How to Search for a Will in Alberta After Someone Dies

After a death, one of the first questions is whether there is a will. If you are a relative and nobody can say where it is, it helps to know there is no single place that holds every Alberta will.

This article walks through the places to look, how the Law Society of Alberta's lost wills service works, how to check whether anyone has already applied to run the estate, and what happens if no will is found.

This article covers the law of Alberta.

Start with the places a will is usually kept

Alberta does not have a will registry. That means a will may be in a locked cabinet, a safe, a bank safety deposit box, or with a lawyer. There is no one office you can phone to ask whether a will exists.

• Home: desk drawers, filing cabinets, a home safe, and papers kept with insurance or tax records.
• The lawyer who prepared it: look for a lawyer's name on old letters, invoices or a will-kit envelope.
• The bank: a safety deposit box may hold a will. How a bank deals with a request to open a box varies, so ask the branch directly and confirm what it needs from you.
• Family and friends: the person may have told someone where the will was kept or who drafted it.

Take care not to throw out any papers while you search. A copy, a draft or an old envelope can help a lawyer track down the original.

The Law Society of Alberta lost wills inquiry

If you cannot find a will, the Law Society of Alberta accepts Lost Wills Inquiry Requests from a member of the public or from a lawyer. If the request does not locate a will, it is posted in a listing for lawyers, and entries are removed automatically after 90 days.

A listing shows the deceased's name, date of birth, date of death, location and the year the will was drafted, when those details are known. If a lawyer holds the will, the Law Society's Customer Service team arranges for a copy to go to the person who made the request.

Have the deceased's full name, birth and death dates, and last location ready, along with any guess about the year a will was made. The more you can give, the more useful the listing is to lawyers who may remember the file.

Check whether anyone has applied to administer the estate

If you are unsure who is administering an estate, you can contact the Court of King's Bench nearest to where the deceased lived and ask whether any grants were issued. A fee may apply.

This matters because a named executor applies for a grant of probate when there is a will. If there is no will, or the executor does not act, someone such as a family member may ask the court for a grant of administration. A grant on file tells you someone has already taken that step.

What a search result does and does not tell you

Private registries and the lost wills listing can be helpful, but they are not proof that no will exists. A result only shows that a will was registered or found. It does not show that the will is valid or that it is the latest one. Before relying on any document you find, have a lawyer review it.

If no will can be found after a careful search, the estate is treated as intestate. The Wills and Succession Act sets out how an intestate estate is distributed in Part 3, and the Estate Administration Act sets the priority to apply for a grant of administration.

For example, if there are no descendants, the spouse or adult interdependent partner takes the entire intestate estate. If all of the deceased's descendants are also the spouse's, the spouse takes it all. If any descendant is not also a descendant of the spouse, the spouse receives the greater of a prescribed amount or 50% of the net value of the intestate estate, and the rest goes to the descendants. A lawyer can explain how this applies to your family.

What to do next

• Search the home, papers and any known storage places.
• Contact the lawyer or law firm named in the deceased's records, if there is one.
• Ask the bank about a safety deposit box and what it requires from you.
• Submit a Lost Wills Inquiry Request to the Law Society of Alberta.
• Ask the Court of King's Bench whether a grant has been issued.
• Keep a written record of every place you searched and the dates.
• Speak with a lawyer before anyone starts distributing property.

Frequently asked questions