Is It Ever Too Early to Make a Will?

The earliest point you can legally make a will in England and Wales is your 18th birthday. Few people do this immediately, and that is understandable, but it is worth knowing there is no minimum threshold of wealth or complexity required. If you have savings, a car, or simply want to make clear who should have your possessions and who should make arrangements on your behalf, a will can do that from day one of adulthood.

For most people in their late teens and early 20s, the more pressing triggers come a bit later, but it is useful to know the option exists from the start, rather than assuming a will is something that only becomes relevant once you own a house or have children.

Moving in with a partner, whether or not you are married, is one of the clearest triggers for making a will, because unmarried partners have no automatic right to inherit from each other under the intestacy rules, regardless of how long they have lived together or how the relationship feels. This applies even more strongly once you buy a property together, since without a will your partner could find themselves with no automatic right to the home you have shared and paid into.

Buying a home with anyone, married or not, is a natural prompt to make or review a will, both to reflect how the property is held and to make sure your intentions for it are actually written down rather than assumed.

Few things focus the mind on making a will like having a child. Beyond simply deciding who should inherit, a will lets you appoint a guardian for your child under the Children Act 1989, someone you have chosen and trust to step in if the worst happened, rather than leaving that decision to the family court to work out between relatives who come forward afterwards.

This applies to every child you have, not just the first, and it is worth revisiting your will each time your family grows, both to update guardianship arrangements and to make sure each child is provided for as you intend.

Marriage or entering a civil partnership generally revokes any will you made beforehand, unless that will was specifically made in contemplation of the marriage and says so. This means a perfectly good will made years earlier can be silently cancelled by a wedding, leaving you unexpectedly without a will at all unless you make a new one.

Divorce works differently: it does not revoke your will, but it does mean your former spouse is treated as having died before you for the purposes of that will, so gifts and appointments in their favour usually fail. Separation without a formal divorce has no such effect, meaning an estranged spouse could still inherit under an old will. Any of these events, marriage, divorce or separation, is a clear moment to make or update a will.

Beyond the big milestones, plenty of everyday moments are worth treating as a prompt. Travelling abroad, particularly for an extended period or somewhere remote, leads many people to finally make a will before they go, simply for peace of mind. Starting a business, taking on a business partner, or building up any significant asset also makes a will more important, since your share of a business needs to be dealt with clearly to avoid disruption for both your family and your business partners.

In truth, there is rarely a wrong time to make a will, and there is no need to wait for a major life event if you would simply feel better having one in place. What matters most is that it exists, reflects your current wishes, and gets reviewed whenever your life changes in a meaningful way. At £69, making a will is a small, straightforward step whenever you decide the moment is right.