Did you know that there were over 242,000 marriages registered in the UK in 2018? That’s an awful lot of happy couples pledging to spend their lives together and share everything – with a legally binding contract to go with it. Marriage changes a lot of things in your lives, but one of the things that seems to cause the most confusion is actually about another stage in life – death. More specifically, what happens to your will if you get married, and what impact does it have on your estate?
Marriage and Wills
If you live in the UK, getting married can have a huge impact on any existing will you have. To the extent that, once you get married, your ‘pre-marriage’ will is automatically revoked. So if you don’t then have another one written, you will become one of the 60% of people who don’t have a will in place when they pass away.
If you do die without having a new will written, then you will be considered by the government as having died ‘intestate’. This means that your estate will be handled under the rules of intestacy, and the government decides who your beneficiaries are and how your estate and assets are split. You have absolutely no say in it. This is usually done in the simplest method possible, but with the more complex the estate, the more complex dividing it becomes, so it can take a long time to sort out. It also means that any specific wishes you had for your estate will not be followed, as you need a will to enforce these in the eyes of the law.
The Rules of Intestacy
The rules of intestacy are there to handle the estate of anyone who dies without a will in place. They state that:
- If you’re married with children and your estate is under £270K, your spouse will automatically inherit everything.
- If you’re married with children and your estate is over £270K, then your spouse would receive the first £270K, and the remaining amount would be split between your spouse and children. So 50% of the remaining money would go to your spouse, and the other 50% would be split between your children.
Something important to know about the intestacy rules is that they only recognise biological or legally adopted children as your beneficiaries. This means that any step-children or foster children in your life will not legally be entitled to anything from your estate. The only way to ensure they inherit from you is to write a will.
The Pre-Marriage Clause
If you’re engaged or planning on getting married when you’re drawing up your will, then you can avoid this by including something called a ‘pre-marriage clause’. In this clause you can specifically state that you do not want your will to be revoked when your marriage to your new partner happens. This is also known as making a will ‘in contemplation’, and it’s the only way to keep an existing will legal after you get married. But this approach only works if you know who you’re marrying. If you think you might get married in the future, but you don’t know to who, then you won’t be able to use this option! You need to be able to provide details of your spouse in order to create the clause, and if you don’t then your will will still become void if you marry in the future. Your other option is to make a new will once the marriage takes place. This means you can do a review of your estate and take stock of how you want it distributed at the same time.
So in short – yes, marriage does, in fact, override your will. This is something that has caught a lot of people out in the past, so it’s important to be prepared and make a new will soon after your wedding. That way you and your new spouse can enjoy married life with peace of mind, knowing that if the worst should happen, you have a will in place. If you would like to find out more, or want some advice on your own will, just get in touch with the team today.