Did you know that only about a third of adults in the United States have written a will? Pew Research Center put the share at 32% in a September 2025 survey of 8,750 adults, and the number stays under half until people reach their seventies.
Making a will is an important part of estate planning. It allows a person to state how they want their property and other assets handled after death. But writing a will needs several considerations.
It’s important to know how to make a will and understand how to address several factors that you can incorporate in it. You can name an executor of the will, identify beneficiaries, and address guardianship for minor children when applicable.
Once you understand the legal requirements for creating and updating a will, you can be assured that your wishes are clearly documented and easily followed after death. Let’s take a closer look.
Signing rules are narrower than most online advice suggests
Connecticut law refuses to let a will pass property unless the document is in writing, subscribed by the testator, and attested by two witnesses who each sign in the testator’s presence, under Conn. Gen. Stat. 45a-251.
Kentucky runs on a different track. KRS 394.040 attaches no witness requirement at all to a will the testator writes out entirely by hand and requires any other will to be acknowledged before two credible witnesses who then sign in the presence of the testator and of each other.
A handwritten page with no witnesses satisfies Kentucky and misses Connecticut’s own execution rule, though Connecticut still admits a will that was executed properly under the law of the state where the signing happened. Two neighboring families can do the same thing and get opposite answers.
Elder law practices watch the fallout more often than general practitioners do, because the will tends to arrive bundled with long-term care questions rather than on its own. Collins Law, PLLC, an Elkton practice run by Mark D. Collins and licensed in both Kentucky and Tennessee, handles wills and trusts alongside Medicaid planning, guardianship, and veterans benefits.
Proving the document once nobody can ask the signer
Witnesses are easier to recruit than to track down twenty years later. Connecticut answers that with an affidavit procedure.
The attesting witnesses swear, before an officer authorized to administer oaths, to the same facts they would give from the stand, and the probate court accepts that sworn statement as if it had been taken in court.
The court publishes the form for it, PC-210. Notarizing the signer’s own signature accomplishes something different, which is where the mix-up usually starts. The oath that carries the document belongs to the witnesses.
The default plan already exists
Skipping the paperwork does not leave an estate to chance. Intestacy laws have established an unchangeable order of succession, which usually begins with the surviving spouse and offspring and proceeds to parents and siblings.
Second marriages, stepchildren nobody adopted, and an unmarried partner of thirty years all sit outside or far down most statutory orders, and no amount of family agreement moves them up.
Connecticut’s probate courts publish plain-language user guides on how an estate travels through the court either way.
The accounts a will never reaches
This means that retirement plans, payable-on-death bank accounts, and insurance plans follow the beneficiary designation on record at the financial institutions and not whatever is stated in the will. A 2009 form indicating the ex-spouse is most likely to override the will signed last month indicating the current spouse.
The divorce revocation statutes will apply in some instances but not in others, while the employer-sponsored retirement plans operate under federal laws and their own plan documents, making it one of the more usual combinations that result in probate litigation.
Movement and milestones should be given the same consideration. Changes like the birth of a child, divorce, having a second house in another state, or moving to a new state can render the old agreement ineffective.
To ensure the will holds up, it needs to have clean execution. The accounts of the witnesses should be fresh, and there should be an update of the will after every marriage, birth, sale, or move.
This content is provided for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional advice. AFP editorial staff were not involved in the creation of this content.
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