I helped my Dad with my Mom's estate recently. It took 10 1/2 months and cost a few thousand dollars.
She died in June 2016 in Idaho with a will and an A/B bypass trust. Idaho is a community property state and my parents had a marriage settlement agreement, and so she had 50% of my parents' investments. She owned no real property, having sold their home about 10 years prior to move into their retirement facility. Idaho has no estate or inheritance taxes, and everything was very clear and there were no disputes among any of the heirs. Her estate mostly went into the bypass trust.
There was some life insurance but that was handled outside of probate because the policies had long ago been transferred into an ILIT.
Things that took time: We had to wait on the attorney for probably three to four months total to do his stuff. The paperwork that my parents completed was quite old (completed in 1999), contemplated my father dying first, and had not been reviewed or updated for changes in taxes and tax law. As a result, we consulted with estate attorneys and a CPA and decided to do a TEDRA agreement, which took time to write up, review, sign, and submit to the court. We also had to publish a death notice and wait a few months for any creditors (we knew there weren't any, but my Dad wanted to follow the process).
Things that took money: The attorney had to write up the executor appointment papers, the death notice in the paper, the TEDRA agreement, the trust registration, the estate inventory, and an allocation agreement. As noted above, we also consulted with another estate attorney and a CPA, who billed separately for their time and advice.
It was a list of tasks, but my Mom was pretty organized about things and everything was documented and had been discussed and reviewed in general beforehand and my Dad was still around to make the few decisions that remained. Also, Idaho is a pretty laid-back state when it comes to probate requirements from the court. Finally, she died in June and we transferred everything with fortuitous timing, so the only tax return we had to deal with for 2016 was my Dad's MFJ federal and state returns.
If there were squabbles among the heirs, or if assets or liabilities were unclear/missing/had to be searched for, or if the state had higher requirements, or if the estate documents were not in good order, then I can imagine that the job of executor would be exponentially more difficult and unappealing.
On my next update to my will, I plan to include a payment to my executor (my sister) as a token of appreciation for her service and help to my kids who I hope will outlive me, with the option for her to decline it if she so chooses. If you're executor on several other wills, you may want to figure out how you feel about that and talk with those wills' owners as needed. Just a thought.
@imoldernu, I thought wills were individual documents, yet you write as though you have one will for two people. How does that work? Just curious.