It will depend on the community where the property is located and the kinship between donor and donee. If the donee is under 21 years old, the tax will also be lower. There will also be capital gains tax to pay.

The tax to donate a property from father to son is not high and sometimes compensates the bother of going through the inheritance paperwork.

Sometimes, the donor wants to keep using the property and a very interesting option is to donate the “title” but not the usufruct (or right to use and enjoy the property).

So that the donor keeps the right to use the property for life and the donee will be the owner by title and when the donor passes away, the donee will get the right to use the property automatically.

DONATION TITLE DEED

To update the title deeds and make the donation official, the donor and donee have to do this with a notary public in Spain.

Both donor and donee will need a NIE number (fiscal number for foreigners).

If you have decided to gift a Spanish property to somebody, please contact us and we will help with the donation and even do the transfer on your behalf without having to travel to the Notary in Spain.

We have a case where a UK national made a Will choosing English Law, his nationality law. The testator only had a property in Spain, no other assets.

The testator left this property in Alicante (Spain) to his partner only and nothing to his children. This can be done according to English law but not Spanish law.  English Law also says that if the Estate is abroad then the Inheritance can be done according to the Laws in the country where the asset is located. In Spain, you are obliged to leave the inheritance to the children and then there is a share that you can leave to anybody.

The children did not agree with the partner getting all the Estate and contacted us. As the only asset of the Estate was the property in Spain, this inheritance will be ruled by Spanish Law, therefore the children have to get a share of the Estate according to Spanish Law.

So if your parents owned a property in Spain and resided in Spain but made a Will leaving the property to somebody else in a Will, we can help you with getting your share of the Spanish Estate. There are precedent and case law supporting this.

Please contact us. We will advise you about your specific case.