Generally speaking, estates are made up of probate and nonprobate property and assets. The terms probate estate, probate property, and probate assets refer only to those items in the estate that can be distributed by a will. For example, you can give money or real estate through a will, but you cannot give money paid by your life insurance policy (because your life insurance policy already has named beneficiaries that you established when you set up the policy and could change throughout your life).
