Did your marriage just void your Will?

Here's a fact that somehow has remained little known: marriage typically invalidates your will. Unless your Will was drafted in contemplation of marriage (i.e. this specific marriage is mentioned in the Will), the Will is invalidated upon marriage.

So what does this mean? The simple answer is that it means either draft your Will in anticipation of an upcoming marriage, or get a new Will prepared as soon as possible following marriage! Otherwise, you are at risk of dying intestate, and the Succession Law Reform Act will determine who gets your assets (this is typically a split according to specific allotment between your new spouse and any children, either from this or previous marriages).

The rationale for this forced invalidation is to of course protect a new spouse from an old Will that was prepared before he or she was in the deceased's life, but without addressing this simple matter the deceased's estate may not reflect his or her wishes, while the surviving spouse may not receive what the deceased would have otherwise wished.

Please contact our firm if you have any questions regarding Wills, or Estate Planning and we would be pleased to assist.

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