To make a valid last will and testament in Rhode Island, you must be at least 18 and of sound mind, put the document in writing, sign it yourself, and have two witnesses present at the same time who then sign in your presence.1Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-5-5 – Execution of Will Acknowledgment and Attestation Miss one of those steps and a probate court can refuse to honor the document, pushing your estate into intestacy where state formulas, not your wishes, decide who gets what.
Who Can Make a Will
Any Rhode Island resident who is at least 18 years old and of sound mind can create a will.2Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-5-2 – Persons Competent to Devise “Sound mind” is not a high bar. You need to understand what property you own, know who your close relatives are, and grasp that the document you are signing will direct where your assets go after you die.
A diagnosis of dementia, mental illness, or cognitive decline does not automatically disqualify you. Courts have upheld wills signed during lucid intervals even when the testator was impaired at other times. Old age, physical frailty, or eccentric habits are not enough on their own to invalidate a will. Anyone later arguing that the testator lacked capacity carries the burden of proof and generally needs medical records, witness testimony, or expert evaluations to make the case stick.
Writing and Signing the Document
Rhode Island does not recognize holographic wills (handwritten documents without witnesses) or oral wills. The document must be in writing, and it must follow the statute’s execution steps or it has no legal effect.1Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-5-5 – Execution of Will Acknowledgment and Attestation
You sign the will personally. If a physical limitation prevents you from signing, you can direct another person to sign for you, but that person must do so in your presence and at your explicit direction. After you sign (or acknowledge to the witnesses that the signature on the page is yours), two witnesses must be present at the same time to observe. Both witnesses then sign the document in your presence. The witnesses do not have to sign in front of each other, and no formal declaration that “this is my will” is legally required, though saying so is good practice and leaves no ambiguity about what the witnesses just watched you do.
Choose Witnesses Who Aren’t Beneficiaries
Rhode Island voids any gift left to a person who also serves as a witness to the will.3Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-6-1 – Gifts to Attesting Witnesses Unlike some states, Rhode Island does not save the bequest because other disinterested witnesses also signed. The gift to that witness is simply void, and so is any gift to someone claiming through them. The witness can still testify about the signing, but they lose their inheritance. The clean fix is to pick witnesses who are not named anywhere in the will.
Add a Self-Proving Affidavit
After signing, you and your witnesses can execute a sworn affidavit in front of a notary public confirming the circumstances of the signing. Rhode Island statute provides a specific form.4Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-7-26 – Proof of Purported Will or Codicil With a self-proving affidavit on file, the probate court can admit the will without calling your witnesses to appear and testify in person. That spares real headaches when, years later, witnesses have moved out of state, become incapacitated, or died. The affidavit can be signed at the same appointment as the will or any time after. Doing it at the signing is the obvious move, since the notary and witnesses are already in the room.
What Your Will Cannot Control
Several categories of property pass outside the will no matter what the document says. Planning only through a will, without checking these, is one of the most common mistakes.
- Bank accounts, brokerage accounts, and real estate held in joint tenancy with right of survivorship automatically go to the surviving owner.
- Life insurance proceeds and retirement accounts go to whoever is named on the policy or account’s beneficiary form.
- Payable-on-death and transfer-on-death accounts send funds directly to the designated recipient.
- Property held in a trust is distributed according to the trust’s terms.
Updating beneficiary designations matters as much as updating the will. A stale form on a retirement account can override the clearest language in the will.
You Cannot Fully Disinherit a Spouse
Rhode Island does not allow a surviving spouse to be cut out entirely. A spouse omitted from the will, or given less than the statutory minimum, can elect to take a share of the estate instead. That elective share includes a life estate in the deceased spouse’s individually titled real estate plus a share of the personal estate going through probate.5Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-28-1 – Elective Share Any family allowances come on top of the elective share, not as a deduction from it.
Naming an Executor
Your executor (sometimes called a personal representative) does the practical work of settling the estate: gathering assets, paying debts and taxes, and distributing what remains to the beneficiaries. Any competent adult can serve. The probate court can refuse to appoint someone with a history of financial irresponsibility or other disqualifying issues.
Name a successor too. If your first choice has died, moved away, or declines the job when the time comes, the court will appoint an administrator on its own, and that person may be a stranger to the family. Listing one or two alternates keeps the choice in your hands.
The executor may be required to post a bond, essentially an insurance policy protecting beneficiaries and creditors from mismanagement. Your will can waive the bond requirement, and many do, because it saves the estate the premium cost. Executors are entitled to reasonable compensation, either as the will specifies or as the court determines.
Including a Digital Assets Clause
Rhode Island adopted the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, effective July 15, 2019.6Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-27.1-3 – Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act Applicability Under this law, your executor does not automatically get access to your email, social media, cloud storage, or other online accounts. Access depends on whether you took one of two specific steps: activating an in-service tool (such as Google’s Inactive Account Manager or Facebook’s Legacy Contact) that grants access upon death, or explicitly authorizing digital asset access in the will itself.
Without one of those authorizations, the executor can generally reach only non-content information like account names and billing records, and even that depends on the service provider’s terms. Logging in with saved passwords after death can violate federal law and platform terms even when the intent is to manage the estate. If you have online accounts worth preserving, closing, or memorializing, include a clause granting your executor authority to access, manage, and close digital accounts.
Changing or Revoking the Will Later
You can modify or revoke your will at any time while you remain competent. Rhode Island recognizes three methods.7Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-5-10 – Revocation of Will or Codicil
- Execute a new will or a codicil. A codicil is a formal amendment and must follow the same signing and witnessing rules as the original. For anything beyond a minor tweak, a new will is usually cleaner, and it should explicitly revoke all prior versions.
- Execute a separate written revocation, signed and witnessed the same way a will would be.
- Physically destroy the will by burning, tearing, or similar means, with clear intent to revoke. You can direct someone else to do it in your presence. An accidental spill does not count; the intent is what matters.
Crossing out lines or writing in the margins does not create a valid amendment. Any change that is not executed with the same formalities as the original has no legal effect.
Divorce Partially Rewrites Your Will Automatically
A final divorce judgment in Rhode Island automatically revokes every provision in the will that benefits the former spouse, including any appointment of the ex-spouse as executor.8Rhode Island General Assembly. Rhode Island Code 33-5-9.1 – Revocation by Divorce The rest of the will stays in effect. Relying on that automatic revocation is risky, though. It does not reach beneficiary designations on life insurance or retirement accounts, and federal law (particularly for ERISA-governed retirement plans) can override state revocation statutes entirely. After a divorce, the right move is a new will plus updates to every beneficiary form.
Keep Rhode Island’s Estate Tax in Mind
Rhode Island is one of a handful of states with its own estate tax, and the threshold is far lower than the federal exemption. For deaths in 2026, a Rhode Island estate valued above $1,838,056 is subject to the state estate tax.9Rhode Island Division of Taxation. Advisory 2025-27 Estate Tax Updates Estates below that owe nothing. Estates at or above $1.3 million in gross assets must still file a full Rhode Island estate tax return, even if no tax is ultimately owed.
The federal estate tax exemption for 2026 is $15 million per person, or $30 million for a married couple, after the One Big Beautiful Bill Act permanently raised the threshold.10Internal Revenue Service. Whats New Estate and Gift Tax Most Rhode Island residents will never approach it. The state tax catches a much wider group. A homeowner in Providence or Newport with a paid-off house, retirement savings, and a life insurance policy can cross that $1.84 million line more easily than they might expect. Married couples with combined assets near or above the state threshold should plan with that number specifically in mind, since Rhode Island’s estate tax does not offer the portability feature available at the federal level.