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Estate inventory and submitting the deed of inventory to the Tax Administration

An estate inventory meeting must be held within three months from the death. The person who is the best informed on the deceased person’s wealth, usually their spouse or offspring, is responsible for the estate inventory.

Deeds of estate inventory are drawn up by banks, law offices, legal aid offices, etc. They also collect the documents relating to the deceased person’s assets and liabilities on your behalf. If you prepare the deed of estate inventory by yourself, make sure you have all the documents needed.

The Tax Administration has no template or form for a deed of estate inventory. You can use the templates available online and in book shops.

What should a deed of estate inventory include?

The deed of inventory should contain the information below. In addition, remember to enclose the required documents.

  • the deceased person’s heirs, surviving spouse, secondary heirs and other beneficiaries of the will; and their addresses and personal IDs
  • the person reporting the estate, and two trustees; they must sign the deed
  • the contact person’s name, address and telephone number
  • the heir’s or beneficiary's relationship to the deceased person
  • if an unmarried partner is a party to the estate, does either of the following apply:
    • the unmarried partner was previously married to the deceased person 
    • the unmarried partner and the deceased person have or have had a child together
  • the assets and liabilities of the deceased person and the surviving spouse on the day of death 
    • If the deceased person’s spouse died earlier but the spouse’s assets have not been divided yet, report the assets and liabilities of them both on the date of death of the later-deceased spouse.
  • whether the deceased person and the surviving spouse have a marital right to each other’s property
  • whether the surviving spouse will hand over any of the property to pay adjustment to the heirs of the spouse who died first
  • whether the surviving spouse will retain a right of possession to the apartment that was their home together
  • the will and any claims for lawful portions
  • any advancements made by the deceased person or the surviving spouse
  • gifts that an heir or a beneficiary of the will has received from the deceased person within the past three years prior to the death – give the date, value and description of the gift
  • insurance indemnities paid to the death estate or a beneficiary on account of the death – state the indemnity beneficiaries and amounts
  • a student loan granted to the deceased person – the value of the loan in the deed of inventory is €0. The death estate is not obliged to pay back a government-guaranteed loan.

Include the following deductions in the deed of estate inventory:

  • funeral expenses
  • expenses from the estate inventory
  • deceased person’s liabilities during lifetime

Liabilities include

  • home loan, hire-purchase debt, and credit card debt
  • deceased person’s tax debt during lifetime
  • water, electricity and telephone bills
  • unpaid medical expenses

Include the following documents: 

  • will and prenuptial agreement
  • deed of distribution if the estate has already been distributed
  • deed of partition or deed of estate distribution if the deceased person's spouse died earlier and if the distribution of matrimonial assets and the estate have been performed between the heirs of the deceased person and their earlier-deceased spouse.

Send us photocopies of the documents. Keep the original documents for yourself. 

In the enclosure, also state who is responsible for the death estate’s other tax matters. If it is a representative, every party to the estate must sign an authorisation in the deed of inventory or grant a separate power of attorney (Form 3630) (available in Finnish and Swedish, link to Finnish).

You do not have to enclose the following documents:

  • deposit balance statements
  • receipts of the estate’s expenses
  • extract from the personal register 
  • photocopy of another deed of estate inventory

We may ask you for more information later.

How to submit a deed of estate inventory

Submit a copy of the deed and its enclosures to the Tax Administration within 1 month of the estate inventory meeting.

Parties to the estate or the person reporting for the estate: If you handle the delivery of the deed to the Tax Administration yourself, use MyTax to submit it. It is enough if just one person among the parties to the estate delivers the deed. For instructions, see How to submit a deed of estate inventory in MyTax

Company managing the estate’s affairs: If you are a representative of a bank or a law firm, for example, and handle the affairs of an estate of a deceased person, you can log in to the Tax Administration's e-service to send the deed electronically. After you have submitted the document, you will receive an acknowledgement of receipt, which you can save or print out.

If you cannot submit the deed and its enclosures electronically, send them to the address:

Verohallinto – the Tax Administration
Perintö- ja lahjaverotus – Inheritance and gift taxes
PO Box 760
00052 VERO

The Tax Administration stores the estate inventory deed and its enclosures in electronic format and destroys the paper documents.

Send the deed of inventory in time – if you file it late, you will have to pay a late-filing penalty or punitive tax increase.

How to submit an additional account relating to a deed of estate inventory

If you need to supplement the deed of estate inventory later, do as follows:

If you cannot submit the additional account electronically, send it to the address

Finnish Tax Administration
Inheritance and gift taxation
P.O. Box 760
FI-00052 VERO.

If necessary, you can hand-deliver the documentation to your local tax office.

Frequently asked questions

A deed of estate inventory is always required, even when the deceased person did not leave any property behind.

You can request an extension

  • for the estate inventory within 3 months of the deceased person’s death
  • for filing the deed of estate inventory within 1 month of the estate inventory.

As a shareholder of the estate or as the, log in to MyTax to ask for an extension of time.

  • Go to the All tax types tab and then click the Activities relating to inheritance tax link under Inheritance tax. After that, click on Extended time for estate inventory or submitting the deed.

If you handle the estate’s affairs as a bank employee, for a legal aid office or if you are a legal counsel, etc., you can log in to the e-services of the Tax Administration to request an extension of time.

Alternatively, you can request an extension on Form 3626 (available in Finnish and Swedish, link to Finnish). Remember to enter your contact information and sign the form.

We grant an extension only for a justified reason.

The Tax Administration can only give instructions for what is required of the deed of estate inventory for purposes of inheritance taxes and submittal of the necessary tax return. If you plan to arrange the meeting for estate inventory with people participating over a remote connection, make sure that the deed you draw up will also meet the requirements of other parties that will need the estate inventory deed later, such as banks and the Digital and Population Data Services Agency.

As long as the deed meets the following requirements, it can be processed at the Tax Administration even if the meeting was conducted remotely:

  1. The deed must contain all required personal details on the shareholders of the estate, the beneficiaries of the will, and information on property and debts of the deceased and the surviving spouse (including the deed’s required enclosures), and information on the relationships under family law.
  2. The deed must contain an account of where, when and how the meeting was held, who were present and therefore aware of the matters discussed, and who presented matters for discussion.
  3. The deed must include declarations made under oath, and certificates from the person reporting the estate and from the trustees.

The Tax Administration stores the tax documents. If you need tax documents other than a deed of inventory for the estate inventory, please contact the Tax Administration. Tax Administration’s contact information

If you need someone else’s deed of estate inventory for the current estate inventory, see the question Can I request a photocopy of a deed of estate inventory from the Tax Administration?

You are entitled to receive information if you are

  • the deceased person’s surviving spouse
  • an heir
  • a beneficiary of the will
  • an administrator or executor of the estate, appointed by the district court.

The Tax Administration only needs one photocopy of the deed of estate inventory. 

However, we recommend that you make several signed (original) copies of the deed of estate inventory. You will need the original deed of inventory whenever you have to determine who can represent the estate. You will need the deed of inventory when you deal with the estate’s bank matters or if you want to register assets for the estate. 

Keep the original receipts enclosed with the deed of inventory that the heirs keep for themselves.

The Tax Administration stores the deed of estate inventory and its enclosures in an electronic format. When the deed is placed in electronic storage, the paper documents are destroyed.

Deeds of estate inventory are confidential. However, photocopies may be obtained for a justified reason. Photocopies may be subject to a charge. The Tax Administration’s price list on documents retrieved from the archive (in Finnish and Swedish)

How to submit a request for a photocopy

You are an inheritor or you are the person reporting the estate

You represent a bank, law firm or a similar organisation

If you cannot use MyTax or the e-service

Photocopies of deeds from before 1994

If the deed of estate inventory was drawn up before 1994, you should contact the District Court of the deceased person’s final municipality of domicile to ask for a photocopy. Contact information for District Courts in Finland: oikeus.fi

The Tax Administration keeps permanent records of deeds of inventory, including enclosures, drawn up in 1994 and later. For deeds drawn up before 1994, the archival period at the Tax Administration is 30 years.

As a private individual, you can log in to MyTax to send the deed either for yourself or on someone else’s behalf. For example, after you have logged in to MyTax with your own personal e-bank codes, you can send the Tax Administration a deed on behalf of a relative of yours. How to submit a deed of inventory in MyTax

If you handle the estate’s affairs and you are employed by a bank, a legal aid office or you are a legal counsel, etc., you can log in to the e-services of the Tax Administration to send the deed.

The Digital and Population Data Service Agency’s (often called the “DVV”) confirmation is not required. However, you can ask the DVV for certification of the personal information, recorded in the estate inventory deed, concerning estate shareholders and the surviving spouse.

Further information about the DVV's certification

The value of a right of possession is deducted from the value of the assets if

  • the will dictates how the deceased person’s property is managed
  • the surviving spouse claims the right to retain possession of the apartment that was their home together
  • someone had a right of possession to the property before the deceased person’s death, and the right of possession continues after the death.

We calculate the value of the right of possession based on the information given in the deed of inventory and then make the deduction. The value of a right of possession is determined in the same way as in gift taxation

Forms

Estate inventory — other pages

Key terms:

Page last updated 6/17/2022