Cohabiting Partner Dies No Will — What Happens Next

Intestacy Laws Don't Know You Exist

When someone dies without a will, their state or country's intestacy laws decide who inherits. These laws follow a fixed hierarchy: legal spouse, then children, then parents, then siblings, then more distant relatives. An unmarried partner — regardless of how long you lived together, how intertwined your finances were, or how committed the relationship was — does not appear in that hierarchy.

This means assets your partner owned in their name alone, and that do not pass by a beneficiary designation or other non-probate structure, generally pass to their blood relatives. The bank accounts you both deposited into. The car they drove you to work in. The home you decorated together. All of it goes to people who may not have spoken to your partner in years.

What Happens to Specific Assets

Solely owned bank accounts with no payable-on-death beneficiary: Frozen by the bank upon notification of death. Released to the legal heirs or the court-appointed estate administrator. You cannot access them.

Jointly owned accounts (with right of survivorship): These pass directly to you by operation of law, outside of intestacy. The key is the account agreement — if it specifies right of survivorship, the money is yours. If it doesn't, the deceased's half enters their estate.

Real estate in their name only: Passes to their heirs. You may face eviction. The estate administrator has a legal obligation to collect and potentially liquidate the property.

Vehicles in their name: Titles transfer through the estate to the legal heirs.

Personal belongings: Technically, everything your partner personally owned — their clothes, electronics, gifts you gave them — is estate property. Relatives have a legal right to claim it. This includes items in your shared home.

What You Can Still Do

Check every beneficiary designation. Life insurance, retirement accounts, and payable-on-death bank accounts pass by designation, not by intestacy. If your partner named you as beneficiary on any of these, that designation holds regardless of whether they had a will.

Document what's yours. Gather receipts, bank statements, and any records showing which assets you purchased or contributed to. In a dispute with relatives, documentation is your strongest evidence.

Look into equitable claims. Some jurisdictions allow surviving partners to bring claims against the estate:

• In the UK, the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 lets a cohabiting partner of at least two years apply for reasonable financial provision from the estate. It's not automatic — you must file a claim and potentially litigate.
• In British Columbia, common-law partners with two or more years of cohabitation have the same intestate inheritance rights as married spouses.
• In Washington State, the committed intimate relationship doctrine may entitle you to an equitable share of property accumulated during the relationship.
• In New Zealand, the Property (Relationships) Act 1976 treats de facto partners of three years or more similarly to married couples for property division purposes.

Consider a small estate affidavit. If the estate is small enough under your state's rules, you may be able to claim specific assets through a simplified affidavit process rather than full probate.

The Hardest Part

Beyond the legal mechanics, dying intestate forces the surviving partner into a position of powerlessness at the worst possible moment. You're grieving, and simultaneously you must prove — to banks, landlords, relatives, and sometimes courts — that your relationship existed and mattered. The institutions that should support you default to treating you as if you don't count.

That institutional invisibility is what makes intestacy so devastating for unmarried couples. The legal system doesn't account for you unless you and your partner built the protections yourselves.

The When Your Partner Dies (Unmarried) toolkit walks through every scenario — from frozen bank accounts to hostile relatives — with step-by-step checklists and ready-to-use communication scripts.