Rhode Island Will Requirements

Rhode Island will requirements sit in one sentence of R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-5. The will must be in writing and signed by the testator. The testator then makes or acknowledges that signature in front of two or more witnesses present at the same time, and those witnesses attest and subscribe the will in the testator's presence.

Two more rules finish the picture. The person signing must be 18 or older and of sane mind under § 33-5-2. Rhode Island writes no handwritten will into chapter 33-5 and asks for no notary.

Read this page as a planning map rather than a signing kit. Chapter 33-5 carries no clause that forgives a botched signing, so a missing witness signature is not something a probate judge can wave through on proof of what the testator wanted. When real estate, a blended family, or a likely dispute is in play, check the plan with a licensed Rhode Island attorney before anyone signs.

This guide pairs with the Rhode Island probate guide for what happens after a death, and with Rhode Island intestate succession for who inherits when no valid will exists.

Who Can Make a Rhode Island Will

The capacity rule runs one clause. Section 33-5-2 opens with "Every person of sane mind and eighteen (18) years or older in age," and gives that person the power to dispose of all real estate and all personal estate they hold at death.

Two conditions, then:

• Age 18. The section prints one age and writes no exception for a married or emancipated minor.
• Sane mind. Rhode Island's statute says sane mind rather than the sound mind phrasing used in many states. The witness affidavit form the legislature printed at § 33-7-26 has the witnesses swear that the testator "appeared to be of sound mind and eighteen (18) years of age or over," so the two phrases sit side by side in the same body of law.

Capacity is measured at the moment of signing. A later illness does not undo a will made while the testator understood what they were doing.

One more power comes with the will. Under § 33-5-4, a person who may make a will may also nominate a guardian for their children during minority, and the probate court appoints that guardian unless good cause is shown against it. The same section adds that where a husband and wife are involved, the survivor, being otherwise qualified, serves as guardian of their children. Rhode Island guardianship planning walks through how that nomination reaches the court.

How to Sign a Valid Rhode Island Will

Section 33-5-5 states the rule as a prohibition, and reading it slowly pays off. No will shall be valid, except as provided in §§ 33-5-6 and 33-5-7, unless four things line up.

1. It is in writing. Nothing in chapter 33-5 gives an oral will any force for an ordinary testator.
2. The testator signs it. Someone else may sign for the testator, but only in the testator's presence and by the testator's express direction.
3. Two or more witnesses are present at the same time when the testator either makes that signature or acknowledges it as their own.
4. The witnesses attest and subscribe the will in the presence of the testator.

The statute then removes two things people expect to see. It says "no form of attestation shall be necessary, and no other publication shall be necessary." A Rhode Island will needs no magic attestation clause and no announcement to the room that the paper is a will.

It also needs no notary. Section 33-5-5 is the whole execution rule and never mentions one. The notary shows up later, in the proof affidavit covered below.

Now the clause that trips people up. The statute requires the two witnesses to be present at the same time. Some states let witnesses sign one after another on different days. Rhode Island asks for one gathering. The safest signing puts the testator and both witnesses in one room, has the testator sign first, and has both witnesses sign while everyone is still there. That sequence also matches the affidavit form in § 33-7-26, which recites that the witnesses subscribed "in the presence of the testator and in the presence of each other."

Rhode Island Accepts No Handwritten Will

A holographic will is a will written entirely in the testator's own hand with no attesting witnesses. Chapter 33-5 creates none. The chapter runs from § 33-5-1 through § 33-5-12, § 33-5-3 is repealed, and no section in it authorizes an unwitnessed document.

So a handwritten page signed at a kitchen table in Providence, with nobody watching, passes no property.

Section 33-5-5 carves out exactly two situations by name, and both are narrow.

• Section 33-5-6, soldiers and sailors. Any soldier or airman in actual military service, and any mariner or sailor at sea, may dispose of personal estate by will as they previously could. Personal estate only. This exception moves no real estate.
• Section 33-5-7, wills executed elsewhere. Covered in its own section below.

Everything else runs through the four elements of § 33-5-5.

Rhode Island Proves a Will With the § 33-7-26 Affidavit

Anyone who signed a will in a Uniform Probate Code state was probably handed a self-proving affidavit at the table. Rhode Island has no such section. Asking a Rhode Island lawyer to make a will "self-proved" points at a statute that does not exist here.

What Rhode Island has is § 33-7-26, titled Proof of purported will or codicil. It lets the probate court admit a will on oral testimony or affidavit, in the absence of objection by anyone interested in the estate, and it lays out three routes.

• Oral testimony. The testimony of any one of the subscribing witnesses about due execution is sufficient evidence of it.
• An affidavit. An affidavit by the subscribing witnesses, or any one or more of them, sworn before any officer authorized to administer oaths in or out of Rhode Island, stating the facts the witnesses would have to testify to in court, is sufficient evidence of due execution.
• The printed form. Subdivision (3) reproduces a form and deems an affidavit that follows it closely to satisfy the affidavit route above. The form has the witnesses swear they watched the execution, that the signature is the testator's handwriting or was made by another at the testator's direction and in the testator's presence, that the testator declared the paper to be a last will in their presence, that they then subscribed as witnesses in the presence of the testator and of each other, that the testator appeared to be of sound mind and 18 or over, and that the witness signatures are genuine.

Here is the part worth planning around. The statute says the affidavit may be executed "at any time after execution of the will or codicil, whether before or after the death of the testator." A Uniform Probate Code self-proving clause is normally signed at the same sitting as the will. Rhode Island leaves the door open later, so a will signed years ago without an affidavit is not stuck. A surviving witness can still swear one.

Take the witnesses to a notary at the signing anyway. Witnesses move, forget, and die, and the alternative is thinner.

When the witnesses cannot be produced at all, § 33-7-10 is the fallback. Where a subscribing witness is serving with the armed forces, serving as a merchant sailor, dead, mentally or physically incapable of testifying, or otherwise unavailable in the course of that service, the court may admit the will on the testimony of at least two credible disinterested witnesses that the signature is in the handwriting of the person whose will it purports to be, or on other sufficient proof of the handwriting. The court keeps discretion to ask for more.

Once the court finishes, the question closes. Section 33-7-23 makes final probate of a will conclusive as to its due execution.

A Witness Who Inherits Loses the Gift

Rhode Island voids the gift, not the will. Read § 33-6-1 before choosing who signs.

If a person attests a will that gives that person a devise, legacy, estate, interest, gift, or appointment, the statute makes it "utterly null and void," so far only as concerns that person attesting the execution of the will, or codicil, or any person claiming under that person. The same section then keeps the witness competent: they may still be admitted to prove the execution of the will, or to prove it valid or invalid, in spite of the lost gift.

Notice what the section does and does not say. It voids the gift as to the attesting witness and anyone claiming under that witness. It writes no exception for a witness who is also an heir, and it names no spouse. Do not build a plan on reading a rescue clause into it. Pick two witnesses who take nothing under the will.

Three neighbouring sections soften the edges:

• Section 33-6-2. A creditor whose charged debt the will secures stays a competent witness, and § 33-6-1 already excepts charges and directions for the payment of debts from the void.
• Section 33-6-3. A devisee or legatee who attests and then dies during the testator's lifetime, or before probate, counts as a legal witness in spite of the gift.
• Section 33-6-4. Being an executor of, or a trustee under, the will does not make a person incompetent to witness it.

Revoking or Changing a Rhode Island Will

Section 33-5-10 closes the list. No will or codicil, or any part of one, is revoked except in these ways:

• Marriage, under § 33-5-9, covered next.
• Another will or codicil, executed the way § 33-5-5 requires.
• A writing that declares an intention to revoke, executed with the same formalities a will needs.
• A physical act. Burning, tearing, or otherwise destroying the will, done by the testator or by some person in the testator's presence and at the testator's direction, with the intention of revoking it.

Two life events act on their own.

• Marriage after signing. Section 33-5-9 makes the marriage of a person a revocation of a will made before it, unless it appears from the will that the will was made in contemplation of the marriage. One carve-out survives: where the will exercises a power of appointment and the appointed property would not have passed to the same people had the testator died intestate, that part of the will stands.
• Divorce. Section 33-5-9.1 makes the entry of a final judgment in a divorce a revocation of all provisions for the benefit of the former spouse, unless the will shows it was made in contemplation of the divorce. Everything else in the will takes effect as though the former spouse had died first. Read the trigger closely. It is the final judgment, not the filing and not a separation.

What does not revoke a will is a change in the testator's situation. Section 33-5-11 says no will is revoked by any presumption of intention on the ground of an alteration in circumstances.

Children born later get their own rule. Under § 33-6-23, a child born after the will was executed and left unprovided for takes the same share of the estate they would have taken had the testator died intestate, unless it appears the omission was intentional and not caused by accident or mistake. The section reaches issue of a deceased child in two further situations, and it treats the date of the latest effective codicil as the date of execution.

Tearing up a newer will does not bring an older one back to life on its own. Sign a fresh will that says what you want.

Wills Signed Outside Rhode Island

Moving to Rhode Island does not void the will signed somewhere else. Section 33-5-7 accepts a will executed outside the state in the mode prescribed by the law either of the place where it was executed or of the testator's domicile, and gives it the same force as one executed under Rhode Island law.

That double hook is wider than the single saving clause many states use. A will can qualify through the place of signing, or through where the testator was domiciled, and either route is enough.

One proviso rides along: the will must be in writing and subscribed by the testator. A handwritten will signed in a state that accepts them clears that bar, since a holograph is by definition written and signed by its maker. The same page signed in Rhode Island with no witnesses fails.

Two more sections handle timing. Section 33-5-8 says a will made and executed in conformity with the law existing at the time of execution passes the estate. Section 33-5-12 keeps chapters 33-5 and 33-6 off wills made and executed before February 1, 1896, and treats a will reexecuted or revived by a later codicil as made at the date of that codicil.

A will already proved in another state comes in through its own track. Rhode Island ancillary probate walks through the foreign will route and the statewide Form PC-1.6.

What a Rhode Island Will Cannot Override

A will decides a lot. It does not decide everything, and Rhode Island's spousal protections are unusual enough to plan around.

The surviving spouse's life estate. Under § 33-25-2, when a person dies leaving a husband or wife, the real estate the decedent owned in fee simple at death descends to that spouse for his or her natural life, subject to any encumbrance existing at death. Subsection (b) carves out real estate the decedent conveyed away before death where the instrument was recorded in the land evidence records before the death.

The election clock. Section 33-25-4 says a devise or bequest to the surviving spouse bars that life estate, unless the spouse files a written statement waiving the devise and claiming the life estate within six months after the date of the first publication of the qualifications of the fiduciary. Where the real estate sits in a city or town other than the one where the will was probated, the waiver and claim also get filed in the records of deeds there.

The elective share. Section 33-28-1 gives the surviving spouse of a decedent domiciled here a right of election, equal to the life estate and allowance in intestate real estate under §§ 33-1-5 and 33-1-6 plus the share of personal estate under § 33-1-10. Chapter 33-10 allowances are not charged against that share. Section 33-28-4 runs the same six-month clock from first publication, with a chance to petition inside those six months for an extension that cannot run past nine months after the death.

Note where both clocks start. They run from the first publication of the fiduciary's qualification, not from the date of death. Rhode Island surviving spouse rights covers how the election plays out.

Assets that pass by beneficiary designation, joint ownership, or a funded trust sit outside the will entirely. Compare those routes in the guide to avoiding probate in Rhode Island before assuming a will controls an account.

Filing the Will After a Death

Rhode Island has no county probate court. Probate is heard by a court in each of the 39 cities and towns, and R.I. Gen. Laws § 8-9-9 gives every probate court jurisdiction in the town or city in which it is established. The town or city clerk serves as clerk of that probate court under § 8-9-6, unless a law or a municipal charter says otherwise. Find the right one in the Rhode Island probate court directory.

Then the clock starts.

• Deliver the will inside 30 days. Section 33-7-5 puts the duty on every person other than a probate clerk who has custody of a will. Within 30 days after notice of the death of the testator, that person delivers the will into the probate court with jurisdiction, or to the executors named in the will, who then deliver it into court within 30 days after they receive it. The clock keys on notice of the death, not on the death, which matters when a will surfaces in a safe deposit box months later.
• The penalty is real. A person who neglects to deliver a will without reasonable cause, after being duly cited by the court, may be adjudged in contempt and committed to the adult correctional institutions until the will is delivered, and stays liable to any aggrieved party for the damage caused.
• Concealing or destroying a will is a felony. Section 33-7-7 reaches anyone who steals, or for any fraudulent purpose destroys or conceals, a will or other testamentary instrument, before or after probate, and sets a term of up to five years.
• A named executor who sits on the will loses the job. Under § 33-8-3, a person named as executor who has possession of the will and neglects or refuses to present it for probate within 30 days after the death, or within 30 days after learning they are named, is deemed to have declined the office.
• Depositing a will with no assets. Section 33-7-5(b) lets a fiduciary named in a will deliver it with an affidavit carrying the date of death and a certified death certificate, a representation that the funeral bill is paid with the receipt attached, the names and addresses of the heirs at law, and a representation that no letters have issued and there are no probate assets. The clerk keeps the will and affidavit on a $30 fee and gives a receipt. The statewide form is PC-1.4 Petition to File Will with No Assets.
• Petitioning for probate. The statewide form is PC-1.5 Petition for Probate of Will, published by the Rhode Island Department of State. Section 33-7-9 has the clerk notify by mail any executor named in the will who was not a party to the petition.

Cost is set by statute, not by the town. Section 33-22-21 charges 1% of the personal property over which the court has jurisdiction for a petition to probate a will, never less than $30 and never more than $1,500, paid before the petition is filed and based on the petitioner's own estimate, subject to revision if the estimate turns out wrong. A petition to file a will with no probate is $30. Then § 42-8.1-20(b) adds a $4.00 Historical Records Trust assessment on every instrument filed for recording under § 33-22-21, which is why city and town charge sheets print $34 and $1,504 instead of $30 and $1,500.

Two housekeeping rules close the file. Section 33-6-32 keeps original wills on file in the probate court where they were proved, and they leave the files only by court order or under a statute. Section 33-6-31 passes title by will once the will is finally proved, and adds a step for scattered real estate: where land sits in a city or town other than the one where the will was proved, the devisee cannot convey it until a certified copy of the will as proved is recorded in that municipality's land evidence records. Title then relates back to the date of death.

Anyone who wants to attack the result files a claim of appeal, not a new lawsuit. The grounds to contest a Rhode Island will cover the two jurisdictional clocks and the de novo review in superior court.

What This Means for Your Rhode Island Will

A Rhode Island will that holds up usually looks like this:

1. Confirm the testator is 18 or older and of sane mind.
2. Put the will in writing and have the testator sign it, or have someone sign for them in their presence and at their express direction.
3. Gather both witnesses in one room at one time, and have them watch the testator sign or hear the testator acknowledge the signature.
4. Have both witnesses subscribe the will while the testator is present.
5. Pick two witnesses who take nothing under the will, since § 33-6-1 voids a gift to an attesting witness and to anyone claiming under that witness.
6. Add the § 33-7-26 affidavit before a notary at the same sitting, using the form the statute prints.
7. Store the original where the person named as executor can reach it, and tell them where it is.
8. Re-read the will after a marriage, a final divorce judgment, a birth, or a move into Rhode Island.

A will is one document inside a wider plan. Pair it with the lifetime paperwork in the Rhode Island power of attorney guide and the Rhode Island advance directive guide, and see how the pieces fit together in Rhode Island estate planning basics. Once a court admits the will, the Rhode Island executor duties guide picks up the story.

This page is general information about Rhode Island wills. Verify anything that touches your own situation with the Probate Court for your city or town, or with a licensed Rhode Island attorney, before you sign or rely on a will.

Sources:

• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-1, Definitions. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-1.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-2, Testamentary capacity - Property subject to will. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-2.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-4, Nomination of guardian by will. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-4.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-5, Execution of will - Acknowledgment and attestation. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-5.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-6, Persons in military service - Sailors. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-6.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-7, Wills conforming to laws of other states. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-7.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-8, Conformation to law at time of execution. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-8.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-9, Revocation of will by marriage. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-9.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-9.1, Revocation of provision in will for divorced spouse. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-9.1.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-10, Methods of revoking will. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-10.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-11, Alteration of circumstances. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-11.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-5-12, Wills prior to 1896. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-5/33-5-12.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-6-1, Gifts to attesting witnesses. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-6/33-6-1.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-6-2, Creditor attesting. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-6/33-6-2.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-6-3, Death of attesting beneficiary in lifetime of testator. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-6/33-6-3.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-6-4, Executor or trustee as witness. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-6/33-6-4.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-6-23, Pretermitted issue. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-6/33-6-23.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-6-31, Passage of title by will - Recording. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-6/33-6-31.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-6-32, Filing of original wills. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-6/33-6-32.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-7-5, Duty of person in possession of will to deliver into court. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-7/33-7-5.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-7-7, Penalty for theft, destruction, or concealment of will. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-7/33-7-7.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-7-9, Notice to executors of petition for probate. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-7/33-7-9.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-7-10, Proof of wills when subscribing witnesses unavailable. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-7/33-7-10.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-7-23, Probate conclusive as to execution. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-7/33-7-23.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-7-26, Proof of purported will or codicil. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-7/33-7-26.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-8-3, Neglect to present will for probate. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-8/33-8-3.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-22-21, Fees enumerated - Hearing date to be noted on receipt. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-22/33-22-21.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-25-2, Life estate to spouse. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-25/33-25-2.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-25-4, Election by surviving spouse - Recording of waiver and claim. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-25/33-25-4.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-28-1, Elective share. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-28/33-28-1.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 33-28-4, Proceeding for elective share - Time limit. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE33/33-28/33-28-4.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 8-9-9, General probate jurisdiction. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE8/8-9/8-9-9.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 8-9-6, Town or city clerk as clerk of court. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE8/8-9/8-9-6.htm
• Title: R.I. Gen. Laws § 42-8.1-20, Rhode Island Historical Records Trust established. Publisher: Rhode Island General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://webserver.rilegislature.gov/Statutes/TITLE42/42-8.1/42-8.1-20.htm
• Title: Probate Forms, PC-1.4 Petition to File Will with No Assets and PC-1.5 Petition for Probate of Will. Publisher: Rhode Island Department of State. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://www.sos.ri.gov/divisions/business-services/probate-forms

It is not legal advice.