- If a person (“deceased”) dies without a Will, his/her deceased estate (the assets s/he owned at time of death) will be distributed in terms of the Intestate Succession Act (“Act”). This is also known as the rules of intestate succession.
- Due to there being no Will setting out the deceased’s wishes, the Act sets out certain rules in respect of how the deceased estate must be distributed to his/her heirs (persons who will receive the deceased’s assets).
- The Act aims to distribute the deceased estate to close relatives first (in a specific order), for example:
• If the deceased is survived by only a spouse, the spouse will inherit his/her entire deceased estate. The term “spouse” also includes a same-sex civil union in terms of the Civil Union Act, a spouse in a religious marriage and polygamous spouses in terms of customary marriages. A spouse does not include a partner in a cohabitation relationship.
• If the deceased did not have a spouse and is only survived by his/her children, then his/her children will inherit the deceased estate in equal shares.
• If the deceased is survived by a spouse and children, then the spouse will receive a child’s share or R 250 000, whichever is the greater amount, and the children will receive equal shares of the balance of the deceased estate.
• If the deceased did not have a spouse or children, his/her parents, aunts/uncles and/or siblings will inherit from his/her deceased estate.
• If the deceased did not have a spouse, children, parents, aunts/uncles and siblings, his/her relatives most closely related to him/her will inherit in equal shares.