Understand your spouse’s inheritance rights before getting remarried

One of the golden rules of estate planning is to revisit your plan after a significant life event. Such an event may be getting married, having a child, going through a divorce or getting remarried.

If you’re taking a second trip down the aisle, you may have different expectations than when you married the first time, especially when it comes to estate planning. For example, if you have children from a previous marriage, your priority may be to provide for them. You may feel your new spouse should have more limited rights to your assets than your spouse in your first marriage.

Unfortunately, your state’s law may not see it that way. Indeed, in nearly every state, a person’s spouse has certain property rights that apply regardless of the terms of the estate plan. And these rights are the same whether it’s your first marriage or your second or third.

Defining an elective share

Spousal property rights are creatures of state law, so it’s critical to familiarize yourself with the laws in your state to achieve your planning objectives. Many states provide a surviving spouse with an “elective share” of the deceased spouse’s estate, regardless of the terms of his or her will or certain other documents.

Generally, a surviving spouse’s elective share ranges from 30% to 50%, though some states start lower and provide for progressively larger shares as the duration of the marriage increases. Perhaps the most significant variable, with respect to planning, is the definition of assets subject to the surviving spouse’s elective share rights.

In some states, the elective share applies only to the “probate estate” — generally, assets held in the deceased spouse’s name alone that don’t have a beneficiary designation. In other states, it applies to the “augmented estate,” which is the probate estate plus certain nonprobate assets. By understanding how elective share laws apply in your state, you can identify potential strategies for bypassing them.

Transfer assets to a revocable trust

Elective shares are designed to protect surviving spouses from being disinherited. But there may be good reasons for limiting the amount of property that goes to your spouse when you die. For one thing, your spouse may possess substantial wealth in his or her own name. And you may want most of your estate to go to your children from a previous marriage. Or perhaps the bulk of your wealth is tied up in a family business that you want to keep in the family.

Strategies for minimizing the impact of your spouse’s elective share on your estate plan include transferring assets to a revocable trust. In most (but not all) probate-only states, transferring assets to a revocable trust is sufficient to shield them from your spouse’s elective share. In augmented estate jurisdictions, the elective share generally applies to revocable trusts. However, the laws of some states provide that the augmented estate only includes assets transferred to a revocable trust during marriage. In that case, it may be possible to protect assets from the elective share by transferring them to a revocable trust before remarrying.

Seek professional help

State elective share laws are complex and can vary dramatically from state to state. If you’re remarrying, we can evaluate their impact on your estate plan and explore strategies for protecting your assets.

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