EPTL § 2-1.3

Adopted children and posthumous children as members of a class · as in force on May 31, 2026

§ 2-1.3 Adopted children and posthumous children as members of a class

(a) Unless the creator expresses a contrary intention, a disposition of property to persons described in any instrument as the issue, children, descendants, heirs, heirs at law, next of kin, distributees (or by any term of like import) of the creator or of another, includes:

(1) Adopted children and their issue in their adoptive relationship. The rights of adopted children and their issue to receive a disposition under wills and lifetime instruments as a member of such class of persons based upon their birth relationship shall be governed by the provisions of subdivision two of section one hundred seventeen of the domestic relations law.

(2) Children conceived before, but born alive after such disposition becomes effective.

(3) Nonmarital children. For the purposes of this paragraph, a nonmarital child is the child of a mother and is the child of a father if the child is entitled to inherit from such father under section 4-1.2 of this chapter. The provisions of this paragraph shall apply to the wills of persons dying on and after September first, nineteen hundred ninety-one, to lifetime instruments theretofore executed which on said date are subject to the grantor's power to revoke or amend, and to all lifetime instruments executed on or after such date.

Official sourcehttps://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/EPT/2-1.3

In plain English

(a) Unless the creator says otherwise, a class gift to issue, children, descendants, heirs, next of kin, distributees, or a similar group includes adopted children and their descendants in the adoptive relationship; children conceived before but born alive after the gift takes effect; and qualifying nonmarital children. ★ Adopted children’s rights through birth relationships follow Domestic Relations Law § 117(2), and a nonmarital child is the mother’s child and the father’s child when inheritance from him is allowed under § 4-1.2. The nonmarital-child rule applies to wills of persons dying on or after September 1, 1991, revocable or amendable lifetime instruments existing then, and lifetime instruments signed afterward.

Marked in the text: penalties, time limits, sums of money. Editorial emphasis added by this edition; it does not appear in the statute as enacted.

In print

This provision appears in Volume 1 — The Surrogate's Court in Plain English; Volume 3 — The Surrogate's Court: Court Rules & the EPTL; Volume 5 — Your Career: Surrogate's Court in Plain English.