Succession and inheritance tax are different systems asking different questions. One decides who inherits; the other decides what is taxed. Living in two countries can put you inside both.
English law starts from testamentary freedom: you can broadly leave your estate to whomever you like. A great many other legal systems do not. Civil law jurisdictions across Europe, Latin America and elsewhere operate forced heirship, reserving fixed shares of an estate for children and sometimes a surviving spouse, and those rules can apply to property situated in that country regardless of what your English will says.
The result is that a perfectly valid UK will can fail to do what it was written to do, in respect of a specific asset, in a specific country, and the discovery is made by the people least able to fix it.
Two Systems, Two Questions
| Succession law | Inheritance tax | |
|---|---|---|
| Question | Who is entitled to inherit? | What is charged, and by whom? |
| Decided by | Domestic succession rules, sometimes with choice | Domestic tax law and treaties |
| Depends on | Where the asset is, and often your habitual residence | Your status and where assets are situated |
| Can be planned | Sometimes, by election in a will | Sometimes, through structure and lifetime gifts |
The UK side of the tax question is covered in our guide to inheritance tax when you live abroad. This page is about the other column, which people plan for far less often.
Some jurisdictions allow you to elect for the law of your nationality to govern succession to your estate. Where that option exists it can preserve testamentary freedom over foreign assets — but it only works if the election is made properly, in the right document, before death. It is not a default and it is not retrospective.
One Will or Several?
Where you hold assets in more than one country, there are two broad approaches and both are used by competent practitioners.
- A single will covering worldwide assets, drafted with the foreign position in mind. Simpler to keep consistent, but administration in the foreign country can be slower where the document is unfamiliar to local process.
- Separate wills for each jurisdiction, each dealing only with assets there. Faster local administration, but a real risk that a later will unintentionally revokes an earlier one — which is the classic and entirely avoidable disaster in this area.
Whichever route, the wills must be drafted together, by people who know the other exists. Two lawyers working independently produce exactly the revocation problem described above.
The Practical Failures
- A UK will that predates the move and does not mention the overseas property at all.
- Beneficiary designations out of step — pension nominations and life policies pass outside a will and are routinely forgotten. Update them when you move.
- Jointly held property that passes by survivorship in one country and does not in another.
- No one who knows where anything is. Executors dealing with a foreign estate need account details, adviser names and document locations.
- Ownership structures taken on locally for property purchase, which change who inherits — see buying property overseas.
Domicile Still Matters, Even Where the Tax Rules Moved
UK inheritance tax has moved towards a residence-based test, but domicile remains a live concept in succession and private international law. It is also notoriously hard to shed: a domicile of origin can persist through decades abroad where the evidence of intention is weak. Anyone planning on the basis that domicile has changed should have that assessed rather than assumed.
What to Do
Review the will when you move, not eventually. Take advice in the country where you own property, from someone independent of whoever sold it to you. Make sure your UK and foreign arrangements are drafted with knowledge of each other. And keep a plain document listing what exists and where, because the most common problem executors report is not legal complexity but not knowing what the estate contains. Our note on choosing an adviser applies here too, with the additional point that this is legal work rather than tax work.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does my UK will cover property I own abroad?
Not necessarily. Many countries apply their own succession rules to property situated there, including forced heirship shares that can override what your will says.
What is forced heirship?
A rule reserving fixed proportions of an estate for particular relatives, usually children and sometimes a spouse. It limits testamentary freedom and applies in many civil law jurisdictions.
Should I have separate wills for each country?
It is one of two workable approaches, and it speeds up local administration. The critical requirement is that the wills are drafted with knowledge of each other, or a later one may revoke an earlier one.
Is succession the same as inheritance tax?
No. Succession law decides who inherits; inheritance tax decides what is charged and by which country. You can be inside both systems at once and they do not necessarily agree.
Related Guides
Keep reading with these related guides and calculators:
- IHT when you live abroad — the tax half of the picture
- Buying property overseas — how ownership structure affects succession
- Deeds of variation — redirecting an inheritance after death
- Family investment companies — structures used in estate planning
- Choosing an adviser — and why this one is a lawyer
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