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French inheritance rules: what happens to assets when a spouse dies?
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Can French home held in SCI be left to survivor?
We bought our house in France seven years ago using an SCI regime and have since become pacsed. We have two minor children. How can we make sure that the house passes to the survivor of our couple without 50% going to the children? This would leave only one shareholder in the SCI whereas we understood an SCI must have at least two shareholders?
Your children would inherit at least a third each of your respective 50% shareholding at the time of the first death.
You can each make a French will leaving the remaining one third of your respective shareholding and other assets to your partner.
As you are pacsed you will pay no inheritance tax. The EU regulation gives the option of choosing English law to govern the inheritance of the shares and you could make wills naming each other as sole beneficiary. This can be done in the form of a valid French handwritten will or a valid English will.
It is not possible to create an SCI with just one shareholder but it is possible for there to be a single shareholder in the event of the death of one of the shareholders.
If your SCI was set up with a démembrement croisé des parts sociales, with each of you being given a usufruit over the other’s shares, on the death of the first of you, the survivor can have usufruit over 100% of the shares.
If there is no démembrement croisé and one individual does become owner of 100%, the SCI dissolution is not automatic. However this is a complicated area of law and we advise that you seek advice from the notaire who set up the SCI for you.
