What does an executor do and what can they do without the heirs?

Types of executor

• Universal executor for the realisation of the estate. This executor takes possession of the estate, administers it, sells what is necessary and makes the payments. They then hand over the remaining money to whoever the testator named or use it for whatever the testator directed.
• Universal executor for the delivery of the residue. This executor pays debts, taxes, legacies and forced shares and sells only what is needed for those payments. They then hand over the rest of the assets to the heirs. If there is no estate partitioner, they also divide the estate. If the will does not make the type clear, the executor is taken to be of this kind.
• Particular executor. There is an heir and the executor only carries out specific tasks, such as delivering a legacy or dividing the estate. If no task was entrusted, the executor sees to the burial and the funeral and ensures that the obligations imposed by the testator are fulfilled.

The executor's duties

• Accepting the office is voluntary, but once it has been accepted, the executor can only give it up for just cause recognised by a notary or the court clerk. If an interested party formally calls on the executor before a notary to accept and the executor does not do so within a month, they are deemed to have declined.
• A universal executor must draw up an inventory of the estate within a year of accepting.
• The executor must carry out the task within the time limit set by the testator. If none was set and a year has passed since they accepted, any interested party can ask the notary to require them to finish within a set period, on pain of losing the office.
• The executor must always account to the heirs, even if the testator has excused them from doing so.
• The executor can be removed from office for wilful misconduct or gross negligence.

What the executor cannot do

• Go against what the testator provided.
• Give away assets of the estate. The executor can sell them when the law or the will allows it.
• Take decisions on behalf of the deceased's companies. The shares or quotas (“participaciones”) in them form part of the estate. The executor can manage them and even sell them, but cannot dispose of the company's assets. If what the deceased leaves is held within a company, the will must provide for how to get it out, for example by obliging the heirs to cooperate.
• Delegate their functions, unless the testator allows it.

This applies where the estate is governed by Catalan law. Under the Spanish Civil Code (“Código Civil”), unless the will gives the executor wider powers, the executor has very limited power to sell assets and does so with the involvement of the heirs.