How an inheritance is distributed from parents to children

Any person of legal age can request the drafting of a will before a notary. It is not necessary to specify all the assets that are held, since it is possible that at the time of the death of the testator, the assets differ from those that were at the time of writing.

As a general rule, people who believe they are suitable can be designated as heirs, although the law establishes a limit, since the legitimate one that corresponds to each descendant must be respected . It is possible that there are people who die without having written a will and have to determine legally who is entitled to inherit the property. in we explain how an inheritance is distributed from parents to children .

What types of inheritance are there?

Children can inherit their parents' assets in two ways:

• Through a testament : The person makes a will and distributes his property according to his will. You can determine one or several heirs, how and in what way you distribute the inheritance and if you establish any condition.
• Heir intestate : As there is no testament, the law establishes who should inherit, distributing the assets of the deceased to their closest relatives .

The most common way to inherit is through a will, although it should be remembered that older people were not used to writing a will, since it was entrusted that the distribution of property was made in accordance with the needs of the family.

Do you have to determine the assets that are left in inheritance?

The law does not require to record how many goods are left in inheritance, since the heir or heirs will receive them all, unless otherwise stated. In this way, the deceased can leave written that a certain group of goods correspond to other people, and that the heirs receive the rest of goods.

This measure is aimed at preventing a mismatch of assets between those who are written in the will and those who actually remain at the time of the death of the person. That is why it establishes the possibility that the heirs, once called to inherit, make an inventory of the goods that remain at the time of inheritance.

It should be remembered that it is the will of the testator that governs the distribution of the assets and it may be that each child has a different portion of the inheritance. There is no legal order, in the case of wills, that forces the inheritance to be distributed equally among the children, or even, in the case of being married, that the widower receives more goods than the children.

The testator can not freely dispose of all assets

In Spain, the testator can not freely leave all his assets, since the law requires him to respect the legitimate that corresponds to his descendants, and the third improvement .

The regulation establishes that a third of the total inheritance must fall, necessarily, to the children of the deceased. In this way, we want to avoid that, due to the bad relationships between parents and children, one of them is left without inheriting.

The third of improvement, however, serves for the testator to distribute a part of the inheritance in favor of a descendant to whom it has special consideration. It can only be done in favor of descendants.

Who has the right to collect the legitimate?

The people who have the right to receive a quarter of the inheritance are:

• The descendants : That is to say, the children, although in the absence of these, the grandchildren can request the payment of the legitimate one.
• Ascendants : In case the parents of the deceased survive, they also have the right to collect the corresponding part of the legitimate one.
• Spouse : He also has the right to collect his share corresponding to the legitimate spouses who survive the testator.

Can you disinherit a child?

The causes cited by the law to disinherit a child are very complicated to comply with, and nothing common. In Spain, you can only disinherit a child if :

• The father has been slandered and there is a final sentence that sends the son to prison for it.
• If you have tried to kill the testator or your spouse.
• If the father has not been fed when he needed it because of his condition or the necessary care has not been taken during his life.
• If there is no relationship with the parents.

In the event that any child incurs any of the causes of disinheritance, part of the legitimate that corresponds to it will happen to receive one of their children, that is, the grandchildren of the testator.