Rutgers Law

New Jersey Statutes, Title: 3B, ADMINISTRATION OF ESTATES--DECEDENTS AND OTHERS

    Chapter 1:

      Section: 3B:1-2: Definitions I to Z.

          3B:1-2. "Incapacitated individual" means an individual who is impaired by reason of mental illness or intellectual disability to the extent that the individual lacks sufficient capacity to govern himself and manage the individual's affairs.

The term incapacitated individual is also used to designate an individual who is impaired by reason of physical illness or disability, substance use disorder, or other cause (except minority) to the extent that the individual lacks sufficient capacity to govern himself and manage the individual's affairs.

The terms incapacity and incapacitated refer to the state or condition of an incapacitated individual as hereinbefore defined.

"Intellectual disability" means a significant subaverage general intellectual functioning existing concurrently with deficits in adaptive behavior which are manifested during the development period.

"Issue" of an individual means a descendant as defined in N.J.S.3B:1-1.

"Joint tenants with the right of survivorship" means 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, but excludes forms of co-ownership in which the underlying ownership of each party is in proportion to that party's contribution.

"Local administration" means administration by a personal representative appointed in this State.

"Local fiduciary" means any fiduciary who has received letters in this State and excludes foreign fiduciaries who acquire the power of local fiduciary pursuant to this title.

"Minor" means an individual who is under 18 years of age.

"Nonresident decedent" means a decedent who was domiciled in another jurisdiction at the time of death.

"Parent" means any person entitled to take or who would be entitled to take if the child, natural or adopted, died without a will, by intestate succession from the child whose relationship is in question and excludes any person who is a stepparent, resource family parent, or grandparent.

"Per capita." If a governing instrument requires property to be distributed "per capita," the property is divided to provide equal shares for each of the takers, without regard to their shares or the right of representation.

"Payor" means a trustee, insurer, business entity, employer, government, governmental agency or subdivision, or any other person authorized or obligated by law or a governing instrument to make payments.

"Person" means an individual or an organization.

"Per Stirpes." If a governing instrument requires property to be distributed "per stirpes," the property is divided into as many equal shares as there are: (1) surviving children of the designated ancestor; and (2) deceased children who left surviving descendants. Each surviving child is allocated one share. The share of each deceased child with surviving descendants is divided in the same manner, with subdivision repeating at each succeeding generation until the property is fully allocated among surviving descendants.

"Personal representative" includes executor, administrator, successor personal representative, special administrator, and persons who perform substantially the same function under the law governing their status. "General personal representative" excludes special administrator.

"Representation; Per Capita at Each Generation." If an applicable statute or a governing instrument requires property to be distributed "by representation" or "per capita at each generation," the property is divided into as many equal shares as there are: (1) surviving descendants in the generation nearest to the designated ancestor which contains one or more surviving descendants; and (2) deceased descendants in the same generation who left surviving descendants, if any. Each surviving descendant in the nearest generation is allocated one share. The remaining shares, if any, are combined and then divided in the same manner among the surviving descendants of the deceased descendants, as if the surviving descendants who were allocated a share and their surviving descendants had predeceased the designated ancestor.

"Resident creditor" means a person domiciled in, or doing business in this State, who is, or could be, a claimant against an estate.

"Security" includes any note, stock, treasury stock, bond, mortgage, financing statement, debenture, evidence of indebtedness, certificate of interest or participation in an oil, gas, or mining title or lease or in payments out of production under the title or lease, collateral, trust certificate, transferable share, voting trust certificate or, in general, any interest or instrument commonly known as a security or as a security interest or any certificate of interest or participation, any temporary or interim certificate, receipt or certificate of deposit for, or any warrant or right to subscribe to or purchase, any of the foregoing.

"Stepchild" means a child of the surviving, deceased, or former spouse who is not a child of the decedent.

"Successor personal representative" means a personal representative, other than a special administrator, who is appointed to succeed a previously appointed personal representative.

"Successors" means those persons, other than creditors, who are entitled to real and personal property of a decedent under a decedent's will or the laws governing intestate succession.

"Testamentary trustee" means a trustee designated by will or appointed to exercise a trust created by will.

"Testator" includes an individual and means male or female.

"Trust" includes any express trust, private or charitable, with additions thereto, wherever and however created. It also includes a trust created by judgment under which the trust is to be administered in the manner of an express trust. "Trust" excludes other constructive trusts, and it excludes resulting trusts, guardianships, personal representatives, trust accounts created under the "Multiple-party Deposit Account Act," P.L.1979, c.491 (C.17:16I-1 et seq.), gifts to minors under the "New Jersey Uniform Gifts to Minors Act," P.L.1963, c.177 (C.46:38-13 et seq.), or the "New Jersey Uniform Transfers to Minors Act," R.S.46:38A-1 et seq., business trusts providing for certificates to be issued to beneficiaries, common trusts, security arrangements, liquidation trusts, and trusts for the primary purpose of paying debts, dividends, interest, salaries, wages, profits, pensions or employee benefits of any kind, and any arrangement under which a person is nominee or escrowee for another.

"Trustee" includes an original, additional or successor trustee, whether or not appointed or confirmed by court.

"Ward" means an individual for whom a guardian is appointed or an individual under the protection of the court.

"Will" means the last will and testament of a testator or testatrix and includes any codicil and any testamentary instrument that merely appoints an executor, revokes or revises another will, nominates a guardian, or expressly excludes or limits the right of a person or class to succeed to property of the decedent passing by intestate succession.

amended 1997, c.379, s.3; 2004, c.130, s.16; 2004, c.132, s.2; 2005, c.160, s.1; 2013, c.103, s.21; 2023, c.177, s.12.

This section added to the Rutgers Database: 2024-03-04 16:42:14.

Older versions of 3B:1-2 (if available):

Court decisions that cite this statute: CLICK HERE.