Who Inherits When You Die With a Spouse and One Child in Ontario?

If you die without a will in Ontario and you have a surviving spouse and exactly one child, the law decides who gets what — and the answer may surprise you. The rules for intestacy with a spouse and one child in Ontario come from the Succession Law Reform Act (SLRA) and follow a specific formula that most people have never heard of until they are dealing with a loved one's estate.

Understanding how these rules work can help you decide whether the law's default matches what you actually want — or whether a will is overdue.

What Is Intestacy?

Intestacy means dying without a valid will. When that happens, Ontario's SLRA takes over and sets out exactly who inherits your estate, in what order, and in what proportions. The rules apply to your "net estate" — broadly, everything you own that passes through your estate rather than by designation (like RRSPs with named beneficiaries or jointly held property that passes by right of survivorship).

The Preferential Share: Spouse Gets First Priority

The first thing to understand is the preferential share. Before anything is divided between a spouse and children, the surviving spouse is entitled to receive a set dollar amount off the top of the estate. As of writing, verify the current amount with ServiceOntario or an Ontario estate lawyer, as this figure is set by regulation and can be updated. This share exists so the surviving spouse is not left with nothing while waiting for shares to be calculated.

What happens if the estate is smaller than the preferential share?

If your entire net estate is worth less than the preferential share, your surviving spouse inherits everything. The child receives nothing under the intestacy formula in that scenario. This is an important point — a modest estate could effectively pass entirely to the spouse by operation of law.

Dividing What Remains: The Residue

If your estate exceeds the preferential share, what is left over (called the residue) is divided between the surviving spouse and your one child. Under the SLRA, as of writing, the spouse and the child each receive a share of the residue. The exact fraction each party receives is set out in the statute — verify the current split with a lawyer, as legislative amendments can alter proportions.

The practical effect is that a portion of your estate may pass to your child as soon as they reach the age of majority (18 in Ontario), with the funds held in trust until then if the child is a minor. This can affect how your family home, savings, and other assets are managed.

Why the Default Rules Often Produce Unintended Results

Your spouse may not control all the money

Many people assume a surviving spouse simply inherits everything and manages it for the family. Under intestacy, that is not always the case. If your child's share is significant, a court-supervised trust must hold those funds, and the surviving spouse may have no say in how that money is invested or spent.

The matrimonial home may be complicated

The matrimonial home is subject to separate rules under Ontario's Family Law Act. How it passes on death depends on how title is held (joint tenancy vs. tenancy in common) and whether the surviving spouse's rights under family law overlap with the intestacy regime. This can create genuine complexity.

Blended families face added friction

If you have a child from a previous relationship and a current spouse, the intestacy formula divides your estate between two parties who may have competing interests. A will allows you to manage that precisely; intestacy does not.

Assets That Pass Outside the Intestacy Rules

Not everything you own goes through your estate. The following generally pass directly to named beneficiaries or co-owners, regardless of the SLRA:

• RRSPs, RRIFs, TFSAs with a named beneficiary
• Life insurance proceeds with a named beneficiary
• Jointly owned property held in joint tenancy (passes by right of survivorship)
• Pension plan death benefits governed by their own legislation

These designations override the intestacy rules entirely, so the actual value your spouse and child receive from your estate depends heavily on how your assets are structured.

Applying to Administer the Estate

Without a will, no executor is appointed. Someone — typically the surviving spouse — must apply to the court for a Certificate of Appointment of Estate Trustee Without a Will. This process takes time and costs money. The estate trustee is then legally responsible for following the SLRA distribution formula, not their own judgment about who deserves what.

Frequently asked questions