When Ibrahim and Metalda (fictitious name) moved to Abu Dhabi twelve years ago, they believed they were on a predictable path, with stable careers, a growing family, and long-term plans to build a life in the UAE. But as their financial landscape expanded, so did their responsibilities. A Muslim – Christian expat partners, with two young children, multiple bank accounts, investments across different emirates, and a family apartment in Abu Dhabi, they began questioning whether their legacy was adequately protected.
Like many expatriates, they assumed their overseas Will would be enough to govern their UAE assets. It wasn’t until a friend faced unexpected legal hurdles during a family emergency that they realised the situation was far more complex. Determined to avoid such uncertainty, they approached ATB Legal to understand whether there was a comprehensive and culturally neutral estate-planning solution in the UAE.
What followed became a transformative journey, one that ultimately empowered them with clarity, control, and long-term security through ADJD Mirror Wills.
The Turning Point: Why They Needed Immediate Clarity
The couple reached out to ATB Legal after a distressing episode within their community, a fellow expat passed away suddenly, and the family struggled for months to access even basic assets such as joint accounts. This incident deeply unsettled Ibrahim and Metalda. They realised that:
- Their children were minors and vulnerable without a clearly appointed guardian,
- Their jointly owned property in Abu Dhabi could be frozen until the court decides its fate,
- And their foreign Will might not be applied by UAE courts in the way they expected.
They were especially concerned about guardianship. Both sets of grandparents lived outside the UAE, but the couple wanted the children to remain in the country under the care of close friends until the grandparents could arrive. Without a UAE-recognised Will, this wish might not be honoured.
This Case Study is a Part of Our Wills and Probate Services.
Their overriding question became simple:
“How do we ensure our family is protected instantly and without complications?”
The Solution: Mirror Wills Under the Abu Dhabi Judicial Department (ADJD)
After a detailed consultation, the Wills team at ATB Legal recommended and suggested that ADJD Mirror Wills were the most suitable and efficient solution for the couple’s needs.
Why Mirror Wills?
Mirror Wills are paired documents, one for each spouse, reflecting parallel wishes. For expatriate couples, especially those with shared assets and minor children, they provide a structured, predictable, and cost-effective planning mechanism.
The ADJD Civil Wills system, in particular, appealed to them because:
- It is available to Muslim and non-Muslim expats residing in the UAE.
- It recognises full testamentary freedom.
- It provides a straightforward and locally enforceable structure.
- It allows guardianship wishes to be clearly documented.
- It avoids the default application of Sharia-based inheritance rules.
- It offers a virtual registration process.
With this system, Ibrahim and Metalda could ensure that every UAE-based asset, whether jointly held or individually owned, would be administered exactly according to their instructions. More importantly, their minor children’s temporary and permanent guardians could be appointed with legal precision.
The ATB Legal Approach: Precision, Care, and Transparency
ATB Legal’s process unfolded in several meticulously planned stages, each designed to reduce stress and maximise certainty for the couple.
Holistic Understanding of Their UAE Estate
The Wills team began with an in-depth session to map the couple’s financial and personal ecosystem:
- Jointly owned property in Abu Dhabi and the UAE,
- multiple UAE bank accounts,
- term insurance policies,
- individual savings plans,
- jointly owned vehicles,
- digital assets such as online accounts and cloud-stored family memories.
The consultation also focused on family dynamics, dependent children, international relatives, and pre-existing arrangements in their home country, to ensure a smooth cross-border strategy.
Registering Mirror Wills Tailored to Their Lives
Instead of producing generic templates, ATB Legal drafted two fully customised Wills that mirrored one another yet addressed each spouse’s distinct assets. Key components included:
- the nomination of primary and substitute executors,
- detailed division of assets,
- specific sentimental bequests,
- guardianship appointments and contingencies,
- directions for digital asset access and management,
- survivorship clauses for simultaneous death scenarios.
Every instruction was written in clear, legally precise language to avoid interpretation risks in the future.
Addressing Guardianship With Sensitivity
For the couple, this was the most emotionally charged part of the process. They wanted close family friends in Abu Dhabi to act as temporary guardians until the grandparents arrived from their home country.
ATB Legal structured the guardianship terms to reflect:
- who would assume immediate care of the minor children,
- who would take over long-term guardianship,
- alternative guardians if the primary nominees were unable to act.
The clarity of this section was invaluable to the couple. It was also the primary reason they felt peace of mind at the end of the process.
Preparing for Seamless Registration
To avoid delays, the Wills team at ATB Legal handled all logistics:
- verification of Emirates IDs and passports,
- preparing bilingual documents as required by ADJD,
- coordinating the signing appointment,
- ensuring that the couple understood each step of the process.
Completion and Secure Registration
The Wills were successfully executed and registered with ADJD. The entire process, from consultation to registration, was completed within a matter of days, a major advantage for a couple balancing demanding professional commitments.
The Impact: Peace of Mind That Transformed Their Outlook
The transformation after the Wills registration was remarkable. The couple described the process as “a weight lifted off our shoulders.”
Their ADJD Mirror Wills ensured:
- immediate access to assets by the surviving spouse,
- uninterrupted guardianship for their children,
- clarity for family abroad who might need to step in,
- protection from asset freezes during emergencies, and
- certainty that their hard-earned UAE estate would pass as intended.
The couple later shared that the exercise also motivated them to organise their international estate planning, something they had postponed for years.
They have since referred several families within their community to ATB Legal, testimony to the trust built through a process handled with care, clarity, and professionalism.
