Ontario changed how marriage and separation affect a will in 2022. This guide explains who the new rules catch, what they leave out, and which documents deserve a second look after a relationship changes.
A couple marries in 2023, each with a will signed years before, and both assume the wedding wiped those documents out. Under Ontario law as it now stands, it did not. Both old wills are still in force, and either one may still name the wrong people.
What the 2022 will changes did to marriage
Before 2022, the Succession Law Reform Act revoked a will automatically when its maker married, unless the will was made in contemplation of that marriage. The Accelerating Access to Justice Act, 2021 repealed that rule, and the repeal took effect on January 1, 2022. For any marriage on or after that date, an existing will survives the wedding intact. The change does not reach back, so a will revoked by a marriage in 2019 stays revoked.
The old rule protected new spouses from outdated documents, but it caused trouble in second marriages, where a remarriage could leave someone in their sixties without any will, and the intestacy rules would then hand a new spouse priority over adult children from an earlier relationship.
The new rule flips that risk rather than removing it. A will written for a previous life now stays in force, and it may leave nothing to the person the will-maker has just married. A surviving married spouse may still have claims under the Family Law Act or for dependant support, but those routes take court time that a current will would have avoided. The practical answer is to treat any wedding since 2022 as the moment to reread the will, because the law will no longer do that job for you.
How separation now affects a will in Ontario
Divorce has long had a precise effect on an Ontario will: gifts to the former spouse and their appointment as estate trustee are revoked, and the will is read as if that spouse had died first. Since January 1, 2022, section 17 of the Succession Law Reform Act applies the same treatment to a spouse who is separated at the date of death. The will itself is not cancelled. Only the parts that benefit or appoint the separated spouse fall away, and the rest of the will is read around the gap.
“Separated” has a specific legal meaning here. Spouses qualify if, before the death, any one of these is true:
- They lived apart because the marriage broke down for three years immediately before the death
- They signed a valid separation agreement under Part IV of the Family Law Act
- A court made an order settling their affairs arising from the breakdown
- A family arbitration award did the same
Each of these must have begun or been made on or after January 1, 2022. Because the three-year clock could only start on that date, the first couples to qualify on time apart alone reached the mark in January 2025. A will can still keep a separated spouse in deliberately, since the rule yields where the will shows a contrary intention.
The separation agreement is usually the quicker trigger, because it takes effect from the day it is signed rather than three years on. It also makes sense to review the will at the same time the agreement is drafted, since the agreement may settle estate rights that the will then needs to match. Keeping both documents with one practice reduces the chance that one is updated and the other forgotten. Gill & Alter Law, a Mississauga law firm, is one practice that handles separation agreements alongside wills and probate.
Section 43.1 applies the same test where there is no will. A separated spouse who meets it no longer takes the share that Ontario’s intestacy rules give a surviving spouse. That does not end every claim, since a separated spouse may still hold rights under the Family Law Act.
What the 2022 changes left untouched
The reforms were narrow by design, and several common situations sit outside them. Bill 245 gave unmarried partners no share of an estate on intestacy, however long they lived together. If one partner dies without a will, the survivor has no automatic inheritance under the Succession Law Reform Act.
| Situation | Effect on the will | What to check |
|---|---|---|
| Married on or after January 1, 2022 | Existing will stays valid | Whether the will provides for the new spouse |
| Married before 2022, will signed before the wedding | Will revoked unless made in contemplation of the marriage | Whether a newer will was ever signed |
| Separated three years, starting 2022 or later | Gifts and executor role for the spouse revoked | Who inherits in the spouse’s place |
| Separation agreement, order or award dated 2022 or later | Same effect, from the date of the document | Whether the agreement deals with estate rights |
| Common-law partners with no will | Survivor has no automatic share | Wills for both partners and how the home is titled |
| Divorced | Gifts and executor role for the former spouse revoked | Alternate beneficiaries and executors |
The home deserves its own look. Property held as joint tenants passes to the surviving owner outside the will, while a share held as tenants in common passes through the estate. For an unmarried couple, that single choice on the title can matter more than anything the will says. Beneficiary designations on registered plans and insurance policies made outside the will are a separate track too, so they should be checked on their own forms.
