18 Sep 2018

Where there's a will

From Nine To Noon, 9:08 am on 18 September 2018

Less than half of all New Zealanders are making wills, and those that do exist are more open to legal challenges, according to new research.

The data from the Public Trust shows 55 percent of New Zealanders and 28 percent of all parents do not have a will.

funeral, generic, coffin, death

Photo: 123RF

Public Trust senior solicitor Theresa Donnelly told Nine to Noon the main reasons for the lack of a will are people thinking they don't have enough assets and saying they do not have enough time to sit down and create one.

But she said anybody with assets worth more than $15,000 - which could include Kiwisaver funds or life insurance - should have a document drawn up, and people who kept saying there was enough time to get one done were "taking a gamble".

She also said there were more deep-seated reasons behind the procrastination.

"They are things like the lack of death conversations in New Zealand, that used to be a primary entertainment of the great aunts, having those death conversations and continuing to change the sticky label of whoever's name is under a particular item. But people don't want to talk about their mortality now."

The study also found there were more challenges to wills after a death.

Auckland litigation lawyer Isaac Hikaka said factors such as rising house prices were partly to blame, as they increased the size of estates.

"The more money that is up for grabs, the more people will try and have a tilt at it."

The study also found some ethnic groups were less likely to have wills - up to 80 percent of Pasifika people, 75 percent of Asian New Zealanders and 69 percent of Maori did not have a will.