Blended family? You need a will

Clem is 90 years old and has been a widower for 20 years. He has six adult children and many grandchildren. On an impulse, he marries one of the other residents of the care center where he has lived for the past ten years who also has children. Within a month of his marriage, he suffers a massive heart attack and dies, unfortunately, without a will. What happens to his extensive estate?

In our society with a divorce rate approaching 50% of all marriages, it is becoming increasingly common for married couples to have "blended" families, children of one spouse who are not the children of the other. It is possible that both spouses have children from previous marriages. In these situations, absent a will, Arizona law is likely similar to that of other states.

Arizona law provides that if all of the children are the children of surviving spouse, then the surviving spouse inherits all of the estate. However, as in the above example, if there are surviving children one or more of whom are not children of the surviving spouse, then one-half of the intestate separate property and no interest in the one-half of the community property that belonged to the decedent.

In short, the newly wed widow could get one-half of the property as her interest in the community and an additional half of the decedent's separate property. Usually, in these situations, the decedents direct descendants are not too happy with this outcome.

All of this can be changed by merely having a will that provides for a proper allocation of the decedent's property.