court Alternatives
| Route | When it is available | Court involved? | Acts on |
|---|---|---|---|
| Transfer on Death Deed (Ch. 114) | Only if the owner recorded one before dying | No | Only the property described in the deed |
| Muniment of Title (Ch. 257) | Valid will, no unsecured debts, within four years of death | Yes, application and hearing | Everything the will passes |
| Affidavit of Heirship (Ch. 203) | No will, documenting heirs to clear title | No, recorded with the county clerk | Real property, as evidence of heirship |
| Independent Administration (Ch. 401) | Debts to pay, assets to manage, or a dispute | Yes, executor appointed | The whole estate |
The comparison is less about choosing and more about sequence. A transfer on death deed is not an alternative a family selects after a death; it either exists in the deed records or it does not. The real decision comes when it does not, or when it covered the house and left everything else untouched. At that point the question is whether a muniment of title, an affidavit of heirship, or a full independent administration fits what is left.
How a Transfer on Death Deed Is Recorded and Cleared in Harris County
Chapter 114 is state law, but it points at a county office, and for a Houston house that office is the Harris County Clerk. The deed never touches the Harris County probate courts unless it failed:
- The County Clerk records it, not the District Clerk. Section 114.055(3) requires recording in “the deed records in the county clerk’s office of the county where the real property is located.” In Harris County that is the County Clerk’s Real Property Records. The District Clerk keeps district court case files and is the wrong office for this, a mix-up that sends people searching the wrong database and concluding no deed exists.
- Verify the file stamp, not the signature date. Search the Harris County Clerk’s real property records by the decedent’s name or the legal description, and compare the recording date on the stamp against the date of death. Those two dates decide the case. A notarized deed with no file stamp is not a Chapter 114 instrument.
- After the death, the beneficiary records an affidavit of death. Chapter 114 does not prescribe a form for this, and no court order is needed when the deed is valid, but a title company will expect the deed records to show that the owner died and the named beneficiary survived. In practice that means recording an affidavit of death, sworn and notarized, with a certified copy of the death certificate, in the same Real Property Records. Until that is on file, the chain reads as though the owner is still alive.
- The homestead exemption does not transfer with the house. Section 114.101(1)(C) protects the owner’s exemptions during life, and that protection ends at death. A beneficiary who moves in must apply to the Harris County Appraisal District for their own residence homestead exemption in their own name. An over-65 or disabled-veteran exemption the parent held does not carry over at all.
- The two-year window shapes a sale. Section 114.106(e) gives a personal representative or, after a 90-day demand period under 114.106(c), a creditor or taxing authority until the second anniversary of the death to reach the property for estate claims and allowances. A Harris County title company asked to insure a sale inside that window will often want an indemnity, a holdback, or proof the estate is solvent.
- Two or more beneficiaries own fractions, not rooms. Under 114.103(a)(3) they take equal undivided shares with no right of survivorship. If one wants to sell a Harris County house and another wants to keep it, the deed supplies no tiebreaker, and the remedy is a partition suit.
The deed is not the whole estate
A transfer on death deed moves one described property and nothing else. Bank accounts, vehicles, other real estate, and personal property still need probate or their own transfer procedure, and the four-year deadline to probate a will under Section 256.003 keeps running from the date of death whatever the deed accomplished. Families who treat a working deed as the end of the matter sometimes discover the rest of the estate is time-barred.
The Statute: Texas Estates Code Chapter 114
Chapter 114, the Texas Real Property Transfer on Death Act, added effective September 1, 2015 and amended through 2025. The text below is the operative language, public record, with a plain-English note under each section. The shorter definitional and housekeeping sections are listed after it. The complete official version is on the Texas Legislature site.
Sec. 114.003. Applicability
This chapter applies to a transfer on death deed executed and acknowledged on or after September 1, 2015, by a transferor who dies on or after September 1, 2015.
Chapter 114 has a hard start date. Texas did not recognize transfer on death deeds before September 1, 2015, and the chapter reaches only deeds signed and acknowledged on or after that date by an owner who also died on or after it. A deed drawn up in 2012 and found in a drawer is not a Chapter 114 instrument, whatever it is labeled, and the house passes through the estate instead.
Sec. 114.051. Transfer on Death Deed Authorized
An individual may transfer the individual's interest in real property to one or more beneficiaries effective at the transferor's death by a transfer on death deed.
The whole authorization is one sentence. An owner may name one or more beneficiaries to receive the owner's interest in Texas real property, with the transfer taking effect only at death. Note what is transferred: "the individual's interest," not the whole property. An owner who holds a half interest can pass only that half.
Sec. 114.054. Capacity of Transferor; Use of Power of Attorney
(a) The capacity required to make or revoke a transfer on death deed is the same as the capacity required to make a contract.
(b) A transfer on death deed may not be created through use of a power of attorney.
Two rules that decide cases. The capacity standard is contractual capacity, which is a higher bar than the testamentary capacity needed to sign a will, so a deed signed late in a decline is more vulnerable than a will signed the same day. And subsection (b) is absolute: an agent under a power of attorney cannot create one of these deeds, no matter how broad the power of attorney is. A transfer on death deed signed by a child acting as agent for a parent is void, and that is a common and expensive discovery after the parent dies.
Sec. 114.055. Requirements
To be effective, a transfer on death deed must:
(1) except as otherwise provided in Subdivision (2), contain the essential elements and formalities of a recordable deed;
(2) state that the transfer of an interest in real property to the designated beneficiary is to occur at the transferor's death; and
(3) be recorded before the transferor's death in the deed records in the county clerk's office of the county where the real property is located.
This is the threshold test, and subdivision (3) is the one that fails. The deed must be recorded in the county's deed records before the owner dies. Signing it is not enough. Notarizing it is not enough. A deed sitting in a safe deposit box, in a lawyer's file, or in an envelope marked "to be filed" has no effect on title at all. For a Houston house, "the county where the real property is located" means the Harris County Clerk's Real Property Records, not the District Clerk and not the probate court. If the file stamp is dated after the death, the deed never took effect and the house is part of the estate.
Sec. 114.057. Revocation by Certain Instruments; Effect of Will or Marriage Dissolution
(a) Subject to Subsections (d) and (e), an instrument is effective to revoke a recorded transfer on death deed, or any part of it, if the instrument:
(1) is one of the following: (A) a subsequent transfer on death deed that revokes the preceding transfer on death deed or part of the deed expressly or by inconsistency; or (B) except as provided by Subsection (b), an instrument of revocation that expressly revokes the transfer on death deed or part of the deed;
(2) is acknowledged by the transferor after the acknowledgment of the deed being revoked; and
(3) is recorded before the transferor's death in the deed records in the county clerk's office of the county where the deed being revoked is recorded.
(b) A will may not revoke or supersede a transfer on death deed.
(c) If a marriage between the transferor and a designated beneficiary is dissolved after a transfer on death deed is recorded, a final judgment of the court dissolving the marriage operates to revoke the transfer on death deed as to that designated beneficiary if notice of the judgment is recorded before the transferor's death in the deed records in the county clerk's office of the county where the deed is recorded, notwithstanding Section 111.052.
(d) If a transfer on death deed is made by more than one transferor, revocation by a transferor does not affect the deed as to the interest of another transferor who does not make that revocation.
(e) A transfer on death deed made by joint owners with right of survivorship is revoked only if it is revoked by all of the living joint owners.
(f) This section does not limit the effect of an inter vivos transfer of the real property.
Subsection (b) is the single most surprising sentence in the chapter: a will cannot revoke a transfer on death deed. An owner who signs a deed in 2019 leaving the house to one child, then signs a will in 2024 leaving "all my property" to all three children, has not changed anything about the house. The deed wins, and the will's residuary clause never reaches it. Revocation takes a recorded instrument, acknowledged after the deed and recorded before death. Divorce is the same trap in reverse: under (c) the divorce decree revokes the deed as to an ex-spouse only if notice of the judgment was recorded in the deed records before death. A decree sitting in the district clerk's file is not recorded in the deed records, and the ex-spouse may still take the house.
Sec. 114.101. Effect of Transfer on Death Deed During Transferor's Life
During a transferor's life, a transfer on death deed does not:
(1) affect an interest or right of the transferor or any other owner, including: (A) the right to transfer or encumber the real property that is the subject of the deed; (B) homestead rights in the real property, if applicable; and (C) ad valorem tax exemptions, including exemptions for residence homestead, persons 65 years of age or older, persons with disabilities, and veterans;
(2) affect an interest or right of a transferee of the real property that is the subject of the deed, even if the transferee has actual or constructive notice of the deed;
(3) affect an interest or right of a secured or unsecured creditor or future creditor of the transferor, even if the creditor has actual or constructive notice of the deed;
(4) affect the transferor's or designated beneficiary's eligibility for any form of public assistance, subject to applicable federal law;
(5) constitute a transfer triggering a "due on sale" or similar clause;
(6) invoke statutory real estate notice or disclosure requirements;
(7) create a legal or equitable interest in favor of the designated beneficiary; or
(8) subject the real property to claims or process of a creditor of the designated beneficiary.
While the owner is alive the deed does nothing. That is the design, and it answers most of the questions families ask before signing one. The owner keeps the right to sell or mortgage the house. The Harris County Appraisal District exemptions are untouched, so an over-65 or disabled-veteran exemption is not lost by recording the deed. The mortgage's due-on-sale clause is not triggered. The beneficiary gets no interest yet, which also means the beneficiary's own creditors and divorce cannot reach the house. Subdivision (7) is the reason the deed is such a weak promise: a named beneficiary has nothing until the owner dies, and can be written out the day after.
Sec. 114.102. Effect of Subsequent Conveyance on Transfer on Death Deed
An otherwise valid transfer on death deed is void as to a subsequent grantee of an interest in real property that is conveyed by the transferor during the transferor's lifetime after the transfer on death deed is executed and recorded if:
(1) a valid instrument conveying the interest or a memorandum sufficient to give notice of the conveyance of the interest is recorded in the deed records in the county clerk's office of the same county in which the transfer on death deed is recorded; and
(2) the recording of the instrument or memorandum occurs before the transferor's death.
An owner who records the deed and later sells the house has effectively undone it, without filing any revocation. The later conveyance, once recorded before death, makes the transfer on death deed void as to the buyer. Read with Section 114.101(1)(A), which preserves the right to sell, this is the mechanism: the owner never lost control. It also means a beneficiary reading an old recorded deed cannot stop at that document. The chain after it has to be checked.
Sec. 114.103. Effect of Transfer on Death Deed at Transferor's Death
(a) Except as otherwise provided in the transfer on death deed, this section, or any other statute or the common law of this state governing a decedent's estate, on the death of the transferor, the following rules apply to an interest in real property that is the subject of a transfer on death deed and owned by the transferor at death:
(1) if the designated beneficiary survives the transferor by 120 hours, the interest in the real property is transferred to the designated beneficiary in accordance with the deed;
(2) the share of any designated beneficiary that fails to survive the transferor by 120 hours lapses, notwithstanding Section 111.052, and is subject to and passes in accordance with Subchapter D, Chapter 255, as if the transfer on death deed were a devise made in a will; and
(3) subject to Subdivision (2), concurrent interests are transferred to the beneficiaries in equal and undivided shares with no right of survivorship.
(b) If a transferor is a joint owner with right of survivorship who is survived by one or more other joint owners, the real property that is the subject of the transfer on death deed belongs to the surviving joint owner or owners. If a transferor is a joint owner with right of survivorship who is the last surviving joint owner, the transfer on death deed is effective.
(c) If a transfer on death deed is made by two or more transferors who are joint owners with right of survivorship, the last surviving joint owner may revoke the transfer on death deed subject to Section 114.057.
(d) A transfer on death deed transfers real property without covenant of warranty of title even if the deed contains a contrary provision.
Three facts here decide what the family actually owns. First, the beneficiary must outlive the owner by 120 hours, five full days, or the share lapses and is routed through the anti-lapse rules in Chapter 255 as though the deed were a will provision. A beneficiary who dies four days after the owner takes nothing under the deed. Second, subsection (b) means a survivorship co-owner beats the deed: if the owner held the house jointly with right of survivorship and another joint owner is still alive, the house goes to that joint owner and the deed never fires. Third, subdivision (3) is the one that creates litigation. Two or more beneficiaries take equal, undivided shares with no right of survivorship, which makes them co-tenants with no mechanism for deciding anything. When those co-owners disagree about selling, the remedy is a partition suit. And (d) means nobody warrants the title: the beneficiary inherits whatever the chain actually holds.
Sec. 114.104. Transfer on Death Deed Property Subject to Liens and Encumbrances at Transferor's Death; Creditors' Claims
(a) Subject to Section 13.001, Property Code, a beneficiary takes the real property subject to all conveyances, encumbrances, assignments, contracts, mortgages, liens, and other interests to which the real property is subject at the transferor's death. For purposes of this subsection and Section 13.001, Property Code, the recording of the transfer on death deed is considered to have occurred at the transferor's death.
(b) If a personal representative has been appointed for the transferor's estate, an administration of the estate has been opened, and the real property transferring under a transfer on death deed is subject to a lien or security interest, including a deed of trust or mortgage, the personal representative shall give notice to the creditor of the transferor as the personal representative would any other secured creditor under Section 308.053. The creditor shall then make an election under Section 355.151 in the period prescribed by Section 355.152 to have the claim treated as a matured secured claim or a preferred debt and lien claim, and the claim is subject to the claims procedures prescribed by this section.
(c) If the secured creditor elects to have the claim treated as a preferred debt and lien claim, Sections 355.154 and 355.155 apply as if the transfer on death deed were a devise made in a will, and the creditor may not pursue any other claims or remedies for any deficiency against the transferor's estate.
(d) If the secured creditor elects to have the claim treated as a matured secured claim, Section 355.153 applies as if the transfer on death deed were a devise made in a will, and the claim is subject to the procedural provisions of this title governing creditor claims.
The deed moves the house, not the debt on it. The beneficiary takes subject to every mortgage, lien, judgment, and contract against the property at the date of death, and the mortgage does not accelerate or disappear. The timing rule at the end of (a) matters in a title dispute: the recording is treated as happening at death, not on the day the deed was filed, so a lien recorded in the years between filing and death still attaches ahead of the beneficiary.
Sec. 114.105. Disclaimer
A designated beneficiary may disclaim all or part of the designated beneficiary's interest as provided by Chapter 122.
A beneficiary is not forced to take the house. Chapter 122 allows a disclaimer, which is worth considering when the property carries more debt, deferred maintenance, or tax exposure than equity, or when the beneficiary is facing creditors of their own. A disclaimer has strict form and timing requirements and cannot be undone, so it is not a decision to make casually.
Sec. 114.106. Liability for Creditor Claims; Allowances in Lieu of Exempt Property and Family Allowances
(a) To the extent the transferor's estate is insufficient to satisfy a claim against the estate, expenses of administration, any estate tax owed by the estate, or an allowance in lieu of exempt property or family allowance to a surviving spouse, minor children, or incapacitated adult children, the personal representative may enforce that liability against real property transferred at the transferor's death by a transfer on death deed to the same extent the personal representative could enforce that liability if the real property were part of the probate estate.
(b) Notwithstanding Subsection (a), real property transferred at the transferor's death by a transfer on death deed is not considered property of the probate estate for any purpose, including for purposes of Section 546.0403, Government Code.
(c) If a personal representative does not commence a proceeding to enforce a liability under Subsection (a) on or before the 90th day after the date the representative receives a demand for payment, a proceeding to enforce the liability may be brought by a creditor, a distributee of the estate, a surviving spouse of the decedent, a guardian or other appropriate person on behalf of a minor child or adult incapacitated child of the decedent, or any taxing authority.
(d) If more than one real property interest is transferred by one or more transfer on death deeds or if there are other nonprobate assets of the transferor that may be liable for the claims, expenses, and other payments specified in Subsection (a), the liability for those claims, expenses, and other payments may be apportioned among those real property interests and other assets in proportion to their net values at the transferor's death.
(e) A proceeding to enforce liability under this section must be commenced not later than the second anniversary of the transferor's death, except for any rights arising under Section 114.104(d).
(f) In connection with any proceeding brought under this section, a court may award costs and reasonable and necessary attorney's fees in amounts the court considers equitable and just.
This is the section that stops a transfer on death deed from being a way to put a house beyond creditors. If the rest of the estate cannot cover its debts, administration expenses, estate tax, or a surviving spouse's or minor child's statutory allowance, the personal representative can reach the house the deed just moved, exactly as if it had been probate property. Subsection (e) sets the outside limit: a proceeding must be brought within two years of death. That two-year window is why a title company often hesitates on a sale early in the period, and why selling before it closes usually calls for an indemnity or a holdback. Subsection (b) keeps the house out of the probate estate for every other purpose, including Medicaid estate recovery, but (a) still lets a representative reach it for the listed claims.
Also in Chapter 114, summarized here for length
- Sec. 114.001. Short title, the Texas Real Property Transfer on Death Act. See the official text.
- Sec. 114.002. Definitions, including beneficiary, joint owner with right of survivorship, and transferor. See the official text.
- Sec. 114.004. Nonexclusivity, the chapter does not displace other ways to transfer real property. See the official text.
- Sec. 114.005. Uniformity of application and construction with other states. See the official text.
- Sec. 114.006. Relation to the federal Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act. See the official text.
- Sec. 114.052. A transfer on death deed is revocable regardless of any contrary provision in the deed. See the official text.
- Sec. 114.053. A transfer on death deed is a nontestamentary instrument. See the official text.
- Sec. 114.056. Notice, delivery, acceptance, and consideration are not required for the deed to be effective. See the official text.
Source: Texas Estates Code, Chapter 114, published by the Texas Legislative Council at statutes.capitol.texas.gov. Statutory text is in the public domain. The plain-English notes, Harris County guidance, and deed validator are original and © Houston Probate Attorney.
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