Estate Planning for Unmarried Couples
If you are not married, the legal system does not recognize your partner the way it recognizes a spouse. There is no automatic right to inherit. No default authority to make medical decisions. No presumption that you share property. In the eyes of the law, your partner is a legal stranger unless you have documents that say otherwise.
Estate planning for unmarried couples is not just a good idea. It is the only way to give your partner the protections that married couples receive by default. We build plans that cover everything from trust structure to healthcare directives to property ownership, so that your partner is protected no matter what happens.
Jon Miller is licensed in Utah, Arizona, and Texas. Each state handles unmarried couples differently, and we design plans that account for those differences. Flat-fee pricing, so you know your cost before we start.
What the Law Does Not Give Unmarried Couples
When a married person dies without an estate plan, state law gives their spouse a significant share of the estate, sometimes all of it. When an unmarried person dies without an estate plan, their partner receives nothing. The estate passes to parents, siblings, or other blood relatives under intestacy laws. Your partner of twenty years has the same legal standing as a stranger.
The same gap exists for medical decisions. If you are incapacitated and cannot speak for yourself, your spouse would have automatic authority to make healthcare decisions. Your unmarried partner does not. Without a healthcare directive and medical power of attorney, the hospital will turn to your parents or adult children for decisions, even if your partner knows your wishes better than anyone.
Property rights are another area where married couples have built-in protection. In community property states like Arizona and Texas, property acquired during a marriage is presumed to belong to both spouses. There is no equivalent presumption for unmarried couples. If you buy a home together and only one name is on the title, the other partner may have no legal claim to the property.
Estate planning closes all of these gaps. It replaces the default rules that ignore your partner with documents that protect them.
Individual Trusts vs. Joint Trust
One of the first questions we work through with unmarried couples is whether to create individual trusts or a joint trust. Married couples often default to a joint trust, but for unmarried couples, the answer depends on your specific situation.
Individual truststend to make sense when partners have children from prior relationships, when there is significant separate property that each partner wants to control independently, or when there is a meaningful disparity in assets. Individual trusts keep each partner's estate plan distinct, which provides clearer boundaries and avoids complications if the relationship ends.
A joint trust can work well when partners share most of their assets, have aligned estate planning goals, and do not have children from prior relationships. A joint trust is simpler to administer and reflects the way many couples actually manage their finances, as a shared unit.
This is a fact-specific decision, and there is no one-size-fits-all answer. We walk through your assets, your family situation, and your goals to recommend the right structure. Either way, the trust is only one piece of the plan. The supporting documents are just as important.
The Essential Documents
Regardless of whether you choose individual trusts or a joint trust, every unmarried couple needs a set of supporting documents that work together. These are the documents that prevent your partner from being treated as a legal stranger when it matters most.
Financial power of attorney gives your partner the authority to manage your finances if you are incapacitated. Without one, your partner cannot access your bank accounts, pay your bills, or manage your investments, even if you have been sharing finances for years.
Healthcare directive and medical power of attorney give your partner the authority to make medical decisions on your behalf if you cannot make them yourself. This includes decisions about treatment, surgery, and end-of-life care. Without these documents, the hospital will turn to your legal next of kin, which for an unmarried person is typically a parent or sibling.
HIPAA authorization allows medical providers to share your health information with your partner. Without it, your partner may not even be able to get updates on your condition.
Beneficiary designation review covers retirement accounts, life insurance, and bank accounts that pass outside of your trust or will. These designations override your estate plan, so they need to be coordinated. A trust that leaves everything to your partner does not help if your retirement account beneficiary is still your ex or your parents.
Property and Ownership Planning
How you title property matters more for unmarried couples than for married couples, because there is no marital property presumption to fall back on. The way your home, bank accounts, and investments are titled determines what happens to them when one partner dies.
Joint tenancy with right of survivorship means the property passes automatically to the surviving partner when one partner dies, without going through probate. This is often the simplest approach for a shared home, but it has implications for asset protection and taxes that need to be considered.
Tenants in common means each partner owns a defined share of the property, and that share passes through their estate plan (not automatically to the other partner). This provides more control but requires coordination with the trust to ensure the surviving partner is protected.
Trust ownershipmeans the property is held in one or both partners' trusts. This provides the most control over what happens to the property and avoids probate, but the trust terms need to address what happens to the property when the first partner dies.
We review how all of your significant assets are titled and make sure the ownership structure aligns with your estate plan. A mismatch between how property is titled and what your trust says can create exactly the problems you are trying to avoid.
Multi-State Considerations
Jon Miller is licensed in Utah, Arizona, and Texas. Each state treats unmarried couples differently, and your estate plan needs to account for the laws of the state where you live and where you own property.
Arizona and Texas are community property states, which affects how property acquired during a relationship is treated. While community property rules technically apply only to married couples, the distinction matters when you are planning around these rules rather than benefiting from them. Utah is a common law property state with different default rules.
Domestic partnership recognition also varies. Some jurisdictions offer domestic partnership registrations that provide limited legal protections; others do not. Regardless of whether your jurisdiction recognizes domestic partnerships, estate planning documents provide the protections that matter most: inheritance rights, medical decision-making authority, and property transfer.
Having one attorney who understands the laws in all three states means your plan works wherever you live or own property. You are not coordinating between multiple firms in different states.
Frequently Asked Questions
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