Updated September 5, 2026. Quick answer: Connecticut’s elective share is not the one-third-of-everything, marriage-length figure most national pages describe. a life estate (not outright) of one-third (1/3) in value of all property passing under the will, after payment of debts and charges
What Connecticut actually sets out
| What the statute sets out | What it says |
|---|---|
| Conn. Gen. Stat. Sec. 45a-436 | “a life estate of one-third in value of all the property passing under the will, real and personal, legally or equitably owned by the deceased spouse at the time of his or her death, after the payment of all debts and charges against the estate.” |
| The share and what it is measured against | a life estate (not outright) of one-third (1/3) in value of all property passing under the will, after payment of debts and charges; measured against property passing under the will, net of debts and charges; probate-estate only. |
| Regime type | flat fraction, not tied to marriage length |
| Can it be waived | not addressed within Sec. 45a-436 itself; general waiver available via Connecticut’s Premarital Agreement Act |
| Time limit to file | written notice of intention to take the statutory share must be filed with the Probate Court within 150 days after the decree admitting the will to probate is mailed |
How it works in practice
- The share is measured against property passing under the will, net of debts and charges; probate-estate only.
- Partially. This state’s formula is limited to the property described above, which does not reach a properly funded revocable trust the same way an augmented-estate state’s formula does, so trust planning can change the outcome here specifically, though it does not change the analysis in a state with an augmented-estate formula.
- Waiver: Not addressed within Sec. 45a-436 itself; general waiver available via Connecticut’s Premarital Agreement Act.
- The election has to be affirmatively filed on a deadline: written notice of intention to take the statutory share must be filed with the Probate Court within 150 days after the decree admitting the will to probate is mailed.
The national picture, including the Uniform Probate Code sliding-scale schedule that a minority of states actually use, is on the elective share calculator page; this page is the record for Connecticut specifically, and its own numbers above should be used instead of the calculator’s national default for a Connecticut estate. The one thing that reliably defeats an elective share in every state that has one is explained on whether a prenup can waive the elective share. A newly widowed reader working through the fuller list of irreversible decisions, of which this is one, can start from the surviving spouse checklist.
What this page does not settle
- This session confirmed the core figure above against a primary or verbatim-mirror source, with one open point: Waiver point is general background, not confirmed against a specific cross-referenced clause.
- A state can amend or repeal this section without the page around it changing, and a detail specific to a reader’s own situation, such as a pending divorce, a premarital agreement, or property held jointly with right of survivorship, can change which part of the statute actually applies.
- Whether a revocable trust changes the outcome in Connecticut is explained above; that answer is specific to this state and does not generalize to any other one.
- Every quotation here was read against the source on September 5, 2026. Nothing on this page is legal advice, and the exact dollar or percentage amount a court awards depends on facts this page cannot know.
Whether this statute reaches a given family’s actual facts is decided by a court, not by this page. Nothing here is legal advice, and no one should sign a waiver or forgo an election on the strength of a web page.
Sources
The sources above were retrieved and read against the state text on September 5, 2026. Every quotation on this page was checked against those bytes.