A Spanish Apartment Needs a Spanish Probate Too

If your mother owned a flat in Spain, the short version of what happens to a property abroad when the owner dies is this: the UK grant of probate you obtain here has no legal force over that flat, and the family will almost certainly have to run a separate succession process in the country where the property sits. Two administrations, on two timetables, in two languages, usually with two sets of professionals to pay. The UK process deals with everything owned here; the Spanish process deals with the flat.

That is the part people are not warned about. A UK will can appoint executors and say who inherits, but a foreign country applies its own rules to land within its borders, and some of those rules can override what the will says. Many civil-law countries — Spain, France, Italy and others — reserve a fixed share of an estate for children or a spouse under what are called forced heirship rules, whatever the will intended. So the question is not only "do you need probate in two countries", but "whose law actually decides who gets the flat".

There is better news on tax. Owning property abroad rarely means the same value is taxed twice over. The UK may tax the worldwide estate of someone connected to the UK, but relief is available for tax paid abroad on the same asset, so the two systems are meant to dovetail rather than stack. The catch is the paperwork and the fees, which genuinely do double. This article walks through the parallel process, the heirship trap, and the tax relief that stops a double charge.

The short answer: a UK grant stops at the border

A grant of probate is an authority issued under the law of England and Wales, and its writ runs only as far as that law does. It lets the executors deal with bank accounts, investments and property held here. It does not, and cannot, compel a foreign land registry to transfer a flat in another country, because that registry answers to its own national law, not to an English court.

So a foreign property has to be dealt with under the succession law of the country it sits in. In much of Europe that means engaging a notary — a public official with a central role in civil-law inheritance that has no exact equivalent here — who oversees the transfer of the property to whoever is entitled under that country's rules. The UK administration and the foreign one proceed in parallel, each needing its own documents and its own decisions.

The practical effect is that the family is running two projects at once. Neither waits for the other, and the foreign one often takes longer, because it may not begin in earnest until certified and translated copies of the UK paperwork have been produced and accepted abroad.

Why a second, parallel probate is usually needed

The reason there is no shortcut is that land is the one asset a country almost always insists on governing itself. Movable assets like bank balances can sometimes be released on the strength of a foreign grant, but immovable property — a flat, a house, a plot of land — is treated as belonging to the legal system of the place it stands in. That principle is old and near-universal, and it is why a second process is the norm rather than the exception.

What that second process looks like varies. In Spain it typically runs through a notary, with an acceptance of inheritance deed and registration at the local land registry. In France a notaire handles the whole succession. In common-law countries such as Ireland or Australia there may be a separate grant to obtain, closer in feel to the UK process. The one constant is that you cannot simply present the English grant and expect the property to transfer.

Because the foreign process is unfamiliar, it is also where families lose time. Documents have to be gathered to the local standard, identities proved to the local satisfaction, and taxes settled locally before the property can move. Starting that strand early, rather than after the UK grant is finished, is the main thing within your control.

Forced heirship: the will may not have the last word

This is the trap that catches British families hardest. In the UK you can, broadly, leave your estate to whomever you choose. Many other countries do not work that way. Under forced heirship, a fixed proportion of the estate — often a large one — is reserved by law for the deceased's children, and sometimes a spouse, and a will cannot cut them out of that reserved share. A UK will that leaves the Spanish flat entirely to one person may simply not be enforceable against children who are entitled to a slice under local law.

There is a route through it in much of the European Union. Succession rules there allow a person to choose, in their will, that the law of their nationality should govern their estate rather than the law of their residence. A British owner who made that choice can, in many cases, have UK freedom of disposition applied to the foreign property. But the choice has to have been made properly, in the will, while the person was alive; it is not something the family can elect after the death.

Where a mortgage is also secured on the overseas property, the picture gets more tangled still, because the debt and the reserved shares interact. We deal with that specific combination separately in the Spanish apartment, the mortgage and forced heirship. The general lesson is the same: never assume the UK will controls a foreign home until a lawyer in that country has confirmed it does.

Two sets of professionals, and two sets of fees

A cross-border estate is one of the few situations where you genuinely do pay twice for the same event. On the UK side you have a solicitor or you handle the grant yourselves. On the foreign side you need a local lawyer or notary who works in that country's system and language, because the UK adviser cannot act there. The two do not replace each other; they run side by side, and the family foots both bills.

Around those two advisers sit a set of smaller, unavoidable costs. Documents produced in England — the death certificate, the grant, the will — usually have to be legalised with an apostille and then officially translated before a foreign authority will accept them. There may be local property taxes to pay before the transfer completes, foreign registration fees, and currency costs each time money moves between countries. None of these is enormous on its own, but together they add up, and they arrive at a point when the estate's UK cash may still be locked up.

That cashflow squeeze is worth planning for. The foreign process often demands money — for taxes and fees abroad — before the UK estate has been distributed, and before any UK property has sold. Families sometimes have to fund the overseas costs personally and reclaim them from the estate later, which is smoother if there is liquidity somewhere in the picture rather than everything tied up in bricks.

Inheritance tax in two places — and the relief that stops it doubling

The fear most people have is being taxed twice on the same flat: once by the foreign country and once by HMRC. In practice the system is built to prevent exactly that. Where the deceased was within the scope of UK inheritance tax, HMRC looks at the worldwide estate, the overseas property included. But if the other country has charged its own death or succession tax on that same property, relief is given for it, either under a double taxation agreement between the two countries or, where there is no agreement, as unilateral relief.

The result is normally that you pay the higher of the two charges rather than the sum of both. To claim the relief, the estate has to prove the foreign tax was paid, which is why keeping every foreign receipt and assessment matters so much. Lose the paperwork and you can end up unable to evidence a relief you were entitled to.

Source: gov.uk / HM Revenue & Customs, How Inheritance Tax works: double taxation relief on foreign assets, Open Government Licence v3.0.

Whether the UK taxes the worldwide estate at all depends on the deceased's connection to the UK, and the rules governing that connection have been changing, so this is a point to confirm rather than assume. The relief for foreign shares and other overseas assets works on the same principle as it does for property — the value counts, but foreign tax already paid is credited. If part of the estate is a home passing to children or stepchildren, the usual UK allowances still apply to the estate as a whole.

The paperwork: apostilles, translations and currency

Cross-border estates run on documents, and the documents have to be in a form the foreign authority trusts. An apostille is an internationally recognised certificate, obtained in the UK, that confirms a public document is genuine so another country will accept it. Death certificates, the grant and often the will typically need one, followed by a certified translation into the local language. Skipping a step usually means the foreign notary hands the papers straight back.

Practical friction shows up in other places too. Bank accounts abroad may be frozen on notification of death, just as they are here, so any income the property generated — rent, for instance — can become inaccessible for a while. Assets held in less tangible forms, such as cryptocurrency with no seed phrase to unlock it, can turn out to be effectively lost across a border where no local process can reach them. The unifying theme is that distance and language turn small administrative tasks into slow ones.

Build the delay into your expectations from the start. If the estate needs money to move at the pace the foreign process demands, and everything is tied up in the property itself, that is precisely the bind a life policy is designed to relieve. If there is no cover and this estate has shown the family how exposed an overseas asset can leave them, you can get life insurance quotes and let an FCA-authorised broker size it against the real position.

Scotland and Northern Ireland

The border principle cuts both ways within the UK too. A Scottish confirmation, like an English grant, has no automatic force over property in another country, so a Scottish family with a flat in Spain faces the same parallel-succession problem. Equally, a grant issued in England will not by itself deal with a house in Scotland, which is a separate question we cover elsewhere in the cluster. Our guide on small estate confirmation in Scotland and the sheriff clerk sets out how the Scottish process works for estates administered north of the border.

In Northern Ireland the grant is obtained through the Probate Office, and it too stops at the national border when a foreign property is involved. Wherever in the UK the estate is being administered, the overseas flat is governed by the law of the country it stands in, and the double taxation relief that prevents a double charge applies across the whole of the UK in the same way. Our full guide to probate, the estate and inheritance tax covers the domestic side in more depth.

Frequently asked questions

Do you need probate in two countries?

Usually yes, where property is owned abroad. A UK grant has no automatic effect over foreign land, so a local succession process is generally required in the country where the property sits. It runs alongside the UK administration and on an entirely different timetable, and it typically involves a local lawyer or notary rather than the solicitor handling the estate here.

Can a UK will deal with an overseas property?

Sometimes, but not always. Many countries apply forced heirship rules that reserve a share of property for children or a spouse regardless of what a will says, and some allow the owner to choose the law of their nationality instead, if that choice was made in the will. Take advice in both jurisdictions before assuming a UK will covers a foreign home in full.

Will the family be taxed twice?

Not usually on the same value. The UK taxes the worldwide estate of someone within its inheritance tax net, but relief is available for tax paid abroad on the same asset, either under a double taxation agreement or as unilateral relief. In effect the estate tends to bear the higher of the two charges rather than both. Keep every foreign tax receipt so the relief can be evidenced.