Do Married Couples Need One Will or Two?

One of the questions I get a lot is I’m married. We’re coming to you for our wills. We just need one, right? No. The reason for that is twofold. One joint wills are not advisable because if the spouse predeceases you, you can’t change the will. And vice versa. This makes it really difficult, especially if there’s a significant gap between when one spouse passes and the other. The second reason is you may have different circumstances. There may be kids from a previous marriage that are treated differently than kids of this marriage. Each spouse may have different desires or wants for those children. The other thing is family heirlooms. This comes up in the context of like, great-grandfathers train conductor, watch that doesn’t work, or grandma’s chip dip bowl that she always had at Thanksgiving. They may not be of significant value, but they may have meaning within your immediate family. It may not mean anything to your spouse and your spouse’s family. So those are things that we want to address in each will. And so we produce a will specific to each individual of the marriage.