A parent has died owning a flat in Spain: the first six months

If you are reading this in the weeks after a death, the single most useful thing on this page is the next paragraph. The rest can wait a few days.

Weeks one to four: find out what is actually there

Families are very often wrong about what their parent owned in Spain and about whether they made a Spanish will. Both are checkable, quickly, and both should be checked before anyone makes a plan.

A search of the Spanish land registry establishes what property was held and whether anything is charged against it. A search of the central register of wills — the Registro General de Actos de Última Voluntad — establishes whether a Spanish will exists, and if so which notary holds it. That second search is worth doing even when the family is certain there is no Spanish will. We find them regularly, made at the time of purchase and forgotten about within a year.

What you will need: the death certificate, and ideally the title deed. If you cannot find the deed, the land registry search will find the property anyway.

The question that decides everything: which law applies

This is the technical heart of a Spanish estate and it is worth understanding, because it determines who inherits.

Spain applies the EU Succession Regulation. Under it, succession is governed by the law of the country where the deceased was habitually resident at death — unless they validly chose the law of their nationality instead. The United Kingdom never opted into that Regulation, which is why the two systems do not reflect one another neatly.

For a parent who lived in Britain and used the Spanish property for holidays, the practical answer is usually that English or Scottish law governs, and Spanish forced heirship — the rules reserving fixed shares to children — does not reach the property. That is the common case and it is generally the reassuring one.

But "usually" is carrying real weight in that sentence. The answer can change if your parent had begun spending most of the year in Spain, if they held Spanish nationality as well as British, if they made a Spanish will containing a choice-of-law clause nobody has read, or if the clause they made identified "British law" without specifying England and Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland. The United Kingdom has three legal systems and no single law of succession, and a clause that does not choose between them is an argument waiting to be had.

Establish this first. Everything downstream — who signs, who pays, what each person receives — depends on it.

Months one to three: the administrative machinery

An NIE for every heir. The Spanish foreigner identification number. Nobody can inherit Spanish property without one, and they take time. Start them early; this is the item that most often delays an otherwise smooth estate.

A power of attorney for every heir. Almost everything in Spain happens in front of a notary, in person. A power of attorney, signed at a notary here in the UK and apostilled, means nobody has to fly out. If the family is scattered, this saves more money than anything else on this list.

A bank certificate. The Spanish bank issues a certificate of the balance at the date of death. You will need it for the tax return, and it is also relevant to the next point.

Months three to six: tax, deed, registration

The inheritance tax return, then the deed of acceptance before the notary, then registration of the heirs' title at the land registry. Until that last step is complete, the property cannot be sold.

Which creates the circular problem families ask about constantly: the tax is due before the property can be sold, so how do you pay it? The usual answer is that the Spanish bank releases funds from the deceased's own account for the purpose of paying the inheritance tax, before the estate is distributed. This is ordinary practice and needs no special arrangement. Where there was no Spanish bank account, the options narrow and it is worth knowing that in month one rather than month five.

Rates and allowances vary considerably between Spain's autonomous regions, and the region that matters is where the property is, not where you live. Two identical estates in Andalucía and in Valencia can produce very different bills.

Three ways families lose money here

Waiting for probate. The commonest and the most expensive. The Spanish deadline is running from the date of death regardless of what is happening here. You do not need a grant to begin the Spanish work.

Leaving it entirely. An estate that sits for years does not go away: it compounds, and it lands on the next generation, who will have to deal with two deaths at once and by then may not have the documents. Late estates are entirely fixable. They are simply more expensive than early ones.

Everyone flying out separately. Four heirs making individual trips to a Spanish notary costs more in flights than the entire legal fee. One power of attorney each, signed locally, does the same job.

If you do not know where to start

Most people do not, and the first step is deliberately small. For £350 we search the registers, establish what the estate contains and who inherits under which law, work out what tax falls due and by when, and send you a written report in English. If you then instruct us on the estate, that £350 comes off the fee in full.

Administering a straightforward Spanish estate is £2,400. The Spanish inheritance tax, the municipal land-value tax and the notary and registry fees are separate, are paid by you directly, and never pass through our account.

How Spanish estates work, in full

Written by ABOGADO LIMITED. General information about Spanish succession, not advice on a particular estate. If your parent died recently, telephone 0330 684 5332 — the deadline matters more than the reading.