**Divorce** (noun) — The legal dissolution of a marriage by court order, terminating the marital relationship and affecting property rights, inheritance rights, and estate planning documents.
Divorce is the formal legal process that ends a marriage. When you get divorced, a court officially terminates your marriage and makes decisions about how to divide your property, assets, and debts.
From an estate planning perspective, divorce has significant implications. In most places, getting divorced automatically revokes any gifts or appointments you made to your former spouse in your will. This means if your will left everything to your spouse and you get divorced, that provision typically becomes invalid. However, the rest of your will usually remains in effect.
Divorce also affects beneficiary designations on things like life insurance policies, retirement accounts, and superannuation. In many jurisdictions, divorce automatically removes a former spouse as a beneficiary, but this isn't universal. It's always best to update these designations yourself rather than relying on automatic changes.
⏱ When you'll encounter this term
Divorce appears in estate planning whenever there's been a change in marital status. After a divorce, you'll need to review and likely update your will, power of attorney documents, and beneficiary designations. If you don't update these documents, your estate might not be distributed according to your current wishes.
The timing of divorce and death can create complicated situations. If someone dies while divorce proceedings are still pending, the surviving spouse may still have inheritance rights. Once a divorce is finalized, most jurisdictions treat former spouses as having predeceased each other for estate purposes.
Many people don't realize that divorce doesn't automatically update all their estate planning documents. While your will might be partially revoked by law, documents like powers of attorney or enduring guardianship appointments typically need to be manually revoked and replaced. Taking care of these updates promptly after divorce protects your interests and ensures your affairs are handled by people you currently trust.
**Related terms:** [Beneficiary](/dictionary/beneficiary), [Revocation](/dictionary/revocation), [Marital Property](/dictionary/marital-deduction)
---
Learn More
Related Dictionary Terms
Common Questions