Maryland homeowners can now name who gets their house at death and have it pass outside probate, using a transfer-on-death deed that became legal on October 1, 2026. House Bill 738, signed by the governor on May 26 as Chapter 751, creates the deed for the first time in the state.
The deed lets an owner stay in full control of the property for life and hand it to a chosen heir the moment the owner dies. It is built for the common situation of an older homeowner who wants a child to inherit without the cost and delay of an estate case.
What the new deed does
The enacted text of Chapter 751 establishes a transfer-on-death deed that takes effect at the owner’s death. The owner names one or more beneficiaries and can add alternates in case a first choice dies early. Nothing passes to the beneficiary while the owner is alive.
The deed does not need the beneficiary’s knowledge or acceptance during the owner’s life. The law’s revised fiscal and policy note describes the instrument as nontestamentary, meaning it works outside a will, and says it requires no consideration, which is the legal term for payment or an exchange of value.
When the owner dies, the heir can record a notice of the death in the county land records, but the transfer does not depend on that notice. The deed itself does the work, which is the reason a house covered by one does not need to be opened in an estate case just to change names.
What the deed must contain to work
The deed has to be executed and acknowledged, and it must follow the same signing rules as a will, with one difference: it states that the transfer happens at the owner’s death. The statutory form asks for the owner’s name and address, a legal description of the property, the primary beneficiary and any alternates, a signature, a notary acknowledgment and a preparer’s certification.
The form’s notice warns against signing under pressure and says witnesses and notaries cannot be relatives or beneficiaries. When several beneficiaries are named without a stated ownership style, they take as joint tenants with rights of survivorship, so a surviving co-heir absorbs a share if another dies first.
Recording is the step that makes it valid. A deed is effective only if, before the owner dies, it is recorded in the land records of the county where the property sits. A deed left in a drawer, however carefully signed, passes nothing under this law.
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What it costs to record
The Act does not set a recording fee for these deeds. What it does is remove the taxes that usually come with a transfer. A transfer-on-death deed is exempt from recordation tax when the property is the owner’s primary or secondary residence, and the exemption reaches State and county transfer tax as well.
That exemption is narrower than it sounds. It covers the tax on recording the deed for a primary or secondary home, not every kind of Maryland property, and the law says nothing about income or estate tax treatment later. The same note also points to a $40 surcharge that circuit court clerks impose on recordable instruments, a charge separate from the taxes.
A clerk may refuse to record a transfer-on-death deed that lacks the intake sheet Maryland uses for land records. Several routine filing steps do not apply to these deeds, including the assessment-office endorsement, but the intake sheet remains. Owners who want the exact fee for their county should ask the circuit court clerk’s land records office.
What the deed does not do
The deed changes nothing during the owner’s life. It does not limit the right to sell or mortgage the house, does not give the beneficiary any interest, and does not expose the property to the beneficiary’s creditors.
It also does not clean the title. After death, the beneficiary takes the house subject to existing mortgages, liens and security interests, and the transfer carries no warranty of title. A child who inherits through the deed inherits the loan with it, as with any other inheritance of a mortgaged home.
The owner can change course by recording a revocation, recording a new transfer-on-death deed, or recording an ordinary deed that expressly revokes the earlier one. A will cannot revoke it, and neither can a note written on the deed. The law also says the deed does not affect the owner’s or beneficiary’s eligibility for public assistance.
Where probate still matters
Probate is the court-supervised process through which a Register of Wills appoints a personal representative to settle an estate. Maryland’s Registers of Wills describe their role as appointing those representatives and handling the duties around decedents’ estates, and they state that their offices cannot give legal advice.
A transfer-on-death deed covers the house, and only the house. A bank account, a car or a brokerage account still follows its own beneficiary designation or the will, and an estate can still be needed to settle debts. The deed shrinks the estate case; it does not abolish the need to plan the rest.
The General Assembly’s bill page lists Chapter 751 as approved May 26 with an October 1, 2026 effective date, and the text ties the new law to older property concepts. Chapter 751 directs courts to interpret and enforce the deed in line with existing law on life estates with powers of alienation, to the extent practicable. The Act’s definition of joint owner includes a tenant by the entirety, so married couples holding a home that way are within it.
Would the Maryland house still go through probate?
The cost of getting this wrong is a house that lands in an estate case anyway. Under Chapter 751 a deed that is signed but never recorded before death passes nothing, and a beneficiary named on the wrong form can undo careful planning.
The Pass It On Checklist is an 11-page guide that puts a deed and beneficiary checklist beside a plain account of what probate does and does not cover. It includes a transfer-on-death deed so the house can skip probate in many states, plus the will-or-living-trust comparison that decides what else needs a plan.
Its beneficiary audit worksheet walks through every beneficiary form with a primary and a backup named, which is the same primary-and-alternate structure the Maryland deed uses.
Get the deed and beneficiary checklist for the house and the accounts →
This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
