Legítima in Spain: Forced Heirship and What It Changes

What the legítima is

The legítima is the part of an estate that the law reserves for certain relatives, the herederos forzosos. Under the common regime of the Código Civil these are the children and other descendants, the parents and other ascendants if there are no descendants, and the surviving spouse. You can arrange your estate in many ways, but you cannot leave these people less than the law reserves for them without a valid reason set out in the law.

The idea sounds old fashioned to people from countries with free testation, such as England or most US states. It reflects a view that family members have a claim on a person's estate, and that a will should not override it lightly. Whether you find that comforting or intrusive, it is the baseline for any estate governed by Spanish law, so it is worth understanding before you sign anything. Our blog on making a will in Spain shows how one family faced it.

How the numbers work under the common regime

For children and descendants, two thirds of the estate is reserved. That reserve is itself split into three parts. One third, the legítima estricta, must be divided equally among the children. A second third, the mejora, can be shared unequally among the descendants as you choose. The final third is free: you can leave it to anyone, including a partner, a friend or a charity.

If there are no descendants, the parents and other ascendants are reserved half of the estate, reduced to one third when the surviving spouse is also entitled. The surviving spouse is a forced heir too, but the entitlement is a usufruct, meaning a right to use or enjoy property for life, not full ownership. As a rule of thumb the usufruct covers one third when the spouse concurs with children, one half when concurring with ascendants alone and two thirds when there are neither. The spouse must not be legally or de facto separated at the time of death. Whether you find those figures generous or cramped, they explain why the surviving partner in a blended family can end up sharing the house with stepchildren.

The regional map is not a footnote

Spain has more than one civil law. In several territories the local rules replace or modify the common regime, and the differences in the legítima can be large. As a rough guide, Catalonia and Galicia reserve a quarter of the estate for children. Aragón reserves half, but as a collective share that can be freely distributed among descendants. The Basque Country reserves a third, again collectively, and the Balearic Islands also work with a third, rising to a half when there are more than four children. Navarra is the most open, with a legítima that is largely formal and leaves almost complete freedom to the testator.

These are summaries, and each regime has its own conditions, exceptions and ways of paying the share, sometimes in cash rather than in property. Which regime applies to a person is tied to a status called vecindad civil, not simply to where a house stands, so a Catalan resident with a flat in Madrid is the kind of case that needs individual advice. The honest takeaway is that the same sentence in a will can mean different things in Valencia and in Barcelona, and anyone who tells you there is one Spanish rule is simplifying.

Disinheriting is possible but narrow

A forced heir can be excluded, but only for a cause that the law lists and that you state in the will. For children the listed causes include refusing support without justification, physical mistreatment and serious insult. If the person later contests the exclusion, the burden of proof falls on the other heirs, who must show the cause existed. In practice that means that a will saying simply that you are cutting a child out because of a family quarrel does not do what many people imagine.

The point is not that disinheriting is hopeless. It is that the route is narrow, specific and evidence based, and it is exactly the sort of thing you plan with an adviser rather than improvise. Reducing a forced share without a recognised cause can lead to a claim by the heir, and the result is often a long and expensive dispute between the people you meant to protect.

How a choice of law interacts with the legítima

This is where the EU Succession Regulation enters. If you live in Spain and do nothing, Spanish law governs your estate and the legítima applies. If you choose the law of your nationality in your will, that law governs instead, and it may have no forced heirship at all or a different system. A British citizen who chooses English law, for example, gains the freedom of testation that English law gives. A Dutch or German citizen would apply their own rules on compulsory shares, which differ from the Spanish ones in structure and in who is protected.

We explain the mechanism in our article on the EU Succession Regulation 650/2012. What matters for this topic is the honest limit. A choice of law is generally effective, but it is not guaranteed to be untouchable in every situation. Courts can set aside a foreign law whose result is manifestly incompatible with public policy, and heirs who lose out can still litigate. The likelihood and the details depend on the facts and on the country, so treat any promise that a choice of law makes forced heirship disappear with caution.

What it means for blended families and second marriages

The households most affected are second marriages and families with children from different relationships. Under Spanish rules the children's reserved share can sit uneasily next to a surviving spouse who has only a usufruct. A partner who hoped to remain in the family home may find they hold a lifetime right while the children hold the ownership, and the practical question of who pays the community fees, taxes and repairs becomes a family negotiation.

Someone who wants their partner to stay in the home for life, or to keep a business in one pair of hands, has several tools. Some use the free third, some use the mejora, some prepare a choice of law and some combine these with other planning. None of this is a template. It is a conversation with a professional who knows the regional regime, the home country law and how a Spanish notary and the Registro de la Propiedad will treat the result.

The legítima and tax are different conversations

It is easy to blur the two. The legítima decides who is entitled to what. Inheritance tax decides what each heir owes to the tax authorities on what they receive, and it varies by region and by closeness of relationship. Our guide to inheritance and gift tax in Spain and the comparison of inheritance tax by region cover the tax side. Keep them apart in your planning, because a plan that works well for one can be poor for the other.

What to do with this information

If you live in Spain, the sensible sequence has three steps. First find out what the legítima would give each of your close relatives under the regime that applies to you. Second decide whether that result matches what you want. Third, if it does not, speak to an adviser about what is available to you, including a choice of law, and have it written into a Spanish will in a form the notary will stand behind.

Everything in this article reflects the general rules as of October 2026. Regional laws are amended from time to time, and individual cases turn on details we cannot see from here. Use this as a map of the terrain, not as a ruling on your own family.