I want to disinherit someone. Is that possible?
Your co-pilot in inheritance law
Mag. Nevena Shotekova-Zöchling
Attorney in Vienna · 16 years of legal practice · Inheritance law
A will must not only express your wishes. It must also defend them in court.
Twenty years of silence
A father has two daughters. Since they left home, neither wants any contact with him – for more than twenty years. He wishes for contact. The answer is always the same: none.
At some point he comes to us. He wants a will that reflects this reality.
The law does not only protect children from unfair parents. It also protects parents who are rejected.
At the time, we disinherited both daughters completely – with reasons that were precisely documented and provable. After his death, the daughters sued.
We won. The will held.
The lesson: anyone who refuses contact for decades cannot later rely on the full family inheritance – if the will is done properly.
Millions for animal welfare
A woman with considerable wealth knows exactly what she wants. Her husband is to receive what he is at least entitled to by law: the compulsory share. Everything else – genuinely millions – is to go to an animal welfare organisation.
We drafted the will. After her death, the husband sued. He wanted more.
The compulsory share is a minimum. Not an average, not a compromise.
A spouse cannot demand to be provided for “appropriately”. He can only demand what he is entitled to as a compulsory share. Whoever leaves him that may freely dispose of the rest – even in favour of animals instead of people.
The animal welfare organisation won.
The lesson: you decide where your wealth goes. The law only sets a floor – and it can be calculated precisely.
What you can and cannot do
- Limit someone to the compulsory share: always possible. Children and spouses then receive only half of their statutory share, in cash.
- Disinherit completely: only on the statutory grounds (section 770 of the Austrian Civil Code, ABGB) – for example a serious crime against you, severe emotional suffering inflicted on you in a reprehensible manner, or a gross breach of family law duties. The ground should be stated in the will and be provable.
- Halve the compulsory share: if for a long time there was no closeness between you and your child of the kind usual between parents and children – and you did not cause this yourself (section 776 ABGB).
- Defer the compulsory share: you can order that it only has to be paid up to five years after your death – for example so that your heirs do not have to sell a house immediately.
- Waiver of the compulsory share: during your lifetime someone can voluntarily waive their compulsory share, often in exchange for a settlement payment. This requires a notarial deed.
- Not possible: disinheriting someone because of their lifestyle, choice of partner, religion or mere disappointment.
Why do-it-yourself disinheritances fail so often
- The ground is not one of the statutory grounds – or belongs to a law that has not existed since 2017.
- The ground is stated in the will but cannot be proven after your death.
- Formal defects: wrong witnesses, missing signatures, missing notes.
- A halving of the compulsory share is ordered although the break in contact was also caused by you.
How to proceed
- Talk to us while you can still explain your reasons yourself. After your death nobody can do that for you.
- Document: letters, messages, attempts at contact, witnesses. This is the evidence later on.
- Have the will drawn up in the correct form and kept safely – for example registered in the central will register.
And if you are on the other side: I have been disinherited. Can I do anything? →
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