Why You Need a Will in Canada (Even If You Think You Don't)

A 38-year-old common-law father of two in Halifax dies in a car accident on the way back from a job site. He owns a house jointly with his partner, has $40,000 in an RRSP with his mother still listed as the beneficiary from when he was 22, and a $180,000 life insurance policy with a similarly stale designation. He has no will. The house and the joint chequing account pass to his partner automatically. The RRSP and the policy pay out to his mother. His partner, the mother of his children, inherits nothing from the registered accounts and is not on the intestacy list under Nova Scotia's rules for common-law partners. His estate is then administered by his next-of-kin under court appointment — a process that took nine months and roughly $14,000 in legal and accounting fees before any money moved.

That is what "I don't need a will, my family knows what I would have wanted" looks like in practice. None of the outcomes were what he would have chosen. None required the law to do anything unusual. They were the default.

According to the Angus Reid Institute, about half of Canadians have no will at all, and only roughly a third say their will is up to date.^[3] Surveys by other firms put the number with no will anywhere from 50% to nearly 70%, depending on definitions. The reasons people give are remarkably consistent — "I haven't gotten around to it," "I'm too young," "I don't have enough assets," "my spouse will get everything anyway." None of those reasons holds up against what actually happens when a Canadian adult dies without a will.

What you give up by not having one #

Five things are at stake in a Canadian will. Without one, every one of them defaults to a setting you probably did not pick.

Who inherits. Provincial intestacy rules set out a fixed formula. In Ontario, a surviving spouse takes a "preferential share" of the first $350,000 (for deaths on or after March 1, 2021) and then splits the remainder with the children — half to the spouse if there is one child, one third to the spouse if there are two or more.^[1] A common-law partner gets nothing under Ontario's intestacy rules unless they bring a dependant-support claim. In BC, the preferential share is $300,000 if all the deceased's descendants are also the surviving spouse's descendants, and $150,000 if any descendant is from a prior relationship — common-law partners who meet WESA's two-year cohabitation test are included as spouses.^[2] The provinces vary widely on how children of a prior relationship, common-law partners, parents, siblings, and more distant relatives are treated.

Who runs the estate. With a will, you name an executor. Without one, an interested party — usually a family member — applies to the court for letters of administration. The court selects from a statutory priority list (spouse first, then children, then more distant relatives). The administrator generally has to post a bond, which the executor under a will is usually exempted from. The cost and delay of getting the bond and the appointment runs longer than a typical probate.

Who raises your minor children. A will names a guardian. Without one, the court decides, taking submissions from any interested family member. Cases involving competing relatives are emotionally bruising and sometimes drag on for over a year. The guardian appointed by the court is sometimes not who you would have chosen — and sometimes not someone the children would have chosen either.

What happens to specific items. Wedding rings, family photos, the cottage, the family business, the dog. None of these has a beneficiary designation. Without a will, they fall into the residue and get distributed by the intestacy formula — which means they get sold and the cash divided if the family cannot agree on who keeps what.

Whether anyone outside the family list inherits. Charities, godchildren, close friends, partners-but-not-spouses, stepchildren who were never legally adopted — none of these people appear on any province's intestacy list. They receive nothing by default. A will is the only way to direct anything to them.

The intestacy formula by province — the high-level shape #

The formulas differ in their specifics, but every common-law province shares a basic structure: a preferential share off the top to the spouse, then a defined split among the spouse and children, with parents, siblings, and more distant relatives queued up if no spouse or descendants exist.

The numbers that change the outcomes most often:

The takeaway most often missed: in roughly half of Canadian provinces, a common-law partner has no automatic inheritance under intestacy. The relationship may have lasted decades, the partner may have raised the children, and they may still be locked out without a will. Dependant-relief statutes provide a path for support claims in most provinces, but a support claim is not the same as an inheritance — it is a separate court process, with its own costs and uncertainty.

What dying without a will actually costs the estate #

The intestacy formula is the visible cost. The hidden costs are usually larger:

• Administrator's bond. Most provinces require an administrator (the equivalent of an executor when there is no will) to post a bond — generally double the estate's value — unless the court waives it. Bonds typically cost 0.5% to 1% of the bonded amount per year. On a $400,000 estate, that is $2,000 to $4,000 a year until the estate is wound up.
• Application delay. Letters of administration generally take longer to issue than probate of a will. The court has to confirm the priority list, give notice to other potential applicants, and sometimes resolve disputes before granting authority. Add 4 to 12 weeks over a typical clean probate.
• Legal fees. A contested administrator appointment, a dependant-support claim from a common-law partner, or a family dispute about who keeps a specific asset all add lawyer hours. The legal cost gap between a clean probate and a contested intestate administration is routinely tens of thousands of dollars.
• The family fight tax. A vague intestate estate is the single most common setup for sibling and stepfamily disputes. The cost is not always money. Family relationships often do not recover.

The arithmetic that surprises most people the first time they see it — a guided online will at roughly $100 versus an average $10,000-plus cost of cleaning up a meaningful intestate estate — is the strongest case for a will that exists.

Common reasons people skip it (and what is wrong with each) #

The seven reasons that come up over and over in Canadian survey data:

"I'm too young." Survey data shows that only 15% of Canadians 18-34 have an up-to-date will, versus 58% of those 55+.^[3] Sudden, unexpected death is, by definition, more common among people who did not see it coming. Young parents are the highest-stakes case for having a will, because of guardianship for minor children.

"I don't have enough assets." Most adults underestimate their estate value because they leave out registered accounts, employer life insurance, and the gross (not equity) value of any real estate. A 35-year-old with a house, a workplace pension, and a $200,000 group life policy can easily have a half-million-dollar estate without thinking of themselves as having one.

"My spouse will get everything anyway." Sometimes true for legally married spouses with no children from prior relationships. Almost never fully true otherwise — blended families, common-law partners, registered accounts with stale beneficiary designations, and family heirlooms all push back against this assumption.

"I'll do it later." The Scotiatrust survey put "haven't gotten around to it" as the dominant reason given by Canadians without a will. Online wills, in particular, have collapsed the time investment — most users finish in well under two hours.

"It's too expensive." Online wills are $50 to $200. Lawyer-drafted basic wills are typically $300 to $700. The "expensive" objection mostly reflects the perceived cost rather than the actual one.

"I'm afraid of making the wrong choice." A will is amendable. You can update it any time, and most Canadians do — typically every three to five years and after major life events. The wrong-choice anxiety is real but is resolved by knowing the document is not permanent.

"It's morbid." The framing-of-death angle is the most resistant. The counter-argument that lands best for most people is that the will is a love letter — it spares the people you love the months of court applications and family arguments that intestacy creates.

What a basic Canadian will needs to cover #

A serviceable, current will for most Canadian adults includes:

• An executor (and at least one alternate)
• A guardian for minor children, and a custodian for any inheritance left to them
• A residuary clause that catches anything not specifically named
• One or two specific bequests where they matter (the cottage, the family heirloom)
• Beneficiary alignment — the will should not assume RRSPs and TFSAs will pass under it; they generally do not
• Funeral and final-disposition wishes, even at a high level
• Proper province-specific execution (signed in the presence of two qualified witnesses, ideally with an affidavit of execution attached)

Witness selection is a place where serviceable wills go wrong. A witness who is also a beneficiary generally voids the gift to that beneficiary in most provinces (though it does not invalidate the rest of the will). Adult, non-beneficiary witnesses are the safe choice.

What we focus on at It's Simple Will #

The Will Creator at app.itssimplewill.ca is built for the 9 common-law provinces in Canada. It walks the structure above — executor, guardian, residue, specific bequests, beneficiary cross-check — with the province-specific execution rules baked in. The same session can produce a Life Discovery Kit alongside the will, so the executor inherits a map of where the assets actually are.

There is no good time to do this. There is also no bad time. The cost of doing it is small enough that the math is no longer the obstacle for most people. The cost of not doing it — court applications, administrator bonds, lost family relationships, unintended distributions — is consistently larger than people predict.

Related reading: dying without a will in Canada, how to write a will in Canada, and what is probate in Canada.