Inheritance Law (Successions) / Estate planning

Only an expert can fully handle the legal difficulties that come up when a German will is to be drafted, you want to start planning your estate, or when claiming your legal rights or other rights to a German estate is at stake.

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It is not only the media proclaiming demographic change as the buzzword of today. The shift in age structure causes substantial assets to be redistributed year after year. This, in turn, may result in considerable conflicts between successors or third parties entitled to the inheritance. Not having considered the essentials of making a will, which eventually leads to the will being invalid, the testator often brings about long-standing disputes that he had wanted to avoid. The legal difficulties that come up when a will is to be drafted or when an estate is going to be planned, can only be handled by an expert in the field.

Basic German regulations on inheritance law have, by and large, been left unchanged over the last years. This creates legal certainty for future estate planning and allows people in charge to determine who is to receive what, long before succession occurs. However, in order to set up a binding will, it is crucial to have a thorough understanding of inheritance law. Due to the complexity of this legal area, laypeople are rarely aware of its pitfalls.

As a qualified expert in inheritance law, successions, and estate planning I can provide wide-ranging services in the matter, including:

• advice on how to make a will under German law
• offering support in planning your estate in Germany
• communicating with and advising heirs in the course of inheritance agreements under German law (Erbvertrag, Pflichtteilsverzichtsvertrag and others)
• supporting clients who have been disinherited under German law and want to claim their legal rights (Pflichtteil)
• drafting wills under German law and in accordance with your ideas on how your estate should be distributed (Testament)
• providing support for dealing with inheritance case involving Germany (e.g. obtaining Probate - Erbschein - according to German legal regulations, preparing actions of divisions or sale, executor support)
• providing assistance in claiming your (legal) share in German estates
• supporting disinherited individuals to claim their legal share in German estates (in-court and out-of-court procedures)
• full legal representation of foreign heirs in German inheritance cases (all across Germany)

Cross-Border Inheritance Law

If there is more than one country involved in assessing a case on inheritance law, the entire situation has to be seen from a completely different angle. The reason for that is the diversity of legal inheritance systems across the globe. Collisions are many, depending on the testator's nationality and her specific will. If the deceased, whose estate is to be distributed, owned a holiday flat and a yacht in southern France, a piece of land in Wales, and a bank account in Switzerland, we are right in the middle of the difficulties that touch international successions.

For successions occurring ever since 17 August 2015, the new European Union Succession Regulation intends to harmonize inheritance rules across 24 member states (except for Denmark and Ireland) and wants to facilitate conflicts regarding the applicable law. Only time and legal practice will tell if this aspiration can be as easily implemented as it sounds. If you decide to have my law practice handle your cross-border succession case, you will be certain that a specialist is dealing with it. Moreover, my foreign language skills in French and Spanish will ensure I can make other countries' inheritance systems available for the solution of your legal issue.