The word “legítima”, the forced share, is used by everyone and used correctly by almost no one. In a family conversation it means “what the children get by law”, and the figure people have in mind is the two thirds of the Spanish Civil Code. In Galicia that figure does not apply. Article 243 of Law 2/2006 on Galician civil law sets the forced share of descendants at one quarter of the net estate, and article 238 limits those entitled to it to the children, the descendants of children who predeceased, were disinherited or are unworthy, and the surviving spouse who is not separated. Parents are not forced heirs. Whether your succession is classified as Galician or as ordinary Spanish law decides whether you can freely dispose of three quarters of what you own or only one third, and that classification depends on your civil residence status, the vecindad civil, not on where your assets are.
Galician civil status is acquired by birth to Galician parents or by prolonged residence in Galicia, and it can be lost the same way, by prolonged residence elsewhere. Someone from A Coruña who has lived in Madrid for fifteen years may have moved to ordinary Spanish law without signing anything, and a Catalan who has spent the same time in Ferrol may today be Galician for succession purposes. Assets follow the person. The flat in Sada and the account at a bank in Valladolid are distributed under the same law, the one that matches the civil status of the deceased at the time of death. Checking which one is yours before sitting down to decide is the first thing we do at the firm, because without that fact the rest of the will is designed on the wrong forced share.
What happens if you die without a will
Article 912 of the Civil Code states that intestate succession takes place when someone dies without a will or with a void one. From there the law distributes in a fixed order, children, parents, spouse, siblings and nephews and nieces, and so on down to relatives in the fourth degree. What that order produces in an ordinary Galician family surprises almost everyone who comes to the firm convinced that “it has all been talked through”.
A married couple with children. One of them dies without a will and the children inherit everything. The widow or widower inherits nothing in ownership, and what Galician law reserves for them is a life usufruct over one quarter of the estate (article 253 of Law 2/2006). In practice, the half of the home that belonged to the deceased passes to the children, and the survivor is left living in a house that belongs to the children with a usufruct that does not cover even half of it. The family getting on well does not change title. It only means that nobody objects, until a child divorces, dies before the widowed parent, or needs money and wants to sell their share.
A married couple without children. If the parents of the deceased are alive, they inherit, and the spouse is left with a usufruct over part of the estate. With a will, since parents are not forced heirs in Galicia, you can leave your spouse absolutely everything.
With no relatives at all, the Autonomous Community of Galicia inherits (article 267 of Law 2/2006). And a couple who live together without marrying and without registering in the Galician register of unmarried couples, which Galician law itself treats as equivalent to marriage, appear nowhere in that order, so the partner receives nothing. The table summarises what changes in the most common situations.
| Situation | Without a will | With a will |
|---|---|---|
| Married with children | The children inherit everything in equal shares and the survivor keeps a life usufruct over one quarter | Widow’s usufruct over the whole estate and distribution among the children as you decide, respecting one quarter shared among all of them |
| Married without children, parents alive | The parents inherit and the survivor is left with a usufruct over part of the estate | You can leave everything to your spouse, because parents are not forced heirs in Galicia |
| Unmarried and unregistered partner | The partner receives nothing | You can leave them whatever you wish within the limit of the children’s forced share, if there are children |
| Single, no children, no parents | Siblings and nephews and nieces inherit, then other relatives down to the fourth degree | Whoever you name inherits |
| No relatives at all | The Autonomous Community of Galicia inherits | Whoever you name inherits |
What Galician law lets you decide
A will changes several things in Galicia that intestate succession does not allow.
The first is the widow’s usufruct. Article 228 of Law 2/2006 allows spouses to agree in a deed, or to provide in a will, a usufruct over all or part of the estate in favour of the other. With a universal usufruct, the survivor keeps the use and income of everything for life, and the children are owners who cannot sell or demand anything until the survivor dies. It is the most common clause in Galician wills and what stops a widow from having to ask her children’s permission to sell a flat or collect rent.
The second is the one-quarter forced share. That quarter is shared among all the children, it is not a quarter per head. The other three quarters are freely disposable. You can leave them entirely to your spouse, to the child who looks after you, to a grandchild, to a child with a disability to secure their future, or use them to make up for what you already gave another child during your lifetime. You can leave specific assets to specific people, and there it helps to know that an heir and a legatee are not the same thing, because they answer differently for the debts of the estate. If what you want is for a child to receive not even the forced share, that requires a cause recognised by law, which I explain in the article on disinheritance and the forced share.
The third is the joint will. Article 187 allows two or more people, married or not, to make their wills in a single notarial instrument. Spouses may also include reciprocal provisions, those that one makes in consideration of what the other provides, and the law makes clear that reciprocity is not presumed, it has to be declared. A couple who want the house to end up with the child who stayed in the village, whichever of them dies first, achieve it with two reciprocal provisions in a joint will. The price of that certainty is rigidity, because reciprocal provisions cannot be changed by one spouse behind the other’s back while both are alive, and after one dies the survivor is largely bound by what was declared reciprocal.
Alongside the will, and often instead of it, Galician law allows the estate to be distributed during your lifetime through the apartación and the pacto de mejora. I explain that in apartación and inheritance in lifetime. Here it is enough to say that a will costs little, can be changed whenever you wish and transfers nothing until death, whereas a succession agreement is final and transfers now.
At the firm, when someone asks us what to do with what they own, we check the civil status, calculate the forced share on what actually exists, deducting debts and adding what was given during life, and draft the clauses that the notary then raises to a deed. I explain this on the civil law page.
Open, holographic and joint wills
The open notarial will is the normal one. It is executed before a notary, stays in the notary’s records and the notary reports its existence to the General Registry of Last Wills, so that when you die any heir can find out that it exists and where it is. It is not lost, not destroyed and nobody disputes the signature.
The holographic will, written entirely in your own hand, is valid, but after death it needs a procedure to verify the handwriting and signature that costs the heirs time and money, and it fails for formal defects that a notary would have avoided. What it saves on the day it is written costs many times over on the day it has to be enforced.
The joint will I have already described. It works for married couples and for siblings or business partners who want a common plan, and its drawback is the rigidity of the reciprocal provisions.
Changing it later
A will is changed by making another one. The latest revokes the earlier one in whatever is incompatible, and there is no need to cancel or retrieve the old one. A will executed in another Spanish region remains valid in Galicia. What changes is the law under which its clauses are read, which will be that of your civil status at death. That is why a will made in Barcelona with Catalan forced shares in mind may produce a different distribution from the one intended if you die as a Galician. With a joint will, a reciprocal provision can only be revoked while both spouses are alive, by an open notarial will and with notice to the other spouse (articles 191 and 192), and that revocation cancels every provision that depended on it. After the first death it can no longer be revoked.
What you can prepare today
Before setting foot in a notary’s office or a law firm there is work you can do alone that improves any will. A list of what you own and what you owe, with the deeds and latest statements located. A record of what you have already handed to each child during your lifetime, with dates and amounts, because that counts towards the forced share. And a considered decision on who should keep the use of the home and who should end up owning it. What I do not advise is signing at the notary’s office a template proposed on the spot without having done that prior work, because the notary gives legal form to what you tell them, and if what you tell them is miscalculated, the deed will be too.
Doing it on your own almost always means signing the standard scheme of universal usufruct and equal shares, which is right for many families and wrong for a good number of others, those with second marriages, children in different financial situations, a family business, a child with a disability, assets outside Galicia or an unmarried partner. You will not see the mistake; your heirs will, when it can no longer be corrected. At the firm we draft the will to fit that family and that estate, with the forced share calculated on real figures, and we attend the execution at the notary’s office, as part of the civil law work we do. If you want us to look at it, call +34 677 841 007 or write through the contact page. Bring the list of assets and debts, the family record book or a list of children and grandchildren, the deeds to the home and, if you have already made a will, a copy.
Frequently asked questions
How much is the forced share in Galicia and can I leave everything to one child?
The children’s forced share in Galicia is one quarter of the net estate, shared among all of them, and the surviving spouse also has a usufruct. The other three quarters are yours to do with as you wish. You can leave one child everything except the part of the forced share that belongs to their siblings, and if you already gave them assets during your lifetime, that is taken into account. Leaving a child nothing at all requires disinheriting them for a cause the law accepts.
If I make a joint will with my spouse, can I change it on my own later?
It depends on whether the clause you want to change is reciprocal or not. What each of you provided independently can be revoked alone. What was declared reciprocal cannot be changed behind the other’s back while both are alive, and when one dies it becomes irrevocable, save for very narrow exceptions. That is why you have to decide carefully what to make reciprocal, and the law does not presume it.
Is a will I made while living in another region valid in Galicia?
Yes, it remains valid. What changes is the law under which it is interpreted, which is that of your civil status at death. If you made it with the forced shares of the Civil Code in mind and die with Galician civil status, the distribution may come out differently from what you wanted. It is worth reviewing when you move region, when you marry or divorce and when a child is born.
Do I need a lawyer to make a will or is the notary enough?
If you are married, your children are in similar circumstances, all your assets are in Galicia and you want the classic scheme, universal usufruct for the spouse and equal shares among the children, the notary will do it properly and a lawyer adds nothing that justifies the cost. A lawyer is worth it when there is a second marriage, an unmarried partner, a child you want to favour or exclude, a business, assets outside Galicia, a child with a disability, or when you are considering a joint will with reciprocal provisions. In those cases the mistake is paid for in the inheritance and can no longer be corrected.