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3.0 Law On Succession
3.0 Law On Succession
▪ Succession opens at the end of the ten year period from the
disappearance of an absentee, or five year period if the
absentee was 75 of age when he disappeared.
Note: Upon reappearance, absentee can recover his properties except fruits and rents thereto.
Types of Succession (Art. 778 of NCC)
▪ Right of Possession
• Executor or administrator has the right of possession when it is
necessary to the payment of debts and expenses;
• Heirs have the right of possession, in the absence of that
necessity, without depriving the co – heirs;
When Vested to the Heirs
▪ Right of Ownership
• The heirs become the co-owner of the estate after paying the
debts;
▪ Requisites of redemption:
▪ Requisites:
• The succession has not yet been opened;
• The object of the contract forms part of the inheritance;
• The promisor has, with respect to the object, an
expectancy of a right which is purely hereditary in nature.
Future Properties
• General rule: The will covers only properties of the testator at the
time of the making of the will.
▪ The will is valid if it complies with the requirements provided under Art. 805
except when there is bad faith, forgery, fraud, or undue and improper
pressure and influence.
Forms of Wills
2. Holographic Will – a will that is entirely written, dated, and signed by the
HAND of the testator himself. It is subject to no other form, may be made in
or out of the Philippines, and need not be witnessed. (Art. 810 of NCC)
❑ Art. 836 – The execution of a codicil referring to a previous will has the effect of
republishing the will as modified by the codicil.
❑ Art. 837 – If after making a will, the testator makes a second will expressly
revoking the first, the revocation of the second will does not revive the first will,
which can be revived only by another will or codicil.
Allowance or Disallowance of Wills
▪ No will shall pass unless it is proved and allowed in accordance with the Rules of Court.
(Art. 838 of NCC):
• Annullable when:
• The cause of the institution of the heirs must be stated in the will;
• The cause must be false;
• It must appear from the face of the will that the testator would
not have made such intention if he had known the falsity of the
cause (Art. 850 of NCC).
Estate Available for Disposition (Art. 851 – 853)
▪ No compulsory heirs – the entire net estate;
▪ With compulsory heirs – free portion;
▪ The value of the inheritance is more than or less than the value of the will –
proportionate increase or decrease in the share of each heir, as the case
,maybe;
▪ (Formula): Actual share of the heir = net estate x Instituted value per heir/ Total
instituted value
LEGITIMES
• he may order the (1) non – partition of not exceeding 20 years; or (2)
the legitime of the other children to whom the property is not assigned
be paid in cash;
LEGITIMES
1. Guilty of an attempt against the life of the testator, his or her spouse, descendants or
ascendants;
2. Groundless accusation of a crime, with imprisonment of more than six years, against the
testator;
3. Convicted of adultery or concubinage with the spouse of the testator;
4. Through vices, it causes the testator to make a will or change a will that is already made;
5. Refusal without justifiable cause to support the testator;
6. Maltreatment through words or deeds of the testator;
7. Leads a dishonorable or disgraceful life;
8. Conviction of crime with penalty of civil interdiction. (Art. 919 of NCC)
Legal Grounds for Disinheritance
(parents or ascendants, legitimate or illegitimate)
1. Abandoned their children or induced their daughters to live a corrupt or immoral life, or
attempted against their virtue;
2. Guilty of an attempt against the life of the testator, his or her spouse, descendants or
ascendants;
3. Groundless accusation of a crime, with imprisonment of more than six years, against the
testator;
4. Convicted of adultery or concubinage with the spouse of the testator;
5. Through vices, it causes the testator to make a will or change a will that is already made;
6. Loss of parental authority;
7. Refusal to support the children or descendants without justifiable cause;
8. An attempt by one of the parents against the life of the other, unless there has been a
reconciliation between them. (Art. 920 NCC)
Legal Grounds for Disinheritance
(Spouse)
1. Guilty of an attempt against the life of the testator, his or her descendants or
ascendants;
2. Groundless accusation of a crime, with imprisonment of more than six years,
against the testator;
3. Through vices, it causes the testator to make a will or change a will that is
already made;
4. Legal separation;
5. Loss of parental authority;
6. Refusal to support the children or descendants without justifiable cause; (Art.
1921 NCC)
Legal or Intestate
Succession
Intestate Succession, Takes Place
1. If a person dies without a will, or with a void will, or one which subsequently lost its validity;
2. When the will does not institute an heir to, or dispose of all the property belonging to the
testator. In such case, legal succession shall take place only with respect to the property
of which the testator has not disposed of;
3. If the suspensive condition attached to the institution of heir does not happen or is not
fulfilled, or if the heir dies before the testator, or repudiates the inheritance, there being no
substitution, and no right of accretion taken place;
4. When the heir instituted is incapable of succeeding, except in cases provided in the NCC;
5. Upon the happening of the resolutory condition imposed in the will;
6. Upon the expiration of a resolutory term stated in the will; and
7. In case of preterition. (Art. 960 of NCC)
Order of Intestate Succession
❑Also known as partial intestacy, means the decedent left a will but
the will does not cover all the disposable portion of the estate.
❑In this succession, the testamentary disposition shall be given effect
first. The balance of the free portion (after deducting the
testamentary disposition) shall be given to the intestate heir.
❑The intestate heir who should have received the free portion under
intestacy shall bear any reduction due to the testamentary
disposition.
Common
Provisions
(Testate or Intestate Succession)
Right of Accretion
❑A right by virtue of which, when two or more persons are called to the
same inheritance, devise or legacy, the part assigned to the one who (1)
renounces or (2) cannot receive his share, or (3) predeceased or who
died before the testator, is added or incorporated to that of his co-heirs,
co-devisees, or co-legatees.
❑The heirs to whom the portion goes by the right of accretion take it in the
same proportion that they inherit.
❑The heirs to whom the inheritance accrues shall succeed to all the rights
and obligations which the heir renounced or could not receive it would
have had.
Limitations on Right of Accretion
❑For the compulsory heirs, right of accretion shall take place only when the free
portion is left to two or more of them, or to any one of them and to a stranger.
❑The right of accretion does not apply to a vacant portion of the legitime. The
co-heirs shall succeed it by their own right.
❑The right of accretion is subordinate to the right or representation, same with
the right of substitution if the testator so provides.
❑In the testamentary succession, when the right of accretion does not take
place, the vacant portion of the instituted heirs, if no substitution has been
designated, shall pass to the legal heirs of the testator, who shall receive it with
the same charges and obligations.
Right of Accretion
❑ Right of accretion in testamentary succession, requisites:
• Two or more persons called to the same inheritance, or to the same portion
thereof, pro indiviso; and
• That one of the persons thus called die before the testator, or renounce the
inheritance, or be incapacitated to receive it.
▪ The unworthy heir has a right to demand indemnity for the expenses he
incurred in the preservation of hereditary rights, and to enforce such
credits as he may have against the estate.
▪ Any person incapable of succession who entered into possession of the
hereditary property shall be obliged to return it together with its
accessions. He shall be liable for all the fruits and rent that he may have
received, or could have received through the exercise of due diligence.
Law and Prescriptive Period
• References:
• New Civil Code of The Philippines;
• Reviewer on Civil Law, Aquino, 2018;