For heirs who live outside Spain
Inheriting a property in Spain
Six months, and the clock started on the day of death
Inheriting a Spanish house from abroad is a paper race against a deadline nobody tells you about. Most families discover the calendar once it is already running, and discover the bill once they can no longer compare it.
What you get
- Your case's calendar in writing: what falls due, when, and the one extension that exists.
- The list of certificates to request and in which order: death, last wills register and life insurance register.
- Which of your home country's documents need an apostille and a sworn translation, and which do not.
- The property's data gathered: nota simple, cadastral reference, reference value and charges.
- The whole file in one PDF, in your language and in Spanish, ready to walk into a law firm.
Why this matters now
Spain's Inheritance Tax Act 29/1987 gives SIX MONTHS from the death to file and pay, with a single six-month extension that must be requested within the first five. And Valencian Act 6/2023 now discounts 99 % of the tax between parents, children and spouses. In other words: on most of this coast's inheritances the tax barely exists — what does exist is the late-filing surcharge. Money is lost on the calendar, not on the rate.
What this service is NOT
We are not lawyers and not a gestoría, and an inheritance is signed before a notary. We do not accept or renounce anything on your behalf, we do not settle the tax and we do not interpret your will: we build the file and we watch the clock. The firm that signs charges its own fees and tells you before starting. If your case has heirs in conflict, that is litigation and not a file, and we will say so on day one.
Questions about this service
The market quotes me a percentage of the house's value. Why don't you?
Because the work of gathering papers does not grow with the value of the house. Requesting the last wills certificate costs the same for a €90,000 house as for a €400,000 one. A 1 % to 3 % fee is what we measured on the market on 06/09/2026; we charge a fixed price.
My mother had an English will. Is it valid here?
Generally yes, but that is a lawyer's call, not ours. The European succession regulation allows the law of your nationality to govern the whole estate if the will said so expressly. What we do is bring the document over, apostilled and translated, in a state where a firm can read it.
What if the six months have already passed?
Then there is a surcharge, and it grows over time. The sooner it is filed, the smaller it is. It is not a lost situation and we will not dramatise it: it is a situation that gets worse on its own while nobody touches it.
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This page was last checked on 4 September 2026
Responsible for this content Sullivan Benedetto · Torrevieja (Alicante), España
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