Left Completely Out of a Will in BC: Does It Help Your Claim?

For a wills variation claim, being left out entirely can make the claim stronger, because it is harder for a court to see a complete disinheritance as fair. A long-time spouse, for example, is generally owed at least what they would have received in a family property division.

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• If a Child Is Left Out of a Will, Can They Contest It?

Full transcript

So, does being left out completely make a claim stronger or weaker? For wills variation, sometimes it makes the wills variation claim stronger that you’re left out of a will completely because the disinheritance is so much more unfair. And so, because for wills variation cases it’s up to the discretion of the judge to determine whether or not a variation is warranted or the will should be respected, they look at factors contributing to whether or not the will is fair or not, what the provision is fair. And sometimes providing a lower but to some people to the judge who thinks that it is an acceptable inheritance could be a bar to a variation at all.

Whereas if they are disinherited completely, then say a long time spouse is disinherited completely, then there’s just no way that a judge can find that that’s fair in the circumstances because at a bare minimum that spouse is entitled to the legal obligation of what’s owed to them, which is what would they be entitled to receive notionally if they had separated right at the time of death and they’re entitled to some kind of family property claim.

General information, not legal advice.