People write a will and assume they've handled everything. A will only directs assets that go through probate, and a big share of the average household's money never goes near probate.
Your 401(k), your IRA, and your life insurance pay whoever is named on the beneficiary form. The will has no say. A house held with right of survivorship goes to the surviving owner the moment you die, no probate, no will. Payable-on-death and transfer-on-death designations on bank and brokerage accounts do the same thing.
So the ex-spouse still sitting on a 401(k) beneficiary form from 2009 gets the money, even if the will says otherwise and even if the divorce decree says otherwise. Courts have gone both ways on cleaning that up afterward, and the family pays lawyers either way.
What the will does control matters too. It names a guardian for minor children, which no beneficiary form can do. It names the personal representative who handles the estate. And it directs the property that has no designation attached: the car, the furniture, the checking account in your name alone, the collection nobody else knows what to do with.
Oregon has a small-estate process for estates under certain dollar limits, which can move things along without full probate. That helps with the timeline. It still doesn't change which assets the will controls, and it doesn't override a beneficiary form.
The practical move is to review both at the same time. Pull the beneficiary designations on every retirement account and every policy, confirm the primary and the contingent, then read the will and make sure the two documents want the same outcome. It takes an afternoon.
I'm a licensed insurance broker rather than an attorney, so the will itself belongs with an estate attorney in your state. The beneficiary forms are the part I can help you check, and they're the part that gets skipped.