Beneficiaries of French wills

If you are a relative of someone who has passed away leaving a French will, you’ll naturally want to understand whether you are entitled to a share of their estate.

Forced heirship

One of the main differences between English and French inheritance law is the level of freedom in making a will. Under English law, a person can usually leave their estate to whomever they wish—whether that’s a spouse, children, partner, charity, or a mix of beneficiaries—without restriction.

French law provides for forced heirship, which is meant to protect a person’s closest family members. In practice, this means that part of the estate must be left to certain relatives, known as ‘forced heirs’ (héritiers réservataires). Only when there are no such heirs does the person have complete freedom to leave their estate to anyone they wish..

So, if the testator has no children, their parents will become the forced heirs according to the priority specified above.

A deceased’s estate is broken down into (i) a reserved portion (réserve héréditaire) and (ii) a disposable portion (quotité disponible). These vary in size according to the number of children the deceased had.

The following table shows the distribution of the estate by reserved portion and disposable portion.

Example:

If you leave an estate of €240,000 and have two children, the latter would be entitled to 2/3 of the estate (€80,000 each) while the remaining 1/3 (€80,000) would make up the disposable portion that you could gift to any person of your choice.

Interesting facts

If a forced heir dies before the testator but leaves children, those children do not lose their rights. Instead, they inherit their parent’s share through a system called representation (représentation successorale).

In addition, the surviving spouse is entitled to a life interest in the entire estate, known in French law as a usufruit.”

Final comments

These concepts can seem quite unfamiliar to anyone not used to the French legal system. While this article only scratches the surface of the many possible situations, having a basic understanding of the rules is important to help you make sense of your current and potential rights under French inheritance law.

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