Inheritance tax in Spain: Accepting an inheritance or not

The covid-19 pandemic has caused an increase in mortality in Spain, especially among the elderly. This will cause a flood of waivers of inheritance during 2021 due to the fear of the beneficiaries of receiving more debts and tax obligations in the context of economic crisis, according to the General Council of Notaries

In addition, it must be taken into account that the number of acceptance of inheritances has remained stable between 260,000 and 320,000 per year, while the number of rejections to them has multiplied by four in two years, from 11,000 in 2017 at 47,421 of 2019. For this reason, the Stop Successions Association has sent a letter to the President of the Government and the Minister of Finance to exonerate all those victims of coronavirus from the inheritance, donations and patrimony tax.

Added to this is the great difference in this tax depending on the location of residence. For example, the Valencian Community is the most expensive region to inherit in Spain, where you can pay 14 times more than in Madrid. At this time, different regional governments are studying increasing or lowering this tax rate, thus adding even more uncertainty about how the tax works.

Meanwhile, faced with this situation, many families wonder how to have everything well distributed and tied up so that, when the time comes, all these steps do not become a problem and a “burden” for them. Likewise, there is a great lack of knowledge on the subject, even on the documentation necessary for the children to have the power to make decisions if their ascendants lose abilities. In addition, among seniors, it is also common to wonder if it is possible to leave the assets in inheritance to anyone, without taking into account only the descendants.