As'sets (Norman-French asez, 'enough,' from late Lat. ad satis, 'to sufficiency'), a term signifying the property of a deceased person which is sufficient in the hands of his executor and heir for the payment of his debts and legacies. In strictness, therefore, the term is not applicable to the property of a person who dies intestate, and without any debts to be paid. In general acceptance, however, it is understood to mean the property left for distribution by a deceased person, whether testate or intestate; and in commerce, and also in bankruptcy and insolvency, the term is used to designate the stock in trade and entire property of all sorts belonging to a merchant or to a trading association.
Assets are either personal or real, the former comprehending such goods, chattels, and debts as devolve on the executor; and the latter including all real estate, whether devised or descending to the heir at law. In connection with this distinction, assets are also said to be assets by descent, and assets in hand, the former of these being recoverable from the heir to whom the land descends, and so far as such lands will extend—assets in hand, again, signifying such property as a person leaves to his executors sufficient for the clearing of burdens and bequests affecting his personal estate. Assets are also in their nature either legal or equitable, according to the nature of the remedy which may be used by creditors against the executor or heir. Where there are several creditors of equal degree, the executor is bound to pay him who first obtains judgment for his debt; and he cannot resist on the ground that nothing will be left for the other creditors. If, after exhausting the whole assets which have come to his hands, by the payment of debts in due order, he be afterwards sued by a creditor remaining unpaid, he is entitled to protect himself by an allegation that he has fully administered, or technically by a plea of plene administravit; and upon this plea the creditor is entitled to judgment that he shall be paid out of any other assets that shall come to the defendants—which is called a judgment of assets in futuro.
Assets is not a law term in Scotland, but it is nevertheless much used in the business of that country.
In the United States, the assets are broken up into several funds, and where some of the creditors can resort to two or more funds, while others can legally only resort to one, a court of equity will, by 'marshalling assets,' compel the more fortunate creditors to exhaust the fund first upon which they have the exclusive claim; or, if they have been satisfied from the general fund, to permit others to stand in their place as to the exclusive fund, that so an equitable division of assets may be made among all the creditors.