Cost of Making a Will in Ireland

What a Solicitor Charges

Most solicitors in Ireland charge between €150 and €500 to draft a straightforward will. "Straightforward" means a single testator, married or single, with a clear list of beneficiaries and no unusual asset structures.

The price rises quickly when complexity enters the picture:

• Mirror wills for a couple: €250–€600 for both
• Wills involving business assets or agricultural relief planning: €500–€1,200+
• Wills with trusts (discretionary or life-interest): €800–€2,000+
• Cross-border wills (assets in Ireland and another jurisdiction): €1,000+, sometimes substantially more if foreign legal advice is needed

These figures do not include storage. Some solicitors store the original will in their vault at no extra charge; others charge an annual safe-custody fee of €25–€75. The Probate Office does not operate a lifetime will deposit registry for the general public, so you are choosing between a solicitor's office, a bank safe deposit box, or a fireproof safe at home.

Do You Actually Need a Solicitor?

Legally, no. There is no requirement in Irish law that a will be drafted by a solicitor. A will is valid if it is in writing, signed by the testator in the presence of two witnesses, and both witnesses sign in the testator's presence. The witnesses cannot be beneficiaries under the will — if they are, the bequest to them is void (though the rest of the will survives).

You can write your will on a blank sheet of paper, and if it meets those requirements, it is legally valid. The cost: zero.

The risk of a DIY will is not legality — it is precision. The Succession Act 1965 imposes strict rules that a poorly worded will can accidentally breach:

• A surviving spouse (or civil partner) has an automatic "legal right share" — one-third of the estate if there are children, one-half if there are none. Your will cannot override this. If your bequests inadvertently try to, the spouse can elect to take their legal right share instead, which reshuffles every other bequest.
• Section 117 allows any child to challenge the will within six months of the Grant of Probate if the court finds you failed in your "moral duty" to provide for them.
• Property held as joint tenants passes automatically by survivorship and cannot be bequeathed separately — naming it in your will creates confusion, not a valid bequest.

A solicitor catches these issues at the drafting stage. A DIY testator often does not realise the problem exists until probate, when it is too late to fix.

When to Update Your Will

Irish law does not require you to update your will on any schedule, but certain life events make an update essential:

• Marriage automatically revokes a prior will unless the will was expressly made "in contemplation of" that marriage. If you marry and do not make a new will, you die intestate.
• Divorce does not automatically revoke your will — it only voids bequests and appointments to your former spouse. Everything else stands, which can produce unintended distributions.
• Birth or adoption of a child does not revoke the will, but the new child has standing to bring a Section 117 claim if the will makes no provision for them.
• Acquiring significant new assets — a property purchase, an inheritance, a business — may make existing bequests disproportionate or create tax inefficiencies.
• Death of a named beneficiary or executor leaves gaps that can trigger partial intestacy.

A good rule of thumb: review your will every three to five years, and immediately after any of the events above. The cost of a will update (a codicil or a fresh will) is typically €100–€300 with a solicitor.

The Bottom Line

A basic solicitor-drafted will costs roughly what a family dinner out costs. Given that a contested or poorly drafted will can tie up an estate for years — with legal costs running into tens of thousands — the drafting fee is one of the most efficient investments in the entire end-of-life planning process.

The Ireland End-of-Life Planning Guide walks through will drafting considerations alongside EPA registration, tax planning, and funeral arrangements — everything in one structured sequence rather than scattered across government websites.

See more Ireland guides →