Brief notions on inheritance law Inheritance, inventory and related concepts

To succeed means – lexically and legally – to replace. Thus, one must start from a basic and fundamental premise: all assets (rights and duties) linked to someone are transmitted, after their death, to their heirs. The universal rules regarding the right to succeed are provided for in the Civil Code, whose variables are basically related to the deceased's marriage regime - if he was married or had a stable union - and his kinship with the heirs. The estate corresponds to the hereditary collection, that is, the universality of the assets left by the deceased – which has a transitory existence, since these assets will be shared and individualized among their heirs. The estate, while existing, is represented by the figure of the executor, a position exercised, as a rule, by one of the heirs and whose function – in addition to the broad representation regarding the assets and rights left – is to ensure the good administration of the assets (rights and duties). Inheritance law, of course, involves several technical rules; from a practical point of view, however, and as far as this article is concerned, it should be noted that the actions of inventory and enrollment seek precisely to formalize the transfer of ownership of the deceased's assets to his heirs – thus operationalizing the succession. The objective is to share the assets among the heirs, to the extent of their rights and always guided by the Civil Code. The assets left by the deceased will cover the debts eventually incurred in their name, but the heirs will not be personally liable for these debts - if the assets left are not sufficient to settle them. This procedure, which aims to share and individualize the assets left by the deceased, can be carried out judicially or extrajudicially – in the latter case, in one of the notary offices, formalized by a public deed that will have the same legal effects as a court decision. In order for it to be possible to carry out the inventory extrajudicially, it is necessary that there are no incapable persons (minors, for example) involved in the sharing (as heirs), that there is no litigation in relation to the assets that will be the object of the transfer, and, furthermore, , that the deceased did not leave a will. CBR Legal Advice