For couples who have built a life together without getting married, Georgia law presents a particular kind of trap. The default rules that govern what happens when someone dies, when someone becomes incapacitated, or when someone needs to make medical decisions for a partner, all assume a marriage. When there is no marriage, the legal system treats long-term partners as strangers, regardless of how many years they have lived together, raised children together, or shared a mortgage.
This is not a matter of opinion or fairness. It is built into the Georgia Code. And it can be fixed, but only with intentional planning. This article walks through what unmarried couples in Georgia need to know about estate planning: why the default rules are so unforgiving, what documents matter most, where the most common gaps appear, and the practical steps a couple can take to protect each other. None of this substitutes for working with a Georgia estate planning attorney who can tailor a plan to your circumstances. The point is to give you a clear picture of the landscape before that conversation.
Why Georgia Law Treats Unmarried Couples Differently
Georgia is not a state where length of relationship matters. Two people can live together for thirty years, share every account, and present themselves to the world as a couple, and still have no automatic legal rights to each other.
No Common-Law Marriage After 1997
Georgia abolished common-law marriage effective January 1, 1997. Common-law marriages established in Georgia before that date are still recognized, and Georgia will recognize a valid common-law marriage formed in another state that does still allow them. But for any couple whose relationship began in Georgia after 1996, common-law marriage is not an option, no matter how long they cohabitate or how committed the relationship is.
This cutoff is meaningful because it eliminates the safety net that some long-term partners assume they have. Many people still believe, incorrectly, that living together for “seven years” or some other period creates marriage-like rights. It does not, anywhere in the United States, and certainly not in Georgia.
What This Actually Means in Practice
For an unmarried couple in Georgia, the legal consequences include all of the following:
Your partner has no automatic right to inherit any of your property if you die without a will. Your partner has no automatic right to make medical decisions for you if you are incapacitated. Your partner has no automatic right to access your bank or investment accounts in an emergency. Your partner is not your “next of kin” for purposes of hospital visitation, funeral arrangements, or releasing your remains. Your partner cannot file a joint tax return, claim spousal Social Security, or qualify as a beneficiary of your employer pension by default.
These are not theoretical risks. They are the everyday default rules. The good news is that nearly all of them can be addressed through careful estate planning. The bad news is that without that planning, the law is going to do something other than what you intended.
What Happens Without an Estate Plan
To understand why the planning matters, it helps to look at exactly what the default rules produce.
Georgia Intestacy Hits Hardest
When someone dies without a will in Georgia, the property passes by “intestate succession” under O.C.G.A. § 53-2-1. The statute lists who inherits, in priority order: surviving spouse and children first, then parents, then siblings, then more distant relatives. Unmarried partners are not on the list. They cannot be on the list. The statute simply does not include them.
So if a Georgia resident dies intestate (without a will) and has been living with a partner for twenty years, the partner inherits nothing through the intestate succession process. The decedent’s assets pass to children, parents, or siblings, in the order set by statute, even if those relatives have been estranged for years and the surviving partner is the only person who actually cared for the decedent.
The same rules apply to a partner’s personal belongings. The car, the furniture, the photographs, the household goods that the couple acquired together over the years, all of it follows the title and the intestacy statute. A surviving partner can find themselves locked out of the home they shared, with grieving in-laws sorting through belongings they have no emotional connection to.
The only way to override the intestacy default is to have a valid will or revocable living trust that names the partner as a beneficiary. Without one of those documents, the partner has no claim, regardless of the moral case.
Healthcare Decisions Without Documentation
If you are incapacitated by an accident, a stroke, or a medical emergency, and you have no advance directive on file, Georgia law allows your closest legal relatives to make medical decisions for you. Your unmarried partner, no matter how much they know about your wishes, is not in that line of authority.
Hospitals follow next-of-kin rules out of caution. They will look for a spouse first, then adult children, then parents, then siblings. A partner who is not a spouse generally cannot consent to procedures, cannot demand information, and may not even be allowed in the room during critical decisions, depending on the policies of the facility.
This is one of the cruelest gaps in the default rules, and one of the easiest to fix.
Financial Decisions During Incapacity
Similar issues arise on the financial side. If you become incapacitated, your partner cannot pay your bills, manage your accounts, or sign documents on your behalf without legal authority. Banks and brokerages will not honor a verbal request from a non-spouse partner. The fallback is a guardianship or conservatorship proceeding, which is expensive, slow, and public, and the court is not required to appoint your partner as the guardian.
A durable financial power of attorney solves the problem cleanly. Without one, the alternative is the courthouse.
The Core Documents
The good news is that all of the gaps above can be filled with a small set of documents, properly drafted and executed under Georgia law.
A Will or Revocable Living Trust
This is the foundation. A valid Georgia will (signed by the testator and witnessed by two competent witnesses, per O.C.G.A. § 53-4-20) lets you direct your probate property to your partner, friends, charities, or anyone else. Without it, intestacy controls.
For unmarried couples, a revocable living trust is often a better choice than a basic will. A trust avoids probate entirely for assets that have been retitled into the trust, which means the partner can take control of the assets quickly and privately without waiting for the probate court. Probate in Georgia is generally manageable but not fast, and the process is public, which can be a problem for couples whose family members may not have accepted the relationship.
Trusts also offer flexibility for ongoing management. If you want your partner to receive income from a property for life, with the remainder going to your children or another beneficiary after your partner dies, a trust handles that. A simple will cannot.
Whichever document you use, it needs to be specific. Vague gifts to “my partner” can be challenged. Use full legal names, addresses, and clear descriptions of property. And update the document if circumstances change, since the partner’s status as a beneficiary lives or dies with the document.
Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care
Since 2007, Georgia has used a single combined document called the Advance Directive for Health Care, codified at O.C.G.A. Title 31, Chapter 32. It replaced the older Living Will and Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care, although documents executed before July 1, 2007 under the old laws remain valid until revoked.
The Advance Directive has four parts. Part One designates a health care agent (the person who will make medical decisions for you). The second part states your treatment preferences for end-of-life situations such as terminal conditions or permanent unconsciousness. Part Three lets you nominate a guardian if a court ever needs to appoint one. Last, part four contains the signatures and witnesses, and it is the only mandatory part.
For an unmarried couple, naming the partner as the health care agent in Part One is essential. Without it, the partner has no legal authority to direct medical care. The form must be signed by two adult witnesses, neither of whom can be a beneficiary of the principal’s estate or directly involved in their health care.
A practical tip: provide copies to both partners’ primary physicians, the local hospital where you would most likely be treated, and keep copies somewhere accessible at home. A perfectly drafted advance directive that no one can find at 2 a.m. in the emergency room does not help.
Durable Financial Power of Attorney
Georgia’s Uniform Power of Attorney Act (codified at O.C.G.A. Title 10, Chapter 6B) governs financial powers of attorney. A “durable” power of attorney remains effective even if the principal becomes incapacitated, which is exactly the situation it is designed for.
For unmarried couples, the financial power of attorney lets your partner step in to handle banking, real estate, tax filings, insurance claims, and similar matters if you cannot. Without it, your partner has no authority to act on your accounts, and family members who do have authority under guardianship law may not act in ways your partner agrees with.
The document must be signed before a notary and a witness who is not the agent. It can be drafted to take effect immediately or only upon incapacity, depending on the level of trust between the partners and the practical needs of the situation.
HIPAA Authorization
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act restricts who medical providers can disclose protected health information to. A signed HIPAA authorization specifically naming your partner allows providers to share medical information with them, even when the advance directive has not yet kicked in.
This is a small document but a useful one. It is often executed alongside the advance directive and the financial power of attorney as part of a complete planning package.
Beneficiary Designations and Account Titling
This is the area where unmarried couples most often lose ground despite having an otherwise complete estate plan. A beautifully drafted will is overridden, every time, by a contradictory beneficiary designation on a retirement account, life insurance policy, or transfer-on-death form.
The Documents That Override Your Will
Certain assets pass outside the probate process by operation of contract or by titling. They go to whoever is named as the beneficiary or co-owner, regardless of what the will says. The most common categories:
Retirement accounts (401(k), IRA, 403(b), pension): pass to the named beneficiary on file with the plan administrator.
Life insurance: pays to the named beneficiary on the policy.
Bank accounts with payable-on-death (POD) designations: pass to the named beneficiary.
Brokerage accounts with transfer-on-death (TOD) designations: same.
Real estate held as joint tenants with right of survivorship: passes to the surviving co-owner.
For unmarried couples, the danger is twofold. First, an outdated beneficiary designation can send assets to a former spouse or partner, regardless of what the current will says. Second, a missing beneficiary designation defaults to the estate, which means the asset goes through probate and is distributed by the will or by intestacy. Either result can blow up an otherwise well-built plan.
The fix is straightforward but easy to neglect: review every beneficiary designation when you update your estate plan, and re-check them every couple of years or after any major life event.
Real Estate Titling
How a couple holds title to real estate matters a lot. Georgia recognizes two main forms of joint ownership: joint tenants with right of survivorship (JTWROS) and tenants in common.
If a couple owns a home as joint tenants with right of survivorship, the survivor automatically becomes the sole owner when the other partner dies. The transfer happens by operation of law, outside of probate, regardless of what either partner’s will says.
If the couple owns the home as tenants in common, each owner has a separate, devisable interest. When one partner dies, that partner’s share passes through the will (or through intestacy, if there is no will). The surviving partner does not automatically inherit anything.
For most committed unmarried couples who want the survivor to keep the home, joint tenants with right of survivorship is the right choice. But it has consequences: the deed must be drafted correctly to create that survivorship, both partners share full ownership during life, and either can encumber the property with a mortgage or judgment lien. Tenants in common may be the better choice when the partners contributed unequally to the purchase, when there are children from prior relationships to provide for, or when the relationship is newer and the parties want more flexibility.
A Georgia real estate attorney should review any deed where the intent is to create survivorship. Mistakes in deed language are common and can defeat the intended result.
Bank and Investment Accounts
The same principles apply to bank and investment accounts. A joint account with right of survivorship passes to the surviving co-owner. A POD or TOD designation accomplishes the same result without making the partner a co-owner during life. For couples who want the partner to inherit the account but not have access during life, the POD/TOD route is usually preferable.
Tax and Benefit Realities
Even with strong estate planning, unmarried couples in Georgia face tax and benefit consequences that married couples do not.
No Federal Marital Deduction
Married couples can transfer unlimited amounts to each other during life or at death without triggering federal estate or gift tax, thanks to the unlimited marital deduction. Unmarried couples have no equivalent. Transfers between unmarried partners count against the gift tax annual exclusion (currently $19,000 per recipient in 2026) and the lifetime estate and gift tax exemption (around $14 million per person in 2026).
For most couples, the high lifetime exemption means there is no actual estate tax owed. But for couples with substantial assets, the lack of a marital deduction can become a real planning concern, and irrevocable trusts or other strategies may be needed to manage the exposure.
Georgia Has No Estate or Inheritance Tax
Georgia does not impose its own estate or inheritance tax, which simplifies the state-level analysis. Federal estate tax applies above the exemption thresholds. Couples with property in other states (vacation homes, rental properties) may face estate or inheritance tax in those states, which is a separate planning consideration.
Other Spousal Benefits Unmarried Couples Do Not Get
Even with perfect estate planning, certain federal and state benefits are tied to marriage and cannot be replicated through documents:
Spousal Social Security and survivor benefits.
The right to receive a deceased partner’s pension as a spouse under federal pension law. (Many private retirement plans require spousal consent for non-spouse beneficiaries on 401(k) accounts. An unmarried partner is not a “spouse” for this purpose, so there is no consent issue, but there is also no automatic survivor benefit.)
Tax-free rollover of a deceased spouse’s IRA to the surviving spouse’s own IRA. A non-spouse beneficiary must take distributions under different rules, generally requiring liquidation within ten years.
Tax-free transfers of property at death using the marital deduction.
Some employer health insurance benefits, depending on the employer’s policy.
These structural gaps are part of why getting married, for couples who want to be married, often makes more financial and legal sense than trying to replicate everything through estate planning.
Special Situations
Children From Prior Relationships
When one or both partners have children from prior relationships, planning gets more complex. A Georgia will can leave specific assets to a partner and other assets to children, but blended-family situations are fertile ground for disputes. Adult children may resent a partner they barely know inheriting the family home.
Trusts are often the cleanest solution. A common structure leaves assets in trust for the surviving partner during their lifetime, with the remainder passing to the decedent’s children when the partner dies. The partner has the use and benefit of the property without having full ownership, and the children’s eventual inheritance is protected.
These structures need careful drafting. Georgia law gives the surviving partner standing to challenge anything that looks like undue influence over a will or trust, and grown children of the decedent often have reason to scrutinize anything that benefits a partner they did not approve of.
Cohabitation and Property Agreements
Couples who have lived together for years often acquire property jointly without much paperwork. A cohabitation agreement (sometimes called a non-marital agreement or domestic partnership agreement) can document who contributed what, who owns what, and what happens if the relationship ends.
These agreements are enforceable in Georgia under contract law principles. They are particularly useful when one partner contributes more financially to a jointly used asset, when one partner has stayed home to care for children while the other built a career, or when one or both partners had significant pre-relationship assets.
For unmarried couples in serious long-term relationships, a cohabitation agreement is the closest thing to a prenuptial agreement that the law allows.
Practical Action Steps
If you are an unmarried couple in Georgia and you do not have a current estate plan, the short version of what to do:
Sit down together and inventory your assets, your debts, your retirement and life insurance accounts, and your real estate.
Talk through what you want to happen if one of you dies, becomes incapacitated, or both. Start with the easy questions before getting to the hard ones.
Hire a Georgia estate planning attorney. Most offer flat-fee planning packages. A typical package for an unmarried couple includes a will or revocable trust, advance directive, financial power of attorney, and HIPAA authorization for each partner, plus deed and beneficiary designation review.
Update beneficiary designations on every retirement account, life insurance policy, and TOD/POD account.
Review the deed to your home and confirm that the form of ownership matches your intentions.
Provide copies of your advance directive and HIPAA authorization to your physicians and the hospital where you would most likely be treated.
Revisit the plan every three to five years, or sooner if your relationship status, assets, or family circumstances change.
A Final Note
The unmarried couple in Georgia who has done no planning is one bad day away from finding out exactly how harsh the default rules are. The unmarried couple who has done the planning is in a position not very different from a married couple, at least within the limits of what documents can do. The difference between those two positions is a few hundred dollars and an afternoon with a lawyer.
This article is general information about Georgia law and is not legal advice. Estate planning depends on specific facts, asset structures, family relationships, and goals that only a qualified attorney can evaluate properly. If you and your partner are not yet married and want to make sure your relationship is legally protected, a conversation with a Georgia estate planning attorney is the place to start.