If a deceased owned a home in joint tenancy, does it pass through the estate at all or go straight to the survivor?

Generally, it goes straight to the surviving joint owner and doesn't form part of the deceased's estate at all. That's the core feature of a joint tenancy with a right of survivorship: when one joint owner dies, their interest doesn't pass under their will or through intestacy — it simply ends, and the surviving owner or owners become entitled to the whole property automatically, by operation of law, rather than through anything the estate trustee needs to administer.

Because of this, dealing with the property afterward is generally much simpler than an estate sale: the survivor typically just needs to register proof of death against title, rather than obtaining a Certificate of Appointment of Estate Trustee, since there's no estate administration step for this asset. This is very different from property the deceased owned as a tenant in common, or owned outright, which does form part of the estate and requires the trustee's authority before it can be sold or transferred. Because whether a property was actually held in joint tenancy, and whether that joint tenancy was ever severed before death, can sometimes be less clear-cut than it first appears, anyone dealing with jointly held property after a death should confirm the exact form of ownership before assuming how it will be treated.