What Counts as an Advancement
Parents often help their children financially during their lifetime. A down payment on a house, a cash gift for a business, or property transferred early. The question is whether those gifts should reduce what the child receives from the estate after the parent dies.
The answer depends entirely on documentation. A lifetime gift is only treated as an advancement against an heir's intestate share if there is written proof.
Property the decedent gave during the decedent's lifetime to a person who, at the decedent's death, is an heir is treated as an advancement against the heir's intestate share only if the decedent declared in a contemporaneous writing or the heir acknowledged in writing that the gift is an advancement.
A.R.S. § 14-2109(A)Without that written declaration, the gift is simply a gift. It does not reduce the heir's share of the estate.
How Gifts Are Valued
When a gift does qualify as an advancement, it is valued at the time the heir received it or the time of the parent's death. Whichever comes first is the value used. This prevents inflation or market changes from distorting the calculation.
If the heir who received the advancement dies before the parent, the gift is not counted against that heir's descendants. The parent's writing must say otherwise for that to happen. This protects grandchildren from being penalized for a gift their parent received.
Why Written Records Matter
For families where one child received significant help during the parent's lifetime, having a clear written record prevents disputes. Without documentation, siblings may disagree about whether a gift was meant to be an early inheritance or a simple act of generosity. A properly drafted estate plan can address these situations directly. It makes the parent's intentions unmistakable and avoids conflict during an already difficult time.