Related question: Is it true that only lawyers can advice and write Wills?

You do not need to engage a lawyer to write your Will. In fact, by my experience, that is probably not advisable.

Anyone can write their own Will provided they know how to do it. It is better to engage professional Will writers who specialised in writing Wills. A lawyer does not necessarily possess the specialized skill to write a Will.

I have ceased recommending my clients to lawyers to have their Wills written unless it is a very straightforward simple Will. Such simple Wills are only appropriate for persons without dependents. I have found that all lawyers I referred my clients to do not do a thorough fact find. I was dismayed to know that they were primarily instruction takers. I do not consider taking mere instructions from clients as advice because an advice must always be accompanied by a thorough fact find. If clients already know exactly what they want, they can write their own Will as there is no law prohibiting anyone from writing their own. Moreover, mere taking instruction from clients provides no value-add as one can input these instructions into online software to generate a Will at NO cost. There are many internet website that can do that. Of course, nobody can be sure of the legality of these free Wills being generated but if a client already know exactly what he wants, he should already know what is legal and what is not. To me, any advice given to a person without a thorough fact find will not be useful since it does not take into account of the client’s situation. A client situation can only be uncovered thorough a systematic through fact find. Also, asking the client a few questions in an ad-hoc manner is unprofessional. The fact find must be systematic and adhere to industry’s standards.

As I already do a systematic fact find for comprehensive financial planning case, I’ll takeover the formal process of Will writing. I’ll deal directly with my legal counsel on behalf of the client to have the Will drafted in accordance with the financial plan developed with the client. This is to ensure that the Will meets the client’s needs exactly. In contrast to lawyers' common practice, the client has plenty of chance and time to amend his Will before the attestation date as draft softcopies are available prior to that. A number of lawyers do not provide the draft copy before the attestation date and only allows the content to be amended on the day of attestation. This time pressure imposed on the client is not in client’s favour. Quite often, the actual Will is only seen by the client on the a day of attestation. This is just ridiculous.

You can read my bad experience dealing with lawyers who did not do fact find in this article here: HERE