Even if you live in Morocco, owning property in France can affect your entire inheritance

The case concerns a French woman who died in Morocco in August 2017, where she had her habitual residence. She was survived by her husband, a son from a first marriage, and two other children from her marriage to her spouse.

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The son brought proceedings before the French courts to seek the division of the estate. But a major difficulty arose: the deceased lived in Morocco, and a document signed in 1988 provided that, if she died before her husband, all her assets would be transferred to him.

The wording of this document was particularly important. Any assets still belonging to the wife at the time of her death were to be transferred to her spouse, with the transfer taking effect “one hour before her death.”

The Paris Court of Appeal had drawn a radical conclusion from this: legally, the deceased would therefore no longer have owned any assets at the time of her death, including in France. The French courts were consequently not competent to settle her estate.

The Court of Cassation has now rejected that reasoning.

According to the ruling issued on 20 May 2026, when a person dies with their habitual residence in a country outside the European Union, such as Morocco, the French courts may nevertheless become competent for the entire estate if two conditions are met: the deceased held French nationality and estate assets were located in France at the time of death.

A property in France can change the entire inheritance

To determine this jurisdiction, it is necessary to examine where the assets were actually located at the time of death.

The Court of Cassation held that the document providing for their retroactive transfer to the husband did not make it possible to act as though the deceased had already owned nothing at that moment. The document itself could produce its effects only in the presence of assets existing at the time of death.

The Court of Appeal’s judgment was therefore partially quashed, and the case was referred back to the Versailles Court of Appeal.

The issue goes beyond this one family. A French person may have left France long ago, live in Morocco and die there, without their estate necessarily falling outside the jurisdiction of the French courts. If they still own estate assets in France at the time of death, the French courts may have jurisdiction to rule not only on those assets, but on the entire estate.

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This judicial jurisdiction must not be confused with inheritance taxation: it determines which court can settle the dispute between the heirs, and not, by itself, in which country inheritance tax must be paid.