How to Make a Will in Massachusetts (2026): Requirements, Witnesses, Self-Proving Affidavit

Updated August 4, 2026. Quick answer for Massachusetts: nobody publishes a reliable, state-specific median for what a will costs here, and the figures you will see quoted — including ours — are national. Anyone showing you a precise Massachusetts number is estimating. What is genuinely Massachusetts-specific, and what actually decides whether your will works, is how it has to be executed. The detail worth knowing before you sign anything: what is genuinely Massachusetts-specific is how a will has to be executed, and that is what decides whether the document works at all.

Putting a loan in writing? The interest limit, the signing rules and the time limit to sue, from the state’s own statutes: Massachusetts promissory note.

The honest position on Massachusetts pricing

We publish a national attorney median for a simple will of $625 (middle 50% $450–$1,000) and a DIY platform range of $129–$599. Attorney figures are the national medians from the LegalTemplates 2026 survey of 909 firms, verified July 23, 2026. They are national, not state-specific. Geographic multipliers are widely republished, but the primary source for them blocks automated verification, so we will not apply one to Massachusetts and present the result as a Massachusetts figure. When a defensible state-level dataset exists, this page will carry it and say where it came from.

What Massachusetts law actually requires

This is the part that is genuinely state-specific, and the part that decides whether the document works at all. Every line below is read from the statute, with the citation attached:

• Witnesses: 2. M.G.L. c.190B, § 2-502
• If a beneficiary witnesses it: the will stands, but a devise to the witness or the witness’s spouse is void unless two other subscribing witnesses are not similarly benefited, or the interested witness establishes that the bequest was not inserted, and the will was not signed, as a result of fraud or undue influence by the witness. M.G.L. c.190B, § 2-505(b)
• Notary required for the will to be valid: no. A notary is not what makes a will valid here — the witnesses are. M.G.L. c.190B, § 2-502
• Self-proving affidavit: available. Signing one at the same time as the will is what saves your executor from tracking witnesses down years later. M.G.L. c. 190B, § 2-504(a)
• Handwritten (holographic) wills: not provided for in Massachusetts (§ 2-503 is reserved), so a will signed in Massachusetts needs two witnesses; a will that complies with the law of the place where it was executed, or where the testator is domiciled, has a place of abode, or is a national, is also valid. M.G.L. c.190B, §§ 2-502, 2-503
• Electronic wills: not recognised. We could not verify this at the state’s own source, so treat it as unconfirmed.

The full 44-jurisdiction comparison is on what each state requires for a will to be valid. Whether a beneficiary may witness is covered nationally on can a beneficiary witness a will, and the notary question on does a will need to be notarised.

Does Massachusetts give you a free form?

No. We found no complete statutory will form in the Massachusetts code. California, Maine, Michigan, New Mexico and Wisconsin each print one in their own codes. Massachusetts has a Uniform Statutory Will Act (M.G.L. c. 191B) whose standard terms a will can adopt with one sentence, but it prints no fill-in form. In Massachusetts your realistic routes are a DIY platform, a flat-fee attorney will, or an hourly engagement if the estate is complicated.

What skipping it costs in Massachusetts

Massachusetts sets probate compensation using “reasonable” compensation with no percentage schedule. The two numbers that decide what an estate actually pays are the fee basis and the small-estate threshold.

Fee basis: MUPC: a personal representative is entitled to reasonable compensation for services (M.G.L. c. 190B, § 3-719); no percentage schedule.

Small-estate threshold: $25,000 of personal property, plus one motor vehicle which does not count against the cap (M.G.L. c. 190B § 3-1201).

A will does not avoid probate — it directs it. What it prevents is the estate being distributed by Massachusetts’s intestacy statute instead of by you, and it lets you name the executor rather than leaving the court to appoint one. The arithmetic on the other side is on what probate costs in Massachusetts.

What a will costs nationally — every route priced, and the four situations where DIY fails.

Statutory text read at the state’s own legislature or official code site. Pricing figures are national and dated above. General information, not legal advice.