Removing an Executor in San Antonio

A Bexar County probate judge will remove an executor only for a specific failure the Estates Code recognizes, and the application needs to show that failure with dates and documents. Frustration with the executor is not enough.

Delay Alone Is Not Enough

Texas gives independent executors a lot of room to work, which is the purpose of independent administration. A complicated estate often takes more than a year even when nobody does anything wrong, and a few quiet months do not justify removal.

Delay becomes a ground for removal when it violates a statutory deadline. Under Estates Code 404.0035(a) the probate court may remove an independent executor on its own motion, after 30 days’ written notice, if the executor neglects to qualify, fails to return an inventory and list of claims or an affidavit in lieu before the 91st day after qualifying absent an extension, or fails to timely file the affidavit or certificate required by Section 308.004. Whether those documents were filed is easy to check.

Estates Code 404.0035(a).

Estates Code 404.003 provides the other route: removal on application, after notice and a hearing. One ground is a material conflict of interest, which is the issue we see most often, such as when the executor is also the buyer, the tenant, or the sibling living in the house.

If the problem is silence rather than self-dealing, Estates Code 404.001 helps. Fifteen months after the executor qualifies, a beneficiary may demand an accounting, and if the executor does not provide one within 60 days, the beneficiary can ask the court to compel it. That turns “he will not tell me anything” into a formal demand with a deadline.

How Removal Works in Bexar County

1. Tie each duty to a date. We start with the order admitting the will, the date letters issued, and the docket sheet. Qualification drives the 91st day under 404.0035(a), and a wrong date in the application is easy for the other side to attack.
2. Send a written demand. Past 15 months, a written demand under 404.001 produces either the accounting or a refusal, and a refusal helps the removal case.
3. File the application with the order attached. The Bexar County probate courts’ local rules, approved September 25, 2026, require a separate proposed order as a lead document in e-filing for every motion (Rule 2.4). Rule 3.2(a) requires a beneficiary to have an attorney, and under 3.2(b) the clerk accepts the filing but the court acts only once counsel appears.
4. The matter becomes contested. Under Local Rule 6.1(a) a written opposition to any application makes the matter contested automatically, and the court may set a scheduling conference.
5. Use the court’s own deadlines. If a required Inventory, Annual Account or Annual Report is more than 60 days past deadline, Local Rule 8.1(d) lets the court set a dismissal hearing, and Rule 8.2(a) makes whoever wants the case kept alive file a verified Motion to Retain seven days beforehand. A removal application combined with a dismissal setting gets the executor’s attention.
6. Mediation. Rule 6.2(b) says that absent good cause the court generally requires mediation before a contested matter is set for final trial, and Rule 6.2(e) wants lead counsel and someone with full settlement authority there in good faith. Many removal cases end at mediation with a resignation and an agreed successor.
7. Hearing or trial. Bexar has three statutory probate courts under Gov’t Code 25.0171(c): Judge Oscar J. Kazen in Court No. 1, Judge Veronica Vasquez in Court No. 2, Judge Barbie Scharf-Zeldes in Court No. 3, all at 100 Dolorosa, with matters other than mental health docketed at random among them. Estates Code 55.002 gives a party in a contested probate proceeding the right to a jury; Local Rule 6.3(a) requires the demand and fee 30 days before the non-jury setting.
8. Successor, accounting, and turnover. Removal does not close the estate. It changes who is in charge of it. In the same proceeding we ask the court to account for what passed through the outgoing executor’s hands and to order records and property handed over.

What to Bring Us

You do not need a legal theory before you call. Documents matter more, and most of them are in the public court file or your email.

• The will as admitted and the order admitting it.
• The date the executor qualified. The deadlines in 404.0035(a) run from that date.
• Whether an inventory and list of claims, or an affidavit in lieu, was filed, and when.
• Every written request you made and every reply, texts included.
• Any sale, lease, loan or transfer of estate property, especially to the executor, a relative, or a connected company.
• Bank, brokerage or title paperwork you hold. Do not try to obtain records you are not entitled to.
• Names and addresses of the other beneficiaries. They will be parties, and their positions will affect the case.

Under Gov’t Code 25.0173(a) all three Bexar statutory probate courts can decide the issue of title to real or personal property. If part of your dispute is over who owns a house or a tract of land, it can usually be decided in the same court.

Who Serves After Removal

Decide this early. If the will names a successor willing and able to serve, that is the easiest path.

If the will names nobody, or the successor is tangled in the same dispute, the court appoints someone else and the beneficiaries’ views carry weight. Where trust has broken down badly, a dependent administration can be the better outcome even though it is slower, because a dependent administrator needs court approval before spending estate money or selling property.

If that person is also trustee of a family trust, say so early. Because Bexar has statutory probate courts, the estate dispute and a related trust dispute can often be heard in one court, not two.

Estates Code 32.006; Property Code 115.001(d)(1).

What We Don’t Handle

KREIG San Antonio is a probate litigation practice. We do not handle routine uncontested administration, muniment of title, small estate affidavits, affidavits of heirship, or wills and estate planning. If there is no dispute, another firm can do that work for less.