Updating your estate plan after divorce, marriage, or a move to Florida means re-examining your will, trust, beneficiary designations, powers of attorney, and the deed to your home so they reflect your current family and your new state’s laws. Florida has its own rules on spousal rights, homestead, and how documents are executed, so plans drafted in another state (or before a major life change) often fail to do what you think they do. The fix is rarely “start over” — it’s a targeted review of the right documents in the right order.
I’ve sat across the table from too many South Florida homeowners who assumed their old paperwork “still worked.” Sometimes it did. More often, a divorce decree, a second marriage, or a relocation from New York or New Jersey quietly broke something — and nobody noticed until a death or an incapacity put it under pressure. This article walks through what actually changes after each of these three events, and what you should do about it.
Why a Life Change Breaks an Otherwise Good Estate Plan
An estate plan is a snapshot. It captures who you trusted, who you wanted to provide for, and what you owned on the day you signed. Divorce, marriage, and relocation each move at least two of those variables — sometimes all three at once. When the snapshot no longer matches reality, your documents start working against you instead of for you.
The danger is that most of these failures are silent. A revocable trust doesn’t send you a warning email when your new Florida homestead isn’t titled into it. A beneficiary form doesn’t flag that it still names an ex-spouse. The gap only surfaces at the worst possible moment, when the person who could fix it is gone or incapacitated.
Updating Your Estate Plan After Divorce
Divorce is the change people most often assume “handles itself.” It doesn’t — at least not completely.
Florida automatically revokes some — but not all — gifts to an ex-spouse
Under Florida Statutes § 732.507(2), a divorce voids any provision of your will that benefits your former spouse, treating them as if they had died at the time of the dissolution. A parallel rule in § 732.703 applies to many beneficiary designations on assets like life insurance and certain retirement and payable-on-death accounts. That sounds like full protection. It isn’t.
These statutes have real limits. Section 732.703 carves out assets governed by federal law — most notably ERISA-covered 401(k) plans, where the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Egelhoff v. Egelhoff made clear that the named beneficiary on file controls, regardless of a state revocation statute. So your will may cut out your ex, while your largest retirement account still pays them in full. I have seen exactly that happen.
What to actually do after a divorce
- Re-sign your will and trust. Don’t rely on automatic revocation to do clean work — it creates gaps and contingent-beneficiary surprises. Execute fresh documents that say what you mean now.
- Manually update every beneficiary designation. Life insurance, IRAs, 401(k)s, annuities, and POD/TOD accounts. Contact each custodian directly. Treat the ERISA accounts as the top priority.
- Replace your powers of attorney and health care surrogate. An ex-spouse named as your financial agent or health care decision-maker is usually the last person you’d want in that role during a crisis.
- Re-title the marital home. If a deed transfer or buyout was part of the divorce, confirm the recorded deed actually reflects it. A judgment that says “the wife shall receive the home” does not, by itself, change the public record.
The deed and homestead trap
If you and your former spouse held the house as tenants by the entirety — the default for married couples in Florida — that form of ownership ends at divorce and converts to a tenancy in common. Now you each own a separate, transferable half, with none of the creditor protection the entirety tenancy gave you. Until the deed is corrected and recorded, you may be co-owning your home with an ex you thought you’d separated from financially. For homeowners whose largest asset is the house, sorting out the deed is not a footnote; it’s the main event.
Updating Your Estate Plan After Marriage (or Remarriage)
Marriage is the happy version of the same problem: your plan now leaves out — or doesn’t properly account for — the most important person in your life.
Florida gives a spouse rights you can’t simply ignore
Florida law builds in protections for surviving spouses that override an outdated will. Two are essential to understand:
- The elective share (§ 732.201 and following). A surviving spouse is entitled to 30% of the “elective estate,” a broad pool that reaches well beyond your probate assets to include things like revocable trust property, certain joint accounts, and payable-on-death assets. You cannot quietly disinherit a spouse in Florida the way you might assume.
- The pretermitted spouse rule (§ 732.301). If you marry after signing your will and never update it, your new spouse may take an intestate share — roughly what they’d receive if you’d died with no will at all — unless the will provided for them or a valid prenuptial agreement waived the right.
Homestead and the surviving spouse
Florida’s homestead protections are some of the strongest in the country, and they reach right into your estate plan. Under Article X, Section 4 of the Florida Constitution and § 732.401, you generally cannot leave your homestead to whomever you please if you are survived by a spouse or minor child. If you have a spouse and no minor children, your spouse receives at least a life estate (or, by election, a one-half tenant-in-common interest). A will that “leaves the house to the kids” can be partly or fully void as applied to homestead.
For remarried couples with children from prior relationships, this is where careful drafting earns its keep. The goal is usually to provide for the new spouse and preserve the home for the children — and the tools that accomplish that (an enhanced life estate deed, a QTIP-style marital trust, or a clear homestead waiver in a prenup) require deliberate planning, not a fill-in-the-blank form.
A practical post-marriage checklist
- Add your spouse to your will or trust intentionally — don’t leave their share to the default statutes.
- Update beneficiary designations on insurance and retirement accounts.
- Re-examine how the home is titled and whether tenancy by the entirety or a trust is right for you.
- Decide consciously whether you want a prenup or postnup to govern homestead and elective-share rights, especially in a blended family.
- Refresh your powers of attorney and health care surrogate to name your spouse where appropriate.
Updating Your Estate Plan After a Move to Florida
This is the one out-of-state arrivals underestimate the most. Your New York or New Jersey documents didn’t expire when you crossed the state line — but several of them stopped working the way they used to.
Will execution and the out-of-state document question
Florida will generally honor a will that was validly executed under the law of the state where you signed it. But two catches matter. First, Florida does not recognize handwritten (holographic) or oral (nuncupative) wills, even if your prior state did — and a holographic will valid elsewhere is void here. Second, Florida law requires a “self-proving affidavit” to let a will be admitted to probate without dragging your witnesses into court; many out-of-state wills lack one in Florida’s required form. The cleanest path is to re-execute your will in Florida.
Powers of attorney get re-read under Florida’s stricter rules
Florida overhauled its power-of-attorney law in 2011, and the current statute (Chapter 709) is demanding. Florida no longer recognizes “springing” powers of attorney that take effect only upon incapacity — they must be effective when signed. Out-of-state POAs are often valid in theory but get rejected in practice when a Florida bank or title company scrutinizes them. A Florida-compliant durable power of attorney avoids that fight.
Claim your homestead — and put the deed in the right place
Once Florida is your primary residence, file for the homestead exemption with your county property appraiser (the deadline is March 1). Beyond the tax savings and the Save Our Homes 3% annual assessment cap, declaring Florida homestead unlocks the constitutional creditor protection that makes this state so attractive. Just as important: make sure the deed reflects how you want the property to pass. Many newcomers fund a revocable living trust but forget to deed the new Florida home into it, leaving the very asset they moved here to protect exposed to probate.
If part of your move involves keeping or transferring property up north, coordinate it carefully. New York handles transfers and life estates under its own rules — our colleagues at Morgan Legal explain the mechanics of , which is essential reading if you still own a residence there. And if you need to refresh the foundational document itself, their overview of the is a useful starting point before you re-sign in Florida.
Domicile is a legal status, not just a mailing address
Establishing Florida domicile protects your heirs from your former state trying to tax your estate or your income. File a Declaration of Domicile, change your driver’s license and voter registration, update your physician and financial accounts, and spend the days here. The estate-tax stakes are real: Florida has no state estate or inheritance tax, while several Northeastern states most snowbirds come from do.
Documents to Review After Any Major Life Change
Whatever triggered the change, the review list is largely the same. Walk through each of these:
- Last will and testament — and confirm it carries a Florida-form self-proving affidavit.
- Revocable living trust — and verify your home and accounts are actually titled into it.
- Beneficiary designations — life insurance, IRAs, 401(k)s, annuities, POD/TOD accounts.
- Durable power of attorney — Florida-compliant, effective when signed.
- Designation of health care surrogate and living will.
- Deeds — including whether an enhanced life estate (“Lady Bird”) deed fits your goals.
- Guardian nominations for minor children.
Common Mistakes I See in South Florida
- Assuming the divorce statute did all the work. It doesn’t touch ERISA retirement plans, and it can leave awkward gaps in contingent gifts.
- Funding a trust but forgetting the house. An unfunded trust is an expensive piece of paper; the home still goes through probate.
- Leaving the homestead to the “wrong” people. A devise that ignores the surviving-spouse and minor-child rules under § 732.401 can be partly void.
- Relying on an out-of-state power of attorney. When a bank balks during a crisis, “it was valid in New Jersey” doesn’t help anyone.
- Treating a divorce judgment as a deed. The court order may award the house, but only a recorded deed changes title.
If you’d like a structured walkthrough of how these pieces fit together, our covers wills, trusts, homestead, and incapacity documents in one coordinated review. You can also start with our overview pages on wills and what to expect from Florida probate.
When to Bring in a Florida Estate Planning Attorney
You don’t need a lawyer to change a beneficiary form. You do need one when a homestead, a blended family, a business interest, an out-of-state property, or a sizeable retirement account is in play — which describes nearly every homeowner who has just divorced, remarried, or relocated. The cost of a focused review is trivial next to the cost of a probate fight or a tax bill your family didn’t see coming. If any of the three events in this article apply to you, treat the next 90 days as your window to get the paperwork to match your life. Schedule a consultation and bring your current documents — we’ll tell you what still works and what needs to be redone.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does getting divorced in Florida automatically remove my ex-spouse from my estate plan?
Partly. Florida Statutes 732.507 and 732.703 automatically void most will provisions and beneficiary designations favoring a former spouse, treating them as having predeceased you. But this does not reach ERISA-governed retirement plans like 401(k)s, where the named beneficiary on file controls. You should manually re-sign your will, update every beneficiary form, and replace any powers of attorney that named your ex.
I just moved to Florida from another state. Is my old will still valid?
Generally Florida honors a will validly executed under the laws of the state where you signed it, with two big exceptions: Florida does not recognize handwritten or oral wills, and your out-of-state will likely lacks a Florida-form self-proving affidavit, which means your witnesses could be required in probate court. Re-executing your will in Florida and updating your power of attorney to comply with Chapter 709 is the cleanest approach.
Can I leave my Florida home to whomever I want in my will?
Not freely if you have a surviving spouse or a minor child. Under Article X, Section 4 of the Florida Constitution and Statute 732.401, your homestead passes under special rules; a spouse is generally entitled to at least a life estate or a one-half interest, and a devise that violates these rules can be void. Planning tools like an enhanced life estate deed or a marital trust can balance providing for a spouse with preserving the home for children.
What's the most overlooked step after remarrying in Florida?
Coordinating the homestead and the elective share. A surviving spouse in Florida is entitled to 30% of a broad elective estate, and a spouse who marries you after your will was signed may take an intestate share as a pretermitted spouse. In blended families, you typically want a prenuptial agreement or carefully drafted trust so you can provide for your new spouse while still protecting children from a prior marriage.
How soon should I update my estate plan after one of these life changes?
Aim to complete the review within 90 days. The risk in waiting is that a death or sudden incapacity can occur before the paperwork catches up, locking in outcomes you never intended. Prioritize beneficiary designations and powers of attorney first, since those control assets and decisions immediately, then update your will, trust, and deeds.
