Canadians adding pets to wills
A recent study and coverage show Canadians are increasingly treating pets like long-term family members by adding them to wills and estate plans. (x.com)
More Canadians are now writing their pets into estate plans, and one new analysis of more than 44,000 wills found that 36% set aside money for an animal after the owner dies. The same dataset showed pet-owner will completions rising from 950 in 2019 to 9,552 in 2025. (ca.news.yahoo.com) This is happening in a country where pets already fill a huge part of home life. The Canadian Animal Health Institute said Canada had 7.2 million dogs and 8.2 million cats in 2024, living in more than half of households. (cahi-icsa.ca) The legal wrinkle is that a dog or cat cannot inherit money in Canada the way a child or spouse can. Royal Bank of Canada Wealth Management says pets are still treated as personal property in common-law provinces, even after courts and legislatures started describing animals as sentient beings. (rbcwealthmanagement.com) So people are not really “leaving money to the dog.” They are naming a human caregiver in the will and attaching cash or a trust so that person can pay for food, medicine, boarding, and vet bills. (rbcwealthmanagement.com) (permawealth.ca) The money can be substantial. Willful’s analysis found an average cash gift of $11,121 to pet guardians nationwide, with horse owners leaving $21,876 on average, dog owners $11,705, and bird owners $12,133. (ca.news.yahoo.com) The person most often chosen to take over the animal is usually already inside the family. In the Willful data, children were named as guardians 38% of the time, followed by siblings at 13%, parents at 11%, and friends at 11%. (ca.news.yahoo.com) Lawyers keep warning that good intentions are not enough if nothing is written down. Ontario estate lawyers note that without clear instructions, a pet falls into the general estate like furniture or a car, and the executor has no automatic duty to keep that animal long term. (allenmalek.ca) (legalwills.ca) That gap shows up when people die suddenly or become incapacitated, not just when estates are settled months later. Canadian advisers now tell owners to pair the will with incapacity documents, such as a continuing power of attorney or Quebec protection mandate, so someone can start paying for care immediately. (permawealth.ca) A trust sounds like the cleanest fix, but it has limits. Royal Bank of Canada Wealth Management says some non-charitable purpose trusts in Canadian common-law jurisdictions can last only 21 years, which can be awkward for animals like turtles and some parrots that may outlive the trust. (rbcwealthmanagement.com) That is why many estate planners push a simpler checklist before fancy legal structures: ask the caregiver first, name a backup, leave written feeding and medical instructions, and set aside enough money to make “yes” realistic. Those details are turning pets from an afterthought in Canadian wills into a line item people plan for years in advance. (allenmalek.ca) (permawealth.ca)
