Will is a legal document where a person specifies how their assets will divide, allocate, and utilize after they pass away. Everyone living in Maryland should engage in estate planning. Unfortunately, a lot of people put off estate planning because they believe it unneeded until they get terminally sick or close to death. Then, it’s good to be aware of types of wills in estate planning and work accordingly.
Even if having a plan during a crisis is preferable to having none at all, waiting until a catastrophe occurs is never a good idea and is almost always less successful than starting early. Early planning not only reduces stress but is also likely to be more thorough because it accounts for events that may occur throughout life as well as after death. Act now and speak with an experienced estate planning lawyer, and you can relax knowing that you and your family are ready for any unforeseen life-changing event.
Four major types of wills in estate planning
Simple wills, testamentary trusts, joint wills, and living wills are the four primary forms of wills.
1. Simple Will
Most people think of a straightforward will when they hear the term “will.” You can specify who will inherit your property and appoint a guardian for any young children through a straightforward will.
2. Testamentary trusts
A testamentary trust appoints a trustee to manage the trust and places some assets into a trust for the benefit of your beneficiaries. This is helpful if any of your beneficiaries are minors or won’t be handling your assets on their own after inheriting them. You can place assets in trust through this kind of will and impose restrictions on the inheritance, which may be progressive based on your age or other considerations.
3. Joint wills in estate planning
A joint will is an individual will signed by two or more parties, one for each testator. In most cases, spouses create a combined will or mirror will that leaves everything to the other spouse. Even after the passing of one of the testators, the terms of a joint will, including the executor, beneficiaries, and other clauses, can’t alter. Joint wills might be problematic for the surviving spouse because of this rigidity, as their preferences may alter.
4. Living will
A live person will have no say in how your property will divided after your passing. Instead, it gives you the option to decide what medical care you wish to receive if you become disabled. You can specify someone to act in your place when making decisions in a living will.
Some additional types of wills in estate planning
1. Privileged and Unprivileged Wills in estate planning
Under the Indian Succession Act of 1925, a soldier, airman, or mariner at sea participating in an expedition or actively engaged in actual combat will grant certain privileges. These implemented with the challenging situation a soldier faces while serving in mind. Section 662 of the Act makes notice of provisions relating to such privileges. Such wills known as Privileged Wills (Section 65 of the Indian Succession Act, 19254).
Some of the most prominent instances of such privileges include clauses that let verbal agreements made in the presence of witnesses regarded as genuine wills. In addition, clauses that permit written instructions to regard as legal wills following the death of a soldier.
2. Contingent/Conditional Wills:
These wills’ execution is subject to the occurrence of a certain event, and only if that event occurs in the future will the will become effective. These wills should written for a variety of reasons. If the testator wants to secure safe appropriations of his property in the event of his passing while travelling abroad6 or wants to motivate a loved one for doing something good, such as “my son will only get my property if he graduates from his law school with a 70% score,” he can make a contingency regarding the same in his will. Any circumstance
3. Mutual wills
Mutual wills are the kind of wills that create when two parties concur to their terms and circumstances. In these wills, the testator names the other person as his or her legatee. Such wills are typically manage by married couples with children from their prior union to protect the interests of those kids.
After the death of the first partner, the remaining partner is still subject to the terms and circumstances of the will. Mutual Will aids in making sure that, if either partner remarries, the property will go to the deceased person’s children and not their new husband.
4. Duplicate Wills
The term “Duplicate Wills” refers to wills that have two copies, as the name suggests. However, they will only regard it as one despite having two copies. It is quite easy to make a copy of the will. According to Section 63 of the Indian Succession Act, 1925, the testator must prepare a second copy of the will, sign it, and have it attested the same way as he did for the original will.
One copy may remain with the testator, while the other may place in a safe place. Such as a bank safe, with a trustee, the draughtsman, or the executor. The testator creates a copy of the will to ensure that it is carried out after his death. The other will would be automatically revoked if the testator destroyed the copy of the will that is in his possession.
5. Holograph Wills
Holographic wills are those that the testator personally wrote by hand. These will have their advantages. Given that they were entirely handwritten by the testator. There is a high degree of confidence in their accuracy and precision. It is argued in numerous legal rulings that “very little” evidence will be needed to demonstrate the proper execution and attestation of such a will if there aren’t many questionable circumstances surrounding it.
6. Concurrent Wills
A testator typically creates one will for all of his or her testamentary declarations. The testator may create various wills for the property located in various areas based on his preferences or for convenience.
7. Sham Wills
These wills are written with another purpose in mind, one unrelated to the testamentary function and execution of the will. Instead, these wills are typically written with unethical intentions in mind. Such as collecting property that does not belong to the claimant, misleading someone, etc. The testator’s purpose is one of the key components of a valid will. The documents required to properly execute the collateral purpose and not to execute the will by testamentary operations are added to these wills.
