Summary of Arkansas' Will Requirements:

Statutes Governing Arkansas' Will Requirements:

Who May Make Wills

Any person of sound mind eighteen (18) years of age or older may make a will.

Arkansas Requirements for a Will - Code, 28-25-101

Witnesses

(a)  Any person, eighteen (18) years of age or older, competent to be witness generally in this state may act as attesting witness to a will.

(b)  No will is invalidated because attested by an interested witness, but an interested witness, unless the will is also attested by two (2) qualified disinterested witnesses, shall forfeit so much of the provision therein made for him or her as in the aggregate exceeds in value, as of the date of the testator's death, what he or she would have received had the testator died intestate.

(c)  No attesting witness is interested unless the will gives to him or her some beneficial interest by way of devise. 

(d)  An attesting witness, even though interested, may be compelled to testify with respect to the will.

Arkansas Requirements for a Will - Code, 28-25-102

Execution generally

(a)  The execution of a will, other than holographic, must be by the signature of the testator and of at least two (2) witnesses.

(b)

(1)  The testator shall declare to the attesting witnesses that the instrument is his or her will and either:

(A)  Himself or herself sign;

(B)  Acknowledge his or her signature already made;  

(C)  Sign by mark, his or her name being written near it and witnessed by a person who writes his or her own name as witness to the signature; or

(D)

(i)  At his or her discretion and in his or her presence have someone else sign his or her  name for him or her. 

(ii)  The person so signing shall write his or her own name and state that he or she signed the testator's name at the request of the testator.

(2)  In any of the cases listed in subdivision (b)(1) of this section: 

(A)  The signature must be at the end of the instrument; and  

(B)  The act must be done in the presence of two (2) or more attesting witnesses. 

(c)  The attesting witnesses must sign at the request and in the presence of the testator. 

Arkansas Requirements for a Will - Code, 28-25-103

 

Holographic wills generally

When the entire body of the will and the signature shall be written in the proper handwriting of the testator, the will may be established by the evidence of at least three (3) credible disinterested witnesses to the handwriting and signature of the testator, notwithstanding there may be no attesting witnesses to the will.

Arkansas Requirements for a Will - Code, 28-25-104

 

Foreign execution

A will executed outside this state in a manner prescribed by §§ 28-25-101 - 28-25-104 or a written will executed outside this state in a manner prescribed by the law of the place of its execution or by the law of the testator's domicile at the time of its execution shall have the same force and effect in this state as if executed in this state in compliance with the provisions of §§ 28-25-101.

Arkansas Requirements for a Will - Code, 28-25-105

 

[Reference - Arkansas Requirements for a Will]