Joint accounts pass to the survivor
Under 18-C M.R.S. § 6-212, part of Maine's Probate Code, sums remaining on deposit at the death of a party to a multiple-party account belong to the surviving party or parties, without a probate proceeding for those funds. If two or more parties survive and one is the decedent's surviving spouse, the amount the decedent was beneficially entitled to immediately before death belongs to that surviving spouse specifically.
Owners can change the rules mid-stream
Here's a genuinely useful, practical feature of Maine's framework: rights at a party's death are determined by the terms of the account as they stand at that time — and a party can actually alter those terms during their own lifetime. A party may change the account's terms, including whether it carries survivorship, simply by giving the financial institution a signed written notice changing the terms or varying payment under them. This gives account owners real, ongoing flexibility to update how their bank accounts are structured without necessarily having to close the account and open an entirely new one.
P.O.D. designations work independently
A single-party or multiple-party account can also carry a payable-on-death (P.O.D.) designation. The named P.O.D. beneficiary has no rights to the funds while any party to the account remains alive; once the last surviving party dies, the beneficiary can claim the remaining balance directly from the bank, without probate. If two or more P.O.D. beneficiaries survive, they take the funds in equal, undivided shares, and there's no further survivorship between the beneficiaries themselves after that point — if one of them later dies, their share simply passes through their own estate rather than to the other beneficiaries.
Tenancy in common as account designation
Maine's statute specifically allows an account to be designated as a tenancy in common, which establishes by definition that the account is without a right of survivorship. This gives account holders a clear, direct way to set up a shared account where each person's individual share genuinely passes through their own estate at death, rather than automatically to the other account holders.
A framework in effect since 2019
Maine's current multi-party account statute governs accounts established before, on, or after September 1, 2019, regardless of the specific form used to open the account, giving the framework broad, retroactive-style coverage over accounts opened well before that date as well as newer ones.
Real estate follows a related, but distinct, framework
The same basic survivorship concept extends to real estate under Maine's joint tenancy statute, though real property follows its own separate rules, including Maine's unusually detailed, specifically enumerated list of accepted survivorship phrasing.
Life insurance and retirement accounts
Life insurance and retirement accounts like a 401(k) or IRA follow the same basic beneficiary-designation rule: the named beneficiary receives the asset directly, outside probate, as long as they're alive when the owner dies. Either one becomes part of the probate estate only if no beneficiary was ever named, every named beneficiary predeceased the owner with no contingent beneficiary in place, or the policy or plan names the owner's own estate.