Spanish death certificate

One of the first steps in the process of dealing with the estate of a client or relative who has died in Spain or with interests in Spain is obtaining a copy of the death certificate (certificado de defunción).

Death certificate

This may be provided by the Spanish notary (notario) assisting you or you may need to request a copy from the local Civil Registry (Registro Civil). There is also an online option available: https://sede.mjusticia.gob.es/es/tramites/certificado-defuncion

You may come across different types of death certificate. For example, older certificates will typically look something like this:

Occasionally, you may be issued with another kind of multilingual death certificate, which looks like the following:

Alternatively, a more recent kind of death certificate looks like this (example available online):

Note the bottom of the document. Recipients can check the authenticity of the certificate by entering the verification code on the Ministry of Justice website.

Final comments

In either case, you are likely to require a certified translation of the death certificate before being able to deal with other aspects of the estate. To receive a quote for a certified translation, click on the Request a Quote button.

Next: Types of Spanish wills