CASE LAB OF THE WEEK: SPANISH WILL POORLY DRAFTED.

Dear Readers,
We would like to take this opportunity to explain to you about a very complex case that we are dealing at present.
The facts: Our client is a widow expat who currently lives in Dolores. She bought a property many years ago with her late husband. To that end, they applied for a mortgage with Caixa bank.
When the husband (the joint owner) passed away, then all the problems began:
Firstly, the bank informed our client that no life insurance had ever been signed by the deceased at all. Subsequently, our client was held liable now to pay the full amount of the outstanding expensive mortgage loan.
Secondly, due to the fact that she couldn’t afford keep paying almost 1.000 euros per month, we discussed all the available options with our client, and we finally recommended her to negotiate with the bank the surrendering of the property to the bank in exchange of the cancellation of the loan. This option is called “dation in payment” and it is the most frequent devise usually granted to Non Resident persons who cannot keep up with their mortgage payments in Spain.
Thirdly, the bank fortunately accepted our client’s application. However, we were informed a few days later, that they required the inheritance process to be dealt with in the first place.
Fourthly, even though the deceased husband had a Spanish Will, the legal advisor gave him a terrible advice, and instead of appointing his wife as sole legal beneficiary, he appointed someone else.
As a consequence, our Firm have had to urgently find out and contact the legal beneficiaries in England in order to request them to either accept or repudiate the inheritance.
In any case, the Spanish Notary will compulsory require now for a Probate or Grant of letter of administration, duly legalized and translated into Spanish.
This basically implies more cost and significant delay, since the bank has put on hold the surrendering process and it is unable to deadlock the situation until the legal papers arrive from England and our client is able to justify that the inheritance process is successfully finished.

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Subsequently, our practical advice for you today, in order to prevent similar situations from happening in the future to you is the following:
In the first place, should you ever apply for a loan, do not forget to hire with any insurance company of your trust, a comprehensive home and life insurance, since at the event of death, the mortgage will be cancelled. Otherwise, your legal heirs will be liable!
Second, make sure that your Spanish Will is properly drafted and in compliance with the new EU regulations. Otherwise, it will be like having no will at all!!

Therefore, should you ever need a reliable, 100% independent, honest, cost effective and efficient English speaking Spanish solicitor, to help you with your home and/or life insurance, Spanish will, inheritance taxation matters, (or with any other legal problem), make sure you bookmark this page, visit our websites: www.ricorabogados.com and www.englishsolicitorinspain.com
or alternatively, please do not hesitate to contact us by e-mail at ricorsolicitors@yahoo.co.uk
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Thank you very much for your kind attention and we look forward to helping you!
Mr Oscar Ricor
“NON-PRACTISING ENGLISH SOLICITOR IN ENGLAND AND WALES”, under the “Solicitors Regulation Authority” (SRA) SRA number 519196 and practicing Spanish Solicitor.