Clear Money Guide
What this guide covers
A quick view of the questions and evidence developed below.
Updated August 3, 2026. Quick answer: Iowa’s schedule is a ceiling. The statute allows such reasonable fees as the court determines, “but not in excess of” the listed commissions — so the percentages are the most that can be paid, not an entitlement, and courts routinely allow less.
The maximum schedule
Iowa Code §633.197 allows personal representatives such reasonable fees as the court determines for services rendered, but not in excess of the following commissions on the gross assets of the estate listed in the probate inventory, as full compensation for all ordinary services: 6% of the first $1,000; 4% of the overplus between $1,000 and $5,000; and 2% of all above $5,000.
Ceiling against floor: Iowa and Missouri
Put Iowa next to Missouri and the difference is the whole lesson of this topic. Both publish a percentage schedule in statute. Missouri’s is a minimum the court must meet and may exceed. Iowa’s is a maximum the court may not exceed and frequently does not reach. An identical estate, identically administered, produces a different fee in each — and any article that reports both as “statutory percentage states” has told you nothing useful.
The base, and the attorney
The base is gross probate inventory assets, with life insurance excluded unless payable to the estate. Iowa applies the same ceiling schedule to attorney fees under §633.198, and extraordinary fees are possible on a showing to the court.
What the whole process costs in this state: Iowa probate cost. Every state’s fee model side by side: probate cost by state.
Work out the number: the executor fee calculator. How the standard is applied where no schedule exists: reasonable-compensation states. Whether to take the fee at all: when the executor is also an heir, and how the fee is taxed.
Statutory text read at each state’s own legislature or official code publisher. General information, not legal advice; a court retains the final say on what compensation is allowed.
An executor’s fee only arises if the estate is actually administered, and the answer is on when probate is required in Iowa, which gives Iowa’s qualifying value for the small-estate route and what that route does not reach.