White Paper on Chinese Testament Repository： The number of young and middle-aged wills has soared, and women are significantly higher than men.

Willmaking tends to be younger, and the number of young and middle-aged testators has doubled. On March 21st, the 2023 White Paper on Chinese Wills Library released by China Foundation for the Development of Aging shows that the number of young people making wills is increasing year by year, and the demand for making wills is more realistic.

Liu Guiming, honorary director of the China Testament Library Management Committee, believes that the trend of younger wills shows that modern young people’s awareness of personal property protection and planning is gradually enhanced, the acceptance of wills by Chinese people is constantly improving, and the concept of wills is constantly changing.

The number of young and middle-aged people making wills has soared, and women are significantly higher than men.

The Chinese Testament Library is a national public welfare project sponsored by the China Foundation for the Development of Aging. According to the statistics of the white paper, in the past eleven years, the Chinese Testament Library has provided 478,850 wills consultation, registered and kept 311,868 wills, and 8,721 wills came into effect. During this period, the average age of testators gradually decreased from 77.43 to 67.82, and the age of testators tended to be younger.

According to the data, as of December 31, 2023, the youngest testator who made a will in the Chinese Testament Library was 17 years old. In addition to the post-90 s, 00 s also began to make wills.

"Traditionally, making a will is a need when you are old and sick, but with the renewal of ideas, more and more people realize the importance of making a will in advance." According to the white paper, especially from 2017 to 2023, although the total number of young and middle-aged people making wills is small, their proportion in the number of people making wills every year is increasing. Especially in 2023, compared with 2022, the number of young and middle-aged testators doubled.

The white paper shows that in the past seven years, the number and proportion of young and middle-aged testators have remained relatively stable. Among them, the age group of 50-59 years old is the main concentrated age group of testators, and the annual proportion is greater than other age groups, with an average overall proportion of 34.01%; Followed by the age group of 30-39 years old, the average proportion is 25.65%.

"Judging from the data changes in the past seven years, the trend chart of the age change of young and middle-aged testators tends to be consistent, basically showing a growth trend." According to the white paper, from the perspective of growth trend, the lower the age group, the faster the growth trend, indicating that wills are increasingly concerned by young people.

The data shows that in 2017, the number of young and middle-aged people who consulted in the Chinese Testament Library was 931, and by 2023, the number of consultations had reached 17,101, and the number of consultations increased by 17.3 times. Similarly, in 2017, the number of young and middle-aged people who kept wills in the Chinese Testament Library was 279, and in 2023, the number reached 7,124, an increase of 24.5 times in seven years.

In terms of age, the number of people under the age of 30 who made wills was 61 in 2017, and it reached 1030 in 2023, an increase of 15.8 times in seven years. In 2017, the number of people aged 30-39 who made wills was 73, and in 2023 it reached 1,623, an increase of 21.2 times in seven years.

According to the white paper, from 2017 to 2023, the number of people who made wills in the Chinese will library after the "80s" increased by 21.5 times; The number of people who made wills after "90s" increased by 11.2 times. Similarly, the number of people who made wills after 00 is also rising. Statistics show that in 2023, a total of 167 people made wills in the Chinese will bank, with an increase rate of 24.62% compared with 2020.

The white paper also pointed out that the number of women among young and middle-aged people who make wills is significantly higher than that of men, "indicating that among young and middle-aged people, women are more conscious of making wills than men". The data shows that from 2013 to 2023, the proportion of women who made wills was relatively high, with a total proportion of 56.67%. In 2023, the proportion of women who made wills was 58.41%, which was higher than that in 2022, and women made wills accounted for the majority of the group.

There are different reasons for making a will, and there are great differences in choosing the object of inheritance.

According to a statistical survey, for young people, there are great differences in family structure corresponding to different age groups, so the reasons for making a will show different distribution trends: for citizens under the age of 30, "preventing the whereabouts of property is unknown" is the main risk they consider. With the increase of the testator’s age, the two reasons of "isolating the risk of one’s own marriage" and "isolating the risk of one’s children’s marriage" are becoming more and more important in the eyes of testators.

According to the white paper, for the testator who is over 30 years old and has just got married, "preventing the property from missing" and "taking care of his family" have become the main reasons for his will. Among the people aged 40-49, the reasons for consideration are relatively balanced, indicating that the groups at this stage consider more contents and have different ideas on the reasons for making wills. For testators aged 50-59, the risk of children’s marriage has become the primary consideration. Relatively speaking, the proportion of "preventing property from falling aside", "simplifying procedures" and "avoiding disputes" has also increased.

According to the staff of China Testament Library, the most common opening remarks of young and middle-aged people in the consideration of making wills are: seeing and hearing many unexpected situations around them, it is necessary to make wills in advance to prevent risks.

The white paper also pointed out that from the statistics, it can be seen that in different age groups, the preferred inheritance objects are quite different. Most testators under the age of 30 are unmarried or in the stage of forming a new family, so they are more inclined to inherit property from their parents. When the testator gets married, the proportion of choosing children or spouses to inherit will gradually increase. However, comparing the population data between 40-49 years old and 50-59 years old, it is found that the latter is more willing to inherit the property to the spouse, while most of the former choose to inherit their own property directly from their children.

According to the analysis, people aged 40-49 are more concerned about their own marriage risks. In case of their own accidents, they will consider whether their spouses may remarry. With the growth of age, most testators will be more dependent and grateful to their spouses, and feel more at ease that their spouses will inherit property directly.

It is worth noting that the situation that young and middle-aged people assign property to people other than legal heirs to inherit property is obviously higher than that of people over 60 years old, especially in the age groups of 30-39 and 40-49.

According to the white paper, the reason may be that the complexity of family structure, interpersonal relationship and emotional conflict in this age group is greater than that in other age groups. People other than legal heirs include brothers and sisters, colleagues, friends, other relatives, alma mater, work unit, etc.