What Happens If You Die Without a Will in Washington?
Most people put off writing a will because it feels like a problem for another day. But in Washington State, dying without one does not mean your estate simply goes to your closest family members in the way you might expect. It means the state steps in and makes those decisions for you, and the results can surprise even the most well-intentioned families. For a focused explanation, read what Happens to Digital Assets in My Will.
Washington's Default Rules: Intestate Succession
When a person dies without a valid will, the law calls that dying "intestate." Washington has a detailed set of default inheritance rules that apply automatically, found in the state's intestate succession statute, RCW 11.04.015. That statute determines who inherits your property, in what order, and in what shares. Your wishes, your relationships, and your personal circumstances do not factor into it. The formula controls.
Understanding how that formula works, especially in Washington, requires understanding the distinction between community property and separate property, because the two are treated very differently.
Community Property vs. Separate Property: Why It Matters
Washington is one of a small number of community property states. Property you acquire during your marriage generally belongs equally to both spouses, which means your spouse already owns half of it. Under RCW 11.04.015, your share of the community estate passes to your surviving spouse or state registered domestic partner automatically if you die intestate. The practical result is that all of the community property ends up with your spouse. That part is straightforward.
Separate property is different. Separate property includes assets you owned before the marriage, as well as gifts or inheritances you received individually during the marriage. That property does not pass automatically and entirely to your spouse. Instead, the statute splits it based on which family members survive you. How an asset gets classified as community or separate can decide who inherits it.
Here is how the separate property division works under RCW 11.04.015:
If you are survived by a spouse and children, your spouse receives one-half of your separate property, and your children split the other half. If you have a surviving spouse but no children, and at least one of your parents or a parent's descendants survives you, your spouse receives three-quarters of your separate property and those relatives receive the remaining quarter. If you leave a surviving spouse with no children and no surviving parents or siblings, your spouse inherits all of your separate property.
Many people are surprised to learn that a surviving spouse does not automatically inherit everything, particularly when the decedent owned property before the marriage or received an inheritance at some point. That surprise can be painful when a widow or widower suddenly finds themselves sharing the family home with adult children from a prior relationship, or with in-laws they have a difficult history with.
Washington Intestate Succession
- Children and their descendants
- Parents
- Siblings and their descendants
- Grandparents
- Aunts, uncles, and cousins (descendants of grandparents)
- Certain stepchildren, but only to prevent the estate from going to the state (RCW 11.04.095)
- Last resort: the State of Washington, if none of the above survive you
What If There Is No Surviving Spouse?
If you die without a spouse and without a will, your estate passes to your children in equal shares. If any of your children have predeceased you but left their own children (your grandchildren), those grandchildren step into their parent's share by what the law calls "representation."
If you leave no spouse and no children, RCW 11.04.015 continues down the family tree in a specific order: your parents, then your siblings (or your siblings' descendants if a sibling has already died), then your grandparents, and then the descendants of your grandparents, which means your aunts, uncles, and cousins. The statute is designed to keep assets within the family as long as any blood relative can be located, and that final rung reaches a lot further than most people assume.
If no eligible relative survives you, there is still one more stop before the state. Under RCW 11.04.095, if a spouse or state registered domestic partner died before you and left you all or substantially all of their property, and that person had children from an earlier relationship, those stepchildren inherit that property rather than surrendering it to the state. That provision exists specifically to prevent escheat, and it is explained in more detail below.
Only if no relative and no such stepchild survives you does your estate escheat to Washington State under chapter 11.08 RCW. It goes to the government. This outcome is genuinely rare given how far down the family tree the statute reaches, but it is not hypothetical.
Who Runs the Estate When There Is No Will?
A will typically names a personal representative, the person responsible for gathering assets, paying debts and taxes, and distributing what remains to the beneficiaries. Without a will, that role falls to an administrator appointed by the court under RCW 11.28.120. That job comes with real duties; understanding how probate is opened is the first step for whoever takes it on.
Washington law sets a priority order for who may seek that appointment. The surviving spouse or state registered domestic partner has first priority, and may also nominate someone else to serve. After that come children, parents, siblings, grandchildren, and nieces or nephews.
Amendments to RCW 11.28.120 that took effect June 11, 2026 changed what happens when nobody in that group steps forward. The court must now allow at least 60 days to pass after the date of death before appointing a public guardianship contract service provider or a guardian ad litem, and at least 90 days before appointing an unrelated "suitable person" to administer the estate. Both thresholds replaced a prior 40-day window. The same amendments limit what an unrelated suitable person can do once appointed: that person generally cannot receive nonintervention powers, cannot buy estate assets or take sale proceeds outside narrow exceptions, and is capped at two such appointment petitions per year.
One point worth understanding: the 90-day mark is not a deadline for opening a probate. A Washington probate can be started long after a death. What the deadline governs is who has priority to serve. A family member who waits can lose the first position they would otherwise have held.
A related change to RCW 11.28.110, effective the same date, requires a petition in an intestate estate to include more detail about the search for a will and the identity of the decedent's heirs. In practice this means opening a probate without a will now takes more preparation than it used to.
Courts often require an administrator in an intestate estate to obtain a bond before being appointed. This is a form of insurance that protects heirs and creditors if the administrator mismanages estate assets. The bonding requirement adds cost and time to the process, and it is one of the practical reasons that an intestate estate frequently takes longer and costs more to close than a properly planned one.
Stepchildren, Unmarried Partners, and Close Friends: Left Out by Default
Washington's intestate succession statute is built around legal relationships, not personal ones. That has real consequences, though the picture is more nuanced than a flat "they get nothing."
A stepchild you raised as your own receives nothing if you never legally adopted them, with one narrow exception. Under RCW 11.04.095, if your spouse or state registered domestic partner died before you, had children from an earlier relationship, and left you all or substantially all of their property by will or by a transfer during life, and you then die with no will and no heirs at all, those stepchildren inherit that property rather than letting it escheat. Their own children can inherit in their place if a stepchild has died. This is a rescue from escheat, not a general right to inherit from a stepparent. If even one relative on the list above survives you, including a cousin you have never met, the exception never comes into play. It also does nothing for a stepchild whose biological parent is still living, or who divorced you, or who kept their own property rather than transferring it to you.
An unmarried partner is not an heir and inherits nothing under the intestacy statute, regardless of how long you lived together or how financially intertwined your lives became. That partner may still have a separate claim. Washington recognizes what courts call a committed intimate relationship, and in Olver v. Fowler, 161 Wn.2d 655 (2007), the Washington Supreme Court confirmed that property acquired during such a relationship that would have been community property is jointly owned and subject to a fair division, and that the death of one or both partners does not extinguish that interest. But this is a claim that has to be brought and proven in the probate. It is expensive, it is uncertain, it reaches only jointly acquired property, and it puts a grieving partner in litigation with your family. It is not a substitute for a will.
A close friend you always intended to help receives nothing. There is no exception here at all.
The statute cannot know what you would have wanted. It only knows what the law says. This is why so many people who think they have a plan discover, after a death in the family, that the plan existed only in someone's head and never on paper.
A Note for Snohomish County Families
In Snohomish County and across the Puget Sound region, blended families, unmarried couples, and property owners with significant separate assets are especially vulnerable to the unintended consequences of intestate succession. A modest home purchased before a second marriage, a business started independently, or an inherited parcel of land can all pass in ways that divide a family or undermine the financial stability of the person left behind.
The conversation about wills is often treated as a conversation about death. It is more accurately a conversation about control, about making sure the people you care about are protected by your decisions rather than by a formula the legislature wrote for people who made none.
The Simple Fix That Most People Never Make
A will is not a complicated or expensive document for most families. It lets you name who inherits your property, who raises your minor children if both parents are gone, and who handles the administration of your estate. It replaces the intestate succession formula with your own judgment. It removes the court from decisions that belong in your family. If you have never made one, start with what it takes to make a valid will in Washington.
If you already have a will but signed it years ago, it is worth reviewing. Washington has seen real changes to estate planning and probate law in recent years. The state adopted the Uniform Electronic Wills Act, found at RCW 11.12.400 through 11.12.491, which allows a will to exist as an electronic record when specific steps are followed, including the use of a qualified custodian. Washington also amended RCW 11.12.020 to allow witnesses to sign in the testator's "electronic presence" rather than the same room. And as noted above, the rules for appointing an administrator in an intestate estate changed in June 2026. Older documents, and older assumptions, may not reflect either current law or your current life.
If you have questions about what would happen to your estate under Washington's intestate rules, or if you are ready to put a plan in place, contact the Law Office of Chad Foster. We serve families throughout Snohomish County and help people make decisions they can be confident in, long before those decisions need to be made for them. Call 425.785.8679 to start the conversation.
Need help with a estate planning matter in King or Snohomish County? Learn about our wills, trusts, and estate planning services, or call 425.785.8679 for a consultation.