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ARTICLE · 02 NOVEMBER 2017

(Don't) Live Together, Love Together

Field Law
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A frequent area of estate litigation involves claims by adult interdependent partners against the estates of their deceased partners.

CanadaFamily and Matrimonial
Predrag Tomic
Predrag Tomic
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A frequent area of estate litigation involves claims by adult interdependent partners against the estates of their deceased partners. An adult interdependent partner is roughly the Alberta equivalent of a common law spouse, but may include other types of relationships.

To qualify as an adult interdependent partner, two people must cohabit in a relationship of interdependence continuously for at least 3 years, unless they have a child together or have entered into a written partner agreement. Where there are no children or agreements, one of the first things we will want to see is evidence of the length of cohabitation. This is a complex analysis which requires more than a review of the couple's address history during the last three years of the deceased's life.

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