Making sure you have an up-to-date will is one of those important life skills. Having one is a great start, but it is little good if it is 30 years old. Think of how much in your life has changed in that time.
Josh Woods is finding that more wills are being contested because the real estate prices are rising far faster than people anticipated:
Let’s say that individual owns a cabin, maybe in Kelowna or in Kamloops, but also owns a home here. Fifteen years ago, they executed a will and they’ve left one of those properties to their first child and the other to their second. Fifteen years later, the dramatic increase means the division of that will is probably no longer fair.
We have seen everything, and we will not be surprised if you walk in with a will that puts everything into trust for your beloved cat who has long since passed away. Unfortunately, a badly written or out-of-date will can make matters more complicated than they need to be, and can result in estate litigation.
There are ways to structure your will so that you get the end result that you want without needing to update it every few years, but you need to be clear with your lawyer about what you want. Is it important to you that Margaret inherit the emeralds, or do you just want Margaret to have something of an equal value to the item her brother has already claimed?
Take a minute and pull out your will. Does it still make sense for your life? If it does, put it away and pat yourself on the back. If not, you may want to consider what your goals are and take your will to a lawyer’s office to ask if it still does what you want it to do. Where there is a will, there is a way!