Fifteen-plus years of BC mortgage experience, distilled into practical writing on buying, renewing, refinancing, and building wealth through real estate.
Five Things That Happen When You Die Without a Will in Canada
Your sister inherits nothing. Your common-law partner of twelve years gets no automatic claim to the house you bought together. Your kids wait eighteen months before anyone can access the bank accounts. That's what intestacy does in British Columbia, and the rules aren't better in Ontario or Alberta.
When you die without a will in Canada, provincial legislation steps in with a distribution formula that has no idea who actually depends on you. Here's what actually happens.
The province picks your executor
You don't get to name the person who handles your estate. Instead, someone has to apply to the court to become administrator, usually your spouse or next of kin, assuming they're willing and the court agrees. The application process runs four to eight months in most provinces before letters of administration are issued. During that window, bank accounts stay frozen. Bills pile up. No one has legal authority to sell property or transfer assets. If your likely administrator lives out of province or has a criminal record, the court may appoint someone you've never met.
Your spouse doesn't inherit everything
The common belief is that spouses automatically get the whole estate. They don't. Every province has a statutory distribution scheme. In BC, if you die intestate and leave a spouse and children, the spouse gets the first $300,000 and half the remainder. The kids split the other half. In Ontario, the spouse gets the first $350,000 and the rest is shared depending on the number of children. If your estate is a $900,000 house in Mississauga and $50,000 in RRSPs, your spouse now co-owns that house with your adult children whether that makes sense or not.
Common-law spouses face worse. Most provinces don't recognize common-law partners under intestacy rules at all. You can live together for twenty years, raise children, share a mortgage, and your partner receives zero. The estate goes to your biological children or, if you have none, to your parents or siblings. Your partner has to sue for dependent support, which means litigation, legal fees, and no guaranteed outcome.
Minor children get a trustee they didn't choose
If your kids are under eighteen, their inheritance sits in a court-managed trust until they reach the age of majority. Nineteen in BC. Eighteen in Ontario. The court appoints a trustee, often a family member, who must apply to the court every time they want to release funds for the child's benefit. Need $15,000 for braces? Court application. Want to fund a college savings plan? Court application. The trustee files annual accountings. When the child turns eighteen or nineteen, they receive the full lump sum, no staged release, no financial literacy requirement, just the whole amount on their birthday.
The estate pays for the mess
Dying intestate doesn't save money. Court applications for letters of administration cost more than probate on a will. Legal fees run higher because there's more to sort out. If disputes arise over who should administer or who qualifies as a dependent, those litigation costs come out of the estate before anyone inherits. A contested intestacy can burn through $40,000 in legal fees before the court even issues letters of administration.
Assets with no named beneficiaries get trapped
Your RRSP, TFSA, and life insurance bypass the estate if you named a beneficiary. If you didn't, they fall into the estate and get distributed under intestacy rules. That means probate fees, delays, and potential creditor claims against money that could have transferred directly to your kids. The same applies to jointly held accounts without right of survivorship, the default assumption in some provinces is tenancy in common, which means your half becomes an estate asset.
Provincial intestacy laws were written for tidy nuclear families that no longer represent how most Canadians actually live. A will costs $500 to draft properly. Intestacy costs your family time, money, and control they won't get back.
Your sister inherits nothing. Your common-law partner of twelve years gets no automatic claim to the house you bought together. Your kids wait eighteen months before anyone can access the bank accounts. That's what intestacy does in British Columbia, and the rules aren't better in Ontario or Alberta.
When you die without a will in Canada, provincial legislation steps in with a distribution formula that has no idea who actually depends on you. Here's what actually happens.
The province picks your executor
You don't get to name the person who handles your estate. Instead, someone has to apply to the court to become administrator, usually your spouse or next of kin, assuming they're willing and the court agrees. The application process runs four to eight months in most provinces before letters of administration are issued. During that window, bank accounts stay frozen. Bills pile up. No one has legal authority to sell property or transfer assets. If your likely administrator lives out of province or has a criminal record, the court may appoint someone you've never met.
Your spouse doesn't inherit everything
The common belief is that spouses automatically get the whole estate. They don't. Every province has a statutory distribution scheme. In BC, if you die intestate and leave a spouse and children, the spouse gets the first $300,000 and half the remainder. The kids split the other half. In Ontario, the spouse gets the first $350,000 and the rest is shared depending on the number of children. If your estate is a $900,000 house in Mississauga and $50,000 in RRSPs, your spouse now co-owns that house with your adult children whether that makes sense or not.
Common-law spouses face worse. Most provinces don't recognize common-law partners under intestacy rules at all. You can live together for twenty years, raise children, share a mortgage, and your partner receives zero. The estate goes to your biological children or, if you have none, to your parents or siblings. Your partner has to sue for dependent support, which means litigation, legal fees, and no guaranteed outcome.
Minor children get a trustee they didn't choose
If your kids are under eighteen, their inheritance sits in a court-managed trust until they reach the age of majority. Nineteen in BC. Eighteen in Ontario. The court appoints a trustee, often a family member, who must apply to the court every time they want to release funds for the child's benefit. Need $15,000 for braces? Court application. Want to fund a college savings plan? Court application. The trustee files annual accountings. When the child turns eighteen or nineteen, they receive the full lump sum, no staged release, no financial literacy requirement, just the whole amount on their birthday.
The estate pays for the mess
Dying intestate doesn't save money. Court applications for letters of administration cost more than probate on a will. Legal fees run higher because there's more to sort out. If disputes arise over who should administer or who qualifies as a dependent, those litigation costs come out of the estate before anyone inherits. A contested intestacy can burn through $40,000 in legal fees before the court even issues letters of administration.
Assets with no named beneficiaries get trapped
Your RRSP, TFSA, and life insurance bypass the estate if you named a beneficiary. If you didn't, they fall into the estate and get distributed under intestacy rules. That means probate fees, delays, and potential creditor claims against money that could have transferred directly to your kids. The same applies to jointly held accounts without right of survivorship, the default assumption in some provinces is tenancy in common, which means your half becomes an estate asset.
Provincial intestacy laws were written for tidy nuclear families that no longer represent how most Canadians actually live. A will costs $500 to draft properly. Intestacy costs your family time, money, and control they won't get back.
Read Next
Brokers Who Think the Filogix Acquisition Changes Nothing Are Missing the Strategic Shift
DLC didn't buy Filogix to own the rails, it bought it because the rails were already failing
A Toronto Townhouse Project Built 147 Units and Can't Sell 65 of Them
MCAN's 19% earnings jump hides a rising impairment problem