Legal Requirements of Wills
What is a WILL and
TESTAMENT?
• A will is an act whereby a person is permitted, with the
formalities prescribed by law, to control a certain degree
the disposition of his estate, to take effect after his
death (Art. 738).
• A will is a physical document which must follow
formalities.
• Wills must either be:
– Executed, signed, and sworn by the Testator and 3
witnesses before a Notary Public (Notarial Will)
– Entirely handwritten, dated, and signed by the
Testator (Holographic Will)
WHO may make a Will?
All persons • Of sound mind at the time of its execution – one must
know the nature of the estate to be disposed of, the
proper objects of his bounty, and the character of the
testamentary act (Art. 799);
• At least 18 years old;
• Able to read and write;
• Not be blind, deaf or dumb;
• Domiciled in the Philippines;
• Not have been convicted of Falsification of a document,
Perjury or False Testimony
Legal Requirements of Wills
• Must be in WRITING
• Every will, other than a holographic will, MUST be (Art. 805):
– SUBSCRIBED at the end by the Testator himself or in his presence,
and by his direction;
– ATTESTED AND SUBSCRIBED by 3 or more credible witnesses in the
presence of the Testator and of one another;
– SIGN EACH AND EVERY PAGE except the last, on the left margin;
– All pages shall be NUMBERED correlatively in letters
– The attestation shall state the NUMBER OF PAGES used upon which
the will is written
– If the attestation clause is in a language not known to the
witnesses, it shall be interpreted to them
• Every will MUST be acknowledged before a Notary Public by the
testator and the witnesses
Special Requirements
• ART 807. If the testator be deaf, or a deaf-mute, he must
personally read the will, if able to do so; otherwise, he shall
designate two persons to read it and communicate to him, in
some practicable manner, the contents thereof.
• ART 808. If the testator is blind, the will shall be read to him
twice; once, by one of the subscribing witnesses, and again,
by the notary public before whom the will is acknowledged.
Legal Requirements of Wills
In Holographic Wills:
• Dispositions of the Testator written below his signature MUST BE
DATED AND SIGNED BY HIM to make it a valid testamentary
dispositions
• When a number of dispositions appearing in a holographic will are
signed without being dated, and the last disposition has a signature
and a date, such date validates the dispositions preceding it, whatever
be the time of prior dispositions
• In case of any insertion, cancellation, erasure or alteration in a
holographic will, the testator must authenticate the same by his full
signature
Jurisprudence
Azuela vs CA – G.R. No. 122880, April
12, 2006
A will whose attestation clause does not
contain the number of pages on which the •
will is written is fatally defective. A will
whose attestation clause is not signed by
the instrumental witnesses is fatally
defective. And perhaps most importantly, a
will which does not contain an
acknowledgment, but a mere jurat, is
fatally defective.
Testate Estate of Abada vs Abaja –
G.R. No. 147145, January 31, 2005
• A scrutiny of Abada’s will shows that it
has an attestation clause. The pages are
numbered correlatively with the letters
“ONE” and “TWO”. The attestation
clause clearly states that Abada signed
the will and its every page in the
presence of the witnesses.
In applying the rule on substantial
compliance in determining the number
of witnesses, while the attestation clause
does not state the number of witnesses,
a close inspection of the will shows that
three witnesses signed it. Precision of
language in the drafting of an
attestation clause is desirable. However,
it is not imperative that a parrotlike copy of the words of the
statute be made. It is sucient if from
the language employed it can reasonably
be deduced that the attestation clause
fullls what the law expects of it.
Jurisprudence
Cruz vs Villasor – G.R. No. L-32213,
Javellava vs Ledesma – G.R. No. LNovember 26, 1973
7179, June 30, 1995
• The notary public before whom the
• Whether or not the notary signed the
will was acknowledged cannot be
certication of acknowledgment in the
considered as the third instrumental
presence of the testatrix and the
witness since he cannot acknowledge
witnesses, does not aect the validity of
before himself his having signed the will.
the codicil. The new Civil Code does
not require that the signing of the
testator, witnesses and notary
should be accomplished in one
single act.
Thank you!