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Some might gripe that their spouse keeps too close an eye on their spending habits, but the wrath of a partner after a frivolous purchase is small fry compared to the power the state has once you're dead.

BC is fairly unique in Canada in the way the state can step in and override a person's will, allowing a judge to make the ultimate decision on how a person's life savings are divvied up.

"It is often surprising to people who walk into my office when I tell them that... any child has the ability to apply to try to vary the will," lawyer Christopher Hart told iNFOnews.ca.

In most other provinces wills can only be challenged by children and spouses who are dependent on the deceased. An adult child unable to live independently, or a minor could appeal the will, but a son angry that dad went and left his house and savings to his siblings couldn't.

In BC that's not the case. Any child or spouse can apply to vary the will if they think mom or dad hasn't been fair.

Hart, who is a partner at Nixon Wenger, said because of this, in BC you see much more litigation over wills and estates than in other provinces.

Vernon lawyer Melody Martin has been working with wills and estates for more than 25 years and says her clients are always shocked when she tells them their will isn't set in stone.

"Often they try to argue with us and say, 'Well, the law would never do that,'" she said. "People feel morally shocked that they're restrained in doing what's important to them... (it's) a great shock to the public, people can't believe it."

Most cases don't make headlines unless there's something unusual about them.

A recent case heard in Vernon, saw the family of an 84-year-old woman leave her $1-million estate to a male escort five decades her junior. Her family claims "undue influence" as she was isolated and vulnerable and is disputing her will.

The "undue influence" law is nationwide and is in place to stop people being exploited.

A BC judge recently called a care aid "dubious and unreliable" after she married a widower and withdrew $80,000 just before he died.

But in BC, there doesn't need to be "undue influence" for a child or spouse to challenge a will.

Martin said in the last 10 years she's seen a significant increase in people challenging wills if they feel they've got a rough deal.

Previously, when an estranged child wasn't left anything in a will, they may not have thought the legal fees were worth spending to dispute the will and challenge it in court.

However, things have changed.

"The rise in real estate wealth has contributed to the size of the estate, making it worth challenging," Martin said.

Canada, and much of the western world, is now seeing the biggest wealth transfer in modern history. The rise in property values, coupled with a generation that saved, has left many baby boomers with large estates, and their children now in their 50s and 60s are expecting to get a piece.

As people live longer there are also a lot more second marriages and seniors remarrying after retirement.

The second wife versus the children of the first marriage is often cause for a variation dispute, Martin said.

When people have waited decades and don't get what they expected, things can turn sour.

"If you were 65, and you've waited all these years to inherit millions from old mom or dad, and you see a remarriage, and most (of the estate) is left to that new spouse, you will sue," Martin said. "You're not going to take that lying down."

Martin said courts do address family issues and if one child moved to Australia 40 years ago and never called, they likely won't get as much as the child who stayed nearby and saw their elderly parent regularly.

"But still, there isn't an automatic respect for what you wanted to do," Martin said.

It's still the judge's decision, not the deceased person who made the will.

Like the subtleties in family dynamics, who gets what when a judge decides a will comes down to lots of different factors.

A 2021, BC case saw a Justice overturn a $1-million estate the deceased had left to his friends and not his children. The Justice said the man had acted out of "sour grapes" after he lost access to his kids 30 years earlier. The man had even left instructions to fight any claim his children tried to make.

What the court would certainly overturn is if anyone is cut out for reasons that by today's standards are discrimination.

Leaving nothing to your son because he's gay, or the daughter who smokes cannabis and had a child out of wedlock might have been considered reasonable 50 years ago, but by today's standards wouldn't fly.

Martin said the law wants people to make "reasonable and adequate provision according to contemporary social standards" for the people in their lives.

While having a judge overturn a will is possible, it doesn't normally get that far. Families don't want estates tied up in litigation for years, and there are plenty of ways to divide up an estate to avoid the matter being disputed in court.

But as baby boomers die and huge amounts of wealth are transferred to the next generation, the large sums involved are likely to see more children challenging their parents' wills.

And it's worth remembering the state has more control over a person's finances when they're dead than when they were alive.

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