Please pardon my ignorance as I am not savvy at all on the legalities of what is correct. A little insight.. My parents married 30 years, joint assets, home, car, bank accounts. In addition, my father received a settlement from a class action suit which was put in a joint account. They have 2 credit cards...one is joint, and the other is not. My mother did not find out about this card until right before he passed. In the will everything is given to my mother. Giving this information...would she be responsible. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Okay, let me try to explain. Any asset that was jointly in both of their names should pass to your mother outside of the estate. So, your mom wouldn't have to go through probate to claim those assets, they would just be hers.
Any assets that were solely in your father's name would cause the will to need to be probated to get those assets to your mother, and that would mean opening an estate.
If your father had no separate assets, so that everything passed to your mother outside of any estate, then no, she would not be responsible, either directly or indirectly for his separate credit card debt.
However, if its necessary to open an estate and probate his will for her to collect any assets that were solely in his name, then indirectly she would end up being responsible for the credit card debt because the estate would end up being responsible for the debt.