Updated September 4, 2026. Quick answer: Missouri is one of the only states where the probate code sets a percentage schedule for the attorney by name, not just the personal representative. RSMo 473.153 gives the attorney the same tiered percentages as a statutory minimum fee, identical to the executor’s schedule in the same statute.
RSMo 473.153: one statute, one schedule, two professionals
In Missouri the wrong-label problem mostly does not exist, because the statute puts the attorney and the personal representative in the same subsection scheme. Subsection 1 of RSMo 473.153 sets a tiered percentage schedule, 5% on the first $5,000, stepping down to 2% on everything over $1,000,000, and subsection 3 states that attorneys performing services for the estate at the instance of the personal representative shall be allowed out of the estate as the minimum compensation for their services sums equal to the percentages set forth in that schedule. That is a statutory minimum fee for the lawyer, not merely a description of what the executor gets.
A floor, not a cap, and who signs off on it
The probate division still approves every fee, and the statute allows more than the schedule when reasonable compensation for either the personal representative or the attorney exceeds it, without requiring proof the extra work was extraordinary. The schedule functions as a floor: the attorney is entitled to at least the percentage amount and can petition for more if the actual work justifies it, all subject to the court’s sign-off in the final settlement.
The same-firm trap and the misconduct forfeiture
Missouri’s statute closes an obvious loophole: when one lawyer in a firm serves as personal representative and another lawyer in the same firm serves as the estate’s attorney, RSMo 473.153 allows only one fee under the schedule, not two, and it withholds any allowance for legal services performed by an attorney who is also the personal representative unless the will, a court order, or the consent of the affected heirs authorizes it. It also strips the attorney of any fee whatever if the court finds the attorney’s services or actions were wrong, improper, or injurious to the estate.
The rest of the arithmetic: Missouri probate cost.
How the fee models compare across all 51 jurisdictions: probate cost by state, and the national picture on what a probate attorney costs.
Statutory text read at each state’s own legislature or official code publisher. General information, not legal advice; fee statutes change and a court retains the final say on what is reasonable.
The attorney fee above is separate from what the court itself charges just to open the case, see the Missouri probate filing fee.