This law field has been settled with the Civil Law (Law no. 4721)
Inheritance law regulates the passage of a person to the heirs of property rights after death.
According to law, in the absence of an express provision made by a deceased person, his estate will, by operation of law, go to his close relatives upon his death. There are two types of heirdom. First one is a statutory, the other one is the appointment inheritor(s) by the decedent.
1. Statutory Inheritors
Inheritance Law, describes the statutory inheritors as a consanguineous (blood relative). The blood relatives of a deceased person are divided into groups which are called parental(s).
There are three degree of the consanguineous.
The first heirs of a deceased person are his/her children. If the deceased has no children, his/her father and mother are his/her heirs. If his/her parents are no longer alive, their children become his/her heirs. The least of a deceased person's heirs among his/her close relatives are his/her grandparents and their offspring.
If there are no inheritors cannot be found in the first degree, the members of second degree will be inheritors. In the same way, if there are no inheritors cannot be found in the second degree, the members of third degree will be inheritors.
Surviving inheritors in the same degree of closeness to the deceased in the same parental, receive equal shares and there is equality between male and female successors.
In case of several marriages, children born during different marriages will all get the same treatment.
Adopted children are treated the same way as the legitimate natural born children of the deceased.
2. The Surviving Spouse
The surviving spouse shares the inheritance with the consanguineous of the deceased.
His/her portion of inheritance depends with whom he/she has to share the estate.
With the first degree of the deceased, the surviving spouse gets a quarter of the estate.
(Children, grandchildren, adopted child)
With the second degree of the deceased, the surviving spouse gets a half of the estate.
(Father, mother, siblings.)
With the second degree of the deceased, the surviving spouse gets 3/4 of the estate.
(Grandparents, uncle, aunt)
If there are nobody in all degrees, the surviving spouse takes all of the estate.
In order to be an inheritor of the deceased, the spouse must be legally married to the deceased at the same time of his/her death.
3. Wills
A will may be defined as a unilateral legal transaction expressing the intention of a person, made according to the conditions required by law, which becomes effective as of the death of the person.
There’s a number of mandatory conditions that have to be observed when setting up the will.
The persons who is drafting their will has to be of legal age which is 15 years old. The persons who is drafting their will must be of sound mind.
Another condition is that a person making their will must be making it willingly and voluntarily.
A will maker will not be able to fully control all their inheritance. There is a reserved portion of inheritance that the will maker cannot decided on, and the will maker cannot dispose of the reserved portion either.
That it’s not possible to exclude your first level relatives. You can also not exclude your spouse or your second level of relatives, although you can exclude siblings.
There are three types of will.
Official Will: This type of will must be notarized by a consulate general, notary or civil court of peace and two witnesses must also be present at the signing of the will.
Hand Written Will: The will must be signed and written by hand of will maker. The draft date of the will must be written on the paper.
Nuncupative Will: The will can only exist if it is impossible to make any other type of will. If someone is dying without leaving a will and two witnesses have heard the deceased last wishes they can come forward to claim the deceased made a valid nuncupative will. The two witnesses should write down what the deceased wishes where and sign and notify the court. They must do this within one month of deceased death.
4. Inheritance Taxes
If someone dies with assets in Turkey there will usually be inheritance tax to pay in Turkey. The rate varies depending on how much the assets in Turkey. The inheritors need to submit a tax declaration to the tax administration.
For more information you can check the connection.
Attorney Fahrettin Erdem Yildizeli
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