Do You Need a Lawyer to Write a Will in Pennsylvania?

The short answer is no. The useful answer is that it depends on your estate - and we would rather tell you honestly when the answer is yes.

Last reviewed 5 August 2026 · Pennsylvania · ~6 min read

What the law requires

Under 20 Pa.C.S. § 2502, a Pennsylvania will is valid if it is in writing and signed by you at the end, and you are 18 or older and of sound mind. Pennsylvania does not require witnesses at the signing, notarization, or an attorney.

A will you write yourself is exactly as legally valid as one drafted by a Philadelphia firm. Validity, however, is a low bar - and it is not the bar that matters. The question is whether the document does what you meant it to do when it is read, years from now, by people who cannot ask you what you intended.

When to hire an attorney

These are not edge cases we are inventing to seem balanced. In each of them, a mistake is expensive and hard to undo:

• A beneficiary with disabilities. An outright inheritance can disqualify someone from Medicaid or SSI. A properly drafted special needs trust preserves eligibility. This is specialist work and the cost of getting it wrong is a person losing their benefits.
• A federally taxable estate. If your assets approach the federal estate tax exemption - counting life insurance you own, retirement accounts, and business value - the planning pays for itself many times over.
• A closely held business. Succession, valuation, buy-sell agreements, and the Pennsylvania family-business exemption all interact. Do not improvise.
• Real estate in several states. Ancillary probate, and possibly a trust, need designing.
• A likely contest. A disinherited child, an estranged spouse, or a recent large gift to a new partner. An attorney can document capacity at signing and structure deterrents such as an in terrorem clause.
• Blended-family remainder planning. "Support my spouse for life, then everything to my children from my first marriage" needs a trust, not a will.
• Medicaid or long-term care planning. Lookback periods and asset transfer rules are unforgiving.
• Second thoughts about capacity. If you are drafting under a diagnosis affecting cognition, contemporaneous professional involvement is protective.

When guided drafting is fine

Conversely, a large share of Pennsylvania estates are genuinely straightforward:

• A house, some accounts, retirement savings, maybe a car.
• Beneficiaries who are adults, or minors whose inheritance can sit in a simple trust until a stated age.
• No business, no out-of-state property, no anticipated dispute.
• A clear idea of who should receive what, who should serve as executor, and who should raise your children.

For these estates, the risk is not that a lawyer would have drafted better clauses. It is that you will keep putting it off. An imperfect will signed this month beats an excellent will you never got around to commissioning - because the alternative is not a better will, it is intestacy.

Where DIY wills actually fail

Failures rarely take the form a person expects. Pennsylvania's execution rules are so permissive that outright invalidity is uncommon. What goes wrong is omission:

• No residuary clause. The will lists specific gifts and stops. Everything unmentioned - including assets acquired after signing - passes by intestacy, defeating the point of writing a will at all. This is the most frequent and most damaging defect.
• No alternate beneficiaries. A named beneficiary dies first and the gift lapses, or falls into the residue, or passes to that beneficiary's children under the anti-lapse statute - probably not what you assumed.
• No survivorship period. Two deaths within days push property through two estates and two rounds of tax.
• No tax apportionment clause. Silence about who bears Pennsylvania inheritance tax means the residuary beneficiaries usually absorb everyone else's liability.
• No executor powers. Without express authority to sell real estate or continue a business, your executor may need court approval for routine steps.
• Minors inherit outright at 18. Without a trust provision, a substantial sum is handed to an eighteen-year-old.
• No self-proving affidavit. Valid, but slower and more expensive to probate.
• Beneficiary designations never reviewed. The will is immaculate and the 401(k) still names an ex-spouse. Designations win.
• An out-of-state form. Generic templates miss Pennsylvania-specific provisions and can import irrelevant ones.

Notice that almost none of these are questions of legal judgment. They are questions of completeness - which is exactly what a well-built guided process can enforce, and what a blank template cannot.

What it costs

Attorney fees for a simple Pennsylvania will commonly range from a few hundred dollars to over a thousand, depending on the firm and the county; a will with trust provisions costs more, and full trust-based planning more again. Some firms offer flat-fee packages covering a will, financial power of attorney, and healthcare directive together.

Guided online drafting costs substantially less. The honest way to frame the difference is that you are paying an attorney for judgment - someone who will notice the issue you did not know to raise. If your situation has no such issues, you are paying for reassurance, which is a legitimate thing to buy but should be a conscious choice.

The middle path

Many Pennsylvanians do best with a hybrid: prepare the documents through a guided service, then pay an attorney for a one-hour review. You arrive with a complete draft and specific questions rather than a blank page, which is a far more efficient use of billed time.

Some attorneys will also do an unbundled review at a flat fee. It is worth asking.

Common questions

Is a will from an online service legal in Pennsylvania?

Yes, provided it meets § 2502 - in writing, signed at the end, by an adult of sound mind. Where it is drafted has no bearing on validity.

Can my spouse and I make one will together?

Joint wills are possible but generally a poor idea. They can bind the survivor and are difficult to change after the first death. Mirror wills - two separate documents with matching terms - are the usual approach.

Do I need a lawyer to probate a will in Pennsylvania?

Not strictly, and simple estates are sometimes administered without one. Executors frequently hire counsel anyway, because the fees are payable from the estate and personal liability for errors falls on the executor.

What if my situation changes?

Review the will after marriage, divorce, a birth, a death among your named parties, a move, or a significant change in assets. For anything more than trivial, execute a new will rather than a codicil.