Vermont Will Requirements

Vermont will requirements sit in one short section. 14 V.S.A. § 5 says a will must be in writing, signed in the presence of two or more credible witnesses, and attested and subscribed by those witnesses in the presence of the testator and each other. 14 V.S.A. § 1 sets who may sign one. No notary appears anywhere in that rule.

Read this page as a planning map rather than a signing kit. Section 5 carries no clause that forgives a botched signing, and Vermont's wills chapter offers no handwritten-will fallback to catch one. When real estate, a blended family, or a likely dispute is in play, check the plan with a licensed Vermont attorney before anyone signs.

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

Who Can Make a Vermont Will

Section 1 runs one sentence: "Every individual 18 years of age or over or emancipated by court order who is of sound mind may make a will in writing."

Three conditions hide in that sentence.

• Age 18, or emancipated by court order. Emancipation is the only route the section gives someone younger. Section 1 names no other exception, so marriage alone does not open that door in Vermont.
• Sound mind. The self-proving acknowledgment at 14 V.S.A. § 108 has each witness swear the testator was of sound mind and under no constraint or undue influence at the time of signing.
• In writing. The writing requirement starts here, in the capacity section, before § 5 repeats it.

The Legislature rewrote the sentence at 2017, No. 195 (Adj. Sess.), § 1, which is the amendment line printed under the section. Any summary of Vermont capacity law written before that act describes older wording.

Section 3 then sets the reach of the document. 14 V.S.A. § 3 lets a will provide for the passage of all property the testator owns at death, plus all property the estate acquires after the death.

How to Sign a Valid Vermont Will

Section 5(a) lists three elements, and a will has to clear all three.

1. The will is in writing.
2. The testator signs it in the presence of two or more credible witnesses, or someone else signs in the testator's name, in the testator's presence, and by the testator's express direction.
3. The witnesses attest and subscribe the will in the presence of the testator and each other.

That third element is the part cross-state templates drop. Plenty of states ask only that each witness sign in the testator's presence. Vermont asks for more: each witness signs while the other witness watches, and while the testator watches. One signing, one room, everybody present.

Notice what the section never asks for. There is no notary in the execution rule, no seal, and no filing during the testator's lifetime. A notary matters later, and only for the optional acknowledgment covered below.

Notice also what the statute does not say about the witnesses themselves. Section 5 asks for witnesses who are "credible" and sets no age, residency, or occupation test on its face. The safe habit is the one that dodges the interested-witness problem entirely: pick two adults who inherit nothing under the will and whose spouses inherit nothing either.

The remote-witnessing paragraph has a condition attached

Section 5(b) treats witnesses as present with the testator and each other, whether or not they are physically present, when two things are true at once. The will has to be signed in conformity with the Emergency Administrative Rules for Remote Notarial Acts adopted by the Vermont Secretary of State, and it has to be signed pursuant to the self-proving provisions of § 108.

The paragraph runs only for the period during which those Emergency Rules remain in force. That wording ties the allowance to the life of a Secretary of State rule rather than to the statute itself, so Vermont is not a permanent remote-witnessing state the way its own § 5(a) is permanent. We could not confirm from an official source whether those emergency rules still stand today, so treat a remote signing as a question for a Vermont attorney and sign in person where you can.

Vermont Recognizes No Handwritten or Oral Will

A holographic will is written entirely in the maker's own hand with no attesting witnesses. Vermont's wills chapter creates none. The section list for 14 V.S.A. chapter 1, read at the Legislature's own site, runs §§ 1, 2, 3, 4 [Repealed], 5, 6 [Repealed], 7, 8 [Repealed], 9 [Repealed], 10 and 11. There is no holographic-will section and no nuncupative-will section in it, and § 5 writes no exception to the two-witness rule.

Do not read that as "an unwitnessed handwritten page is always void here." 14 V.S.A. § 112 says a will executed outside this State in the mode prescribed by the law either of the place where it was executed or of the testator's domicile shall be deemed legally executed and shall have the same force and effect as one executed under Vermont law, provided the will is in writing and subscribed by the testator. A holograph signed in a state whose law accepts holographs can be allowed in a Vermont Probate Division. The same page written at a kitchen table in Montpelier passes nothing.

One section sits nearby and gets misread. 14 V.S.A. § 7 says the provisions of chapter 1 shall not prevent a person in active military service from disposing of an estate as that person might otherwise have done, and it deems a military will prepared and executed under 10 U.S.C. § 1044d to be legally executed here. That is a federal-form rule for service members. It is not a general oral-will exception, and nobody outside active military service can lean on it.

Making a Vermont Will Self-Proved

Self-proving is optional in Vermont, and it saves the estate a step later. Section 108 sets the rule, and it lives in chapter 3 rather than chapter 1.

A will may be self-proved as to its execution by the sworn acknowledgment of the testator and the witnesses, made before a notary public or another official authorized to administer oaths in the place of execution. Under oath, the acknowledgment covers four points:

1. the testator signed the instrument as the testator's will, or expressly directed another to sign for the testator, in the presence of two witnesses;
2. the signing was the testator's free and voluntary act for the purposes expressed in the will;
3. each witness signed at the request of the testator, in the testator's presence, and in the presence of the other witness; and
4. to the best knowledge of each witness at the time of signing, the testator was at least 18 or emancipated by court order, and was of sound mind and under no constraint or undue influence.

Here is why it is worth the extra signature. 14 V.S.A. § 107 lets the Probate Division allow a will without a hearing where the heirs at law and the surviving spouse all file consents. Where no timely objection is filed, § 107(b)(1) lets the court allow the will on the testimony of only one subscribing witness, and § 107(b)(2) lets the court allow it with no hearing at all if it meets § 108. A self-proved will skips the hunt for a witness who moved away years ago.

Skip the acknowledgment and the estate falls back on live proof. Where a subscribing witness cannot be found or cannot testify, 14 V.S.A. § 110 lets the court admit the will on the testimony or affidavit of at least one credible disinterested individual that the signature is in the handwriting of the person whose will it purports to be, or on other sufficient proof of the handwriting, with the will complying on its face. That route works. It also costs time and money the acknowledgment would have saved.

Vermont has a second self-proving track for a document built to travel. Chapter 4 codifies the international will: 14 V.S.A. § 133 sets the form, which needs two witnesses plus an authorized person, 14 V.S.A. § 139 makes any lawyer with an active Vermont license an authorized person, 14 V.S.A. § 140 makes a compliant will self-proved and allowable by the court, and 14 V.S.A. § 132 adds that failing as an international will does not spoil the document's formal validity as a will of another kind.

A Witness Who Inherits Can Lose the Gift

Vermont voids the gift rather than the will, and it prints the cure inside the same sentence. Read 14 V.S.A. § 10 before choosing who signs.

Any beneficial devise or legacy given in a will to a subscribing witness, or to the spouse of a subscribing witness, is voidable unless there are two other competent subscribing witnesses to the will. A provision in the will for payment of a debt is not void, and it does not disqualify the creditor as a witness.

Two things follow.

• The spouse clause catches people. A witness who takes nothing personally, but whose husband or wife is a beneficiary, triggers the same result.
• Three witnesses fix it. Where a beneficiary has already signed, two other competent subscribing witnesses save the gift, since the section asks for two others rather than two total.

The simplest plan still holds. Ask two neighbors, colleagues, or friends who take nothing under the will, and who are married to nobody who takes anything, to sit down together and sign at the same table.

Revoking or Changing a Vermont Will

14 V.S.A. § 11 closes the list of methods. A will is revoked by executing a subsequent will that revokes the previous one expressly or by inconsistency, or by performing a revocatory act on the will with the intent and for the purpose of revoking it. Another person may perform the act, in the testator's conscious presence and by the testator's direction.

The statute defines the act. Burning, tearing, canceling, obliterating, or destroying the will or any part of it counts, and a burn, tear, or cancellation counts whether or not it touched any of the words on the page.

Two presumptions then sort out what a later document did to an earlier one. Where the later will makes a complete disposition of the estate, the testator is presumed to have meant it to replace the earlier will, and the earlier will is revoked unless clear and convincing evidence rebuts the presumption. Where the later will does not make a complete disposition, the testator is presumed to have meant it to supplement, so the later will revokes the earlier one only where the two conflict and both stay operative otherwise.

Divorce acts on its own. 14 V.S.A. § 320 says a final divorce or dissolution order from any state nullifies a gift by will to a person who was the decedent's spouse when the will was executed, along with any nomination of that spouse as executor, executrix, trustee, guardian, or other fiduciary, where the decedent was no longer married to or in a civil union with that person at death, unless the will states the contrary in express terms.

Nothing in chapter 1 makes marriage revoke a will. A new spouse is protected by a separate mechanism, the elective share, which the Vermont surviving spouse rights guide covers.

Children Born or Left Out After the Will

Vermont writes these rules in chapter 42, alongside the intestacy scheme, so a page that only reads chapter 1 misses them.

• A child born after the will. 14 V.S.A. § 332 gives an afterborn child with no provision in the will the same share as if the testator had died intestate, unless it is apparent from the will that the testator meant to leave that child out.
• A child omitted by mistake. 14 V.S.A. § 333 reaches any child, or the descendants of a deceased child, whom the testator omitted where the omission was made by mistake or accident. That child takes the intestate share.
• Where the share comes from. 14 V.S.A. § 334 takes the share first from estate the will did not dispose of. Where that falls short, the rest comes from the devisees and legatees in proportion to what each receives, and the court may exempt a specific gift and adopt a different apportionment where the obvious intention of the testator would otherwise be defeated.
• A beneficiary who dies first. 14 V.S.A. § 335 gives a testamentary gift made to a child or other kindred of the testator to that beneficiary's surviving descendants, unless the will requires a different disposition.

Each of these is a default the will can override with clear drafting. Reviewing the document after a birth, an adoption, a divorce, or a death in the family is cheaper than litigating which default applied.

Depositing a Will With the Probate Division

Vermont lets a living testator hand the original to the court. 14 V.S.A. § 2 allows a will to be deposited for safekeeping in the Probate Division of the Superior Court for the district where the testator resides, on payment of the fee at 32 V.S.A. § 1434(a)(18), which the statute sets at $30.00. Filing a later will for safekeeping, or transferring one to another Probate Division, costs another $30.00 under subdivision (19). Those two subdivisions are unusual: § 1434(a) directs their fees to the county where the fee was collected, while every other entry fee in the section goes to the State.

The mechanics protect privacy. The register gives the testator a receipt and keeps an index. Each will goes into a sealed envelope marked with the testator's name and address and the names and addresses of the executors named inside, and it stays sealed until the court delivers it to someone entitled to receive it. During the testator's life the will goes only to the testator, or on the testator's written order duly acknowledged or otherwise proved to the court's satisfaction, though a duly authorized legal guardian or attorney-in-fact may inspect and copy it in front of the judge or register. Deposited wills and the index of them stay closed to public inspection while the testator lives.

The Judiciary publishes a cover letter for the filing and a request form for removing a will from safekeeping on its Estates and Wills self-help page. Find your county's court in the Vermont probate court directory.

Filing the Will After a Death

Vermont abolished its separate county probate courts in 2011. Probate now runs through the Probate Division of the Superior Court, one district per county. Then the clocks start.

• Custodians get 30 days. 14 V.S.A. § 103 requires a person holding a will to deliver it to the Probate Division where venue lies, or to the executor named in the will, within 30 days after learning of the testator's death.
• Refusing to hand it over has teeth. 14 V.S.A. § 106 requires delivery with reasonable promptness on the request of an interested person, exposes a person who intentionally refuses a court order to deliver to civil contempt under 12 V.S.A. § 122, and gives anyone damaged by an intentional failure to deliver an action in Superior Court for damages and injunctive relief.
• The named executor files. 14 V.S.A. § 104 requires a person named executor who knows of the will to file a death certificate and a petition to open the estate with reasonable promptness. Where no assets require probate administration, that person may file the original death certificate and the will with no petition, telling the court that no assets appear to need administration.
• Nothing moves until the will is allowed. 14 V.S.A. § 101 says a will is effective only once allowed in the Probate Division, or on appeal in the Civil Division of the Superior Court or the Supreme Court.
• Objections have their own deadline. Under § 107(b), objections to allowance must be filed in writing not less than seven days before the hearing.
• Allowance settles execution. 14 V.S.A. § 102 makes the allowance of a will conclusive as to its due execution and validity.
• The named executor can protect the property first. Section 107(c) gives that person power, after the will is delivered to the court and while allowance is pending, to take custody of the estate for its preservation until a special or other administrator is appointed and qualifies.

Once the court allows the will, the Vermont executor duties guide picks the story up. Where someone plans to fight the document, the guide to the grounds to contest a Vermont will covers that route instead.

A will already proved in another state travels a different track, and the Vermont ancillary probate guide walks it.

What a Vermont Will Cannot Control

A will moves probate property. Several things sit outside it.

Retirement accounts and life insurance follow their beneficiary forms. Jointly held property with survivorship passes to the survivor. A funded trust follows its own terms, which is why a Vermont revocable living trust needs its assets retitled to work. Land held under an enhanced life estate deed passes to the named remainderman, and the Vermont enhanced life estate deed guide covers the statute behind it. Compare all of those routes in the guide to avoiding probate in Vermont before assuming a will controls an account.

What This Means for Your Vermont Will

A Vermont will that holds up usually looks like this.

1. Confirm the maker is 18 or emancipated by court order, and of sound mind.
2. Put the will in writing and have the maker sign it, or have someone sign in the maker's name, in the maker's presence, and at the maker's express direction.
3. Gather two credible witnesses in one room, and keep the maker and both witnesses there while everyone signs. Section 5(a)(3) asks the witnesses to attest in the presence of the testator and each other.
4. Pick witnesses who take nothing under the will and whose spouses take nothing either, since § 10 makes a gift to a subscribing witness or that witness's spouse voidable.
5. Add the § 108 acknowledgment at the same sitting, sworn before a notary public, so the Probate Division can allow the will without a hearing under § 107(b)(2).
6. Store the original where the named executor can reach it, or deposit it with the Probate Division for $30.00 under § 2, and tell that person where it is.
7. Re-read the will after a divorce, a birth or adoption, a move into Vermont, or the death of a beneficiary.

A will is one document inside a wider plan. Pair it with the lifetime paperwork in the Vermont power of attorney guide and the Vermont advance directive guide, and see how the pieces fit together in Vermont estate planning basics.

This page is general information about Vermont wills. Check anything that touches your own situation with the Probate Division of the Superior Court for your county, or with a licensed Vermont attorney, before you sign or rely on a will.

Sources:

• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 1, Who may make. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/001/00001
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 2, Deposit of will for safekeeping; delivery; final disposition. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/001/00002
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 3, Will may pass all property and after-acquired property. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/001/00003
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 5, Execution of will; requisites. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/001/00005
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 7, How made by soldier or sailor; military will. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/001/00007
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 10, Devise or legacy to witness. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/001/00010
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 11, How revoked. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/001/00011
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 101, Will not effective until allowed. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00101
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 102, Allowance conclusive as to execution. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00102
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 103, Custodian of will to deliver. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00103
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 104, Executor to present will and accept or refuse trust. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00104
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 106, Duty of custodian of will; liability. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00106
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 107, Allowance of will; custody of property. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00107
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 108, Self-proved wills. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00108
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 110, Absence of witness, proof. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00110
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 112, Wills made out of state. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/003/00112
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 132, Validity. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/004/00132
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 133, Requirements. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/004/00133
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 139, Authorized persons. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/004/00139
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 140, Self proved. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/004/00140
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 320, Effect of divorce order. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/042/00320
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 332, Share of afterborn child. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/042/00332
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 333, Share of child or descendant of child omitted from will. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/042/00333
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 334, Afterborn and omitted child; from what part of estate share taken. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/042/00334
• Title: 14 V.S.A. § 335, Beneficiary dying before testator; descendants to take. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/14/042/00335
• Title: 32 V.S.A. § 1434, Probate cases. Publisher: Vermont General Assembly. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/32/017/01434
• Title: Estates and Wills. Publisher: Vermont Judiciary. Publication Date: Not listed. URL: https://www.vtcourts.gov/probate/estates-and-wills

It is not legal advice.