If You Don’t Have a Will in New York

November 18, 2020

After Prince died without a will in 2016, Gallup Poll conducted a survey and found that 55% of respondents didn’t have wills, either.

Patricia C. Marcin, an estate planning attorney at Farrell Fritz, guesses some don’t put an estate plan together because they don’t want to even have the discussion, while others may be worried about the money it costs to put their ducks in a row. Mostly, though, she assumes people simply don’t realize the ramifications.

“Not having a will is actually surprisingly common among people that have significant wealth, which is rather shocking,” she says. “People generally think that their spouses get their estates when they die.”

Per New York law, it’s not quite that simple.

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