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The Heritage Rights of Foreign Country Citizens
When a foreign person who is a resident of Turkey dies, then the rules regarding inheritance apply under the ‘Law on International Special Rights and Procedures’
The laws main principle is that where the will or inheritance of the deceased originated, it will be subject to their national law. This applies to movable property (cash, savings, jewellery, cars, furniture etc.), while Turkish law applies to immovable property (bricks and mortar).
However for both the movable and immovable property, the law of the place where the property is applies regarding the conditions of the opening, acquisition and division of the heritage.
If the deceased foreigner has no legal or voluntary inheritors at all, and if he does not have a will, all their possessions are left to the Turkish state.
According to Turkish Law of Heritage, holding a right on the inheritance is based on either law or the declared will of the deceased. Legitimate inheritance is when the right is based on law; voluntary inheritance is when the right is based on the will (that is, when a written will or inheritance agreement is present).
In determining the holders of right in inheritance the first condition is whether the deceased has declared his own wish. If the deceased has no written will, the holders of right are determined in accordance with the legal principles as set out below:
1. The first rank heirs of the deceased are their descendants (children, grandchildren, great grandchildren etc.). The children are heirs in equal share and have no superiority over each other.
2. If there isn’t anybody in the line of descendants, then the heirs are the parents.
3. If the parents are dead, then the heirs become their children (the deceased’s brothers and sisters).
4. In the case where the deceased have no descendants, their parents are dead and they have no siblings, then the heirs are the grandparents.
5. If the grandparents are dead too, then the heirs are their children (the deceased’s uncles and aunts).
6. The surviving spouse gets a share according to the relative group he or she is in. According to this:
a. If the surviving spouse is an heir with the descendants (the children), ¼ of the inheritance goes to the surviving spouse and ¾ to the children.
b. If the deceased has no children, the surviving spouse is then an heir with the parents. In this case, ½ of the inheritance goes to the surviving spouse and the balance goes to the parents.
c. If the children and the parents of the deceased are dead, then the surviving spouse is an heir with the grandparents. In this case, the surviving spouse gets part of the inheritance and the grandparents get a share.
d. If the deceased has no descendants, no parents or grandparents, the surviving spouse gets all the inheritance.
In determining the holders of right in inheritance, the first condition is whether the deceased, whose inheritance is in question, has declared his own wish on the subject. If the person who is leaving the inheritance wants to determine the holders of right according to his own wish, he has to clarify his in a written will or an inheritance agreement. In Turkish inheritance law a written will is valid and used quite frequently.
A written will, which is a single-sided legal document, is made in handwriting with the participation of official offices; or in exceptional situations (in cases where there is death risk and when a handwritten or formal will cannot be made), it can be made verbally.
The person who is leaving an inheritance, as a principle, can bequeath his possessions to anybody and in any form he wishes. However, in Turkish inheritance law, a person even via a will cannot remove the right of inheritance of some of his close relatives. Law has taken under protection a certain portion of the share on heritage for some close relatives.
Those heirs, whose shares of heritage are under protection by law, are called ‘heirs with reserved share’ and the portion of heritage is called ‘reserved share’.
The person bequeathing the inheritance has the right and opportunity to save his inheritance as he wishes except the reserved share of the heirs with reserved share. If the written will violates the reserved share of the limited number of heirs with reserved share, it will be subjected to reduction in the ratio of portion that is violated. That is, the written will is valid for the rest of the portion apart from that reserved share of the heir with reserved share.
If the person bequeathing the inheritance has violated the reserved share of the heirs with reserved share, the heir whose reserved share is violated can object to the written will and ask for it to be allocated to him. In such a case, the court will first determine if the heir is one with reserved share, then calculate the reserved share; and if the written will violates that reserved share the violating part will be amended and that portion will be given to the heir with reserved share.
Heirs with reserved shares are the descendants of the person bequeathing the inheritance (their children, grandchildren, great grandchildren etc.), their parent’s siblings and spouses.
The reserved share consists of the following portions:
1. For the descendants, half of the share of the descendants.
2. For the parents, ¼ of their share.
3. For siblings, 1/8 of their share.
4. For the surviving spouse the reserved share is: if the spouse is an heir with the descendants or the group of parents, then it is the entire legal share of inheritance, and in other cases it is ¾ of the legal share.
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