Making a Will in France: The Complete Guide for Foreigners

Do you need a French will?

You do not always need a French will, but if you own property in France you almost always benefit from one. French law does not oblige anyone to make a will; where there is none, the estate simply passes by the default rules of legal devolution — "the estate is devolved by law to the relatives and the surviving spouse of the deceased" (Article 731 of the Civil Code). A will is the instrument that lets you depart from those default rules, within limits: it is defined as "the act by which the testator disposes, for the time when he will no longer exist, of all or part of his property or of his rights, and which he may revoke" (Article 895 of the Civil Code), and it may modify the legal devolution "subject to respecting the rights of the reserved heirs" (Articles 913 to 919).

For a foreign owner of French property, three things make a French will worth having even where a foreign will already exists. The first is traceability. Every notaire who settles a French estate begins by searching the central register of wills (fichier central des dispositions de dernières volontés, or FCDDV) before drawing up the deed of known heirs (acte de notoriété, Article 730-1 of the Civil Code). A French will deposited with a notaire and registered there will be found; a will sitting in a drawer in another country may never surface. The second is certainty of form: a will drawn up before a French notaire is made in a form French law knows, and cannot later be attacked for failing to meet a French formality. The third is control of the applicable law — a French will is the natural place to record a choice of your national law under the EU Succession Regulation, discussed below.

What a French will cannot do is override forced heirship. If you have children, they are reserved heirs, and a French will can only dispose of the freely disposable portion (quotité disponible) once the reserve is respected (Articles 913 and following of the Civil Code). Making a will does not let you disinherit a child. What it does is let you decide who takes the part you are free to give, appoint an executor (exécuteur testamentaire, Article 1025), name a guardian for a minor child, and — where the family is international — set the framework for which country's law governs your estate. For a couple who own a French holiday home, or an individual who has retired to France, that is usually reason enough.

Types of French will: holographic, authentic and international

French law provides three ordinary forms of will — the holographic will, the will by public act (the authentic will) and the mystic will (Article 969 of the Civil Code) — and, alongside them, the international will created by the 1973 Washington Convention. For a foreign owner the real choice is almost always between the holographic will and the authentic will, with the international will as a useful cross-border option.

The holographic will (testament olographe)

The holographic will is the simplest and cheapest. To be valid it must be "written in full, dated and signed by the hand of the testator", and it is "subject to no other form" (Article 970 of the Civil Code). It costs nothing to make, needs no notaire and no witnesses, and can be kept entirely private. Those are real advantages, but they come with real risks. Because it is secret, a holographic will can easily be lost or destroyed, and because it is often written without advice it can be annulled for a defect of substance or of form. The standard protection is to deposit the holographic will with a notaire and have it registered at the central register of wills, so that it will be found and preserved. The document is fragile in a physical sense too: the courts have treated the loss of the three signed originals of a holographic will as a case of force majeure allowing the legatees to prove their status from photocopies (Cass. civ. 1re, 31 March 2016, no. 15-12773). The whole document must be in the testator's own handwriting — a will typed or printed and merely signed is not a valid holographic will.

The authentic will (testament authentique)

The authentic will, also called the will by public act, is "received by two notaires or by one notaire assisted by two witnesses" (Article 971 of the Civil Code). The testator dictates it; the notaire writes it down (by hand or mechanically) and then reads it back to the testator (Article 972). It is signed by the testator in the presence of the witnesses and the notaire — and, if the testator declares that they cannot sign, the deed records that declaration and its cause — and it is then signed by the witnesses and the notaire (Articles 973 and 974). These formalities are strict on pain of nullity. The witnesses are controlled: neither the legatees, nor their relatives or relatives by marriage up to the fourth degree, nor the clerks of the instrumenting notaire, may act as witnesses (Article 975 of the Civil Code).

The reward for that formality is strength. As a public act the authentic will has probative force, so it is harder for disappointed heirs to contest; it is preserved among the notaire's records and publicised at the central register; and a universal legatee named by an authentic will is dispensed from the formality of being put in possession (envoi en possession) that a holographic will can require. In some situations the authentic form is not just advisable but compulsory — for example, where the testator wants to deprive the surviving spouse of the life right to occupy the home (Article 764 of the Civil Code) or to acknowledge a child (Article 316). For a foreign owner who expects the will to be scrutinised, the authentic will is the safer instrument.

The mystic and international wills

The mystic will (testament mystique, Article 976 of the Civil Code) is a secret will, written by the testator or a third party, then handed in a sealed envelope to a notaire in the presence of two witnesses, who draws up a certificate of subscription on the envelope. It keeps the content secret while giving a date-certain, but it is very rarely used, and a person who cannot read may not make one (Article 978). The international will was created by the Washington Convention of 26 October 1973, ratified by France and in force there since 1 December 1994. It is valid whatever the country in which it was drawn up, whatever the nationality or domicile of the testator, and wherever the assets are situated; it may be written, typed or printed, by the testator or a third party, in any language. In France, notaires are competent to receive it (French diplomatic and consular agents for French nationals abroad). Its cross-border validity makes it a sensible choice where an estate straddles several countries, and the courts have even saved a defective authentic will by recognising it as a valid international will where the Convention's formalities were met (Cass. civ. 1re, 12 June 2014, no. 13-18383). Beyond these ordinary forms, French law also recognises exceptional "privileged" wills dictated by particular circumstances — for the military, in an epidemic, or during a sea voyage (Articles 981 and following) — but these are of no practical relevance to estate planning.

Requirements for a valid will

A French will has to satisfy two separate sets of requirements: the conditions of substance common to all gifts, and the conditions of form of the particular type of will chosen. A will that meets the form but not the substance is as void as one that meets the substance but not the form.

On substance, a will, like any lifetime or death-time gift, requires that "the will of the testator be sound, free and enlightened" (Articles 901 and 1129 of the Civil Code) and that its content be lawful and certain (Article 1128). A will can be attacked for unsoundness of mind (insanité d'esprit) — that is, a significant impairment of the mental faculties of the testator at the time of the act (Article 901) — and the action to have it annulled on that ground prescribes five years, running from the death of the testator. The two people involved must also be legally capable: the testator capable of making a will, and the legatee capable of receiving.

Who can make and receive a will

The general rule is that everyone may dispose and receive by will except those whom the law declares incapable (Article 902 of the Civil Code). A minor under sixteen cannot make a will at all (Article 903); a minor of sixteen or over who is not emancipated may dispose of only half of what an adult could (Article 904). An adult under guardianship (tutelle) may make a will only with the authorisation of the judge or family council, the guardian being unable to assist or represent them (Article 476), whereas an adult under the lighter regimes of curatorship (curatelle) or judicial safeguard may make a will freely. On the receiving side, it is enough to be conceived at the time of the testator's death, provided the child is then born viable (Article 906). Legal persons are more restricted: public bodies need administrative authorisation to accept a legacy, and among private bodies only associations and foundations recognised as being of public utility, religious associations, and associations whose exclusive object is assistance, charity or scientific or medical research may receive legacies (Article 910).

On form, the requirements are those of the chosen will — the testator's own handwriting for the holographic will, the notarial ceremony for the authentic will — and the courts apply them strictly, several of the authentic-will formalities being expressly sanctioned by nullity (Articles 973 and 1001 of the Civil Code). This is why a foreign owner who wants the will to survive challenge is usually better served by the authentic form, where a notaire guarantees that the formalities are met.

Is my UK or foreign will valid in France?

A will made abroad is not automatically void in France. A will that is valid in form under the law of the place where it was made will generally be recognised in France, and a foreign will can dispose of French assets. But recognising the form of a foreign will is a different question from which country's succession law governs the estate — and that is where foreign owners most often come unstuck.

The default is that French-situated assets, and French real estate above all, are governed by French succession law unless the deceased has validly chosen another law. So a English will that leaves "everything to my spouse" can dispose freely of English assets but runs into French forced heirship on the French property: if there are children, their reserved share of the French estate stands, whatever the will says, unless a valid choice of national law has displaced French law. A foreign will is therefore not a way around the reserve; it is simply a will that French law will read, and then apply French devolution rules to the French assets it cannot override.

Two practical points follow. First, a foreign will will not be recorded in the French central register, so a French notaire settling the estate may not know it exists; depositing a French will, or at least ensuring the foreign will is produced, avoids the estate being wound up as if there were no will. Second, where a foreign owner makes a separate French will to deal with the French assets, the two wills have to be coordinated. A later will tacitly revokes the earlier one only to the extent that its dispositions are incompatible (Article 1036 of the Civil Code); a badly drafted "I revoke all previous wills" clause in a new French or foreign will can wipe out dispositions the testator meant to keep. The international will, valid across borders, is often the cleaner solution for an estate that spans two or more countries.

Choosing your national law: the Brussels IV election

The single most useful tool a foreign owner of French property has is the right to choose the law of their nationality to govern their whole estate. Since 17 August 2015 the EU Succession Regulation — Regulation (EU) No 650/2012, often called "Brussels IV" — has governed cross-border successions in the participating member states. By default it makes the law of the deceased's last habitual residence govern the entire succession, but it expressly allows a person to choose, instead, the law of a country of their nationality (EUR-Lex, Regulation 650/2012). Denmark and Ireland do not take part in the Regulation, but for a British, American or other foreign national living in or owning property in France, it is the mechanism that decides which law applies.

That choice — the professio juris — is made in the will, and the will is the only place to make it. A national of a country whose law does not impose forced heirship can, by electing that national law in their French or international will, seek to leave their French estate more freely than French devolution would allow, escaping the children's reserve. This is the reason a French will matters so much for a foreign owner: not because French law demands one, but because the will is where the election lives.

The election is powerful but not absolute. For estates opened since 1 November 2021, French law provides a corrective. Where the deceased, or at least one of their children, is at the time of death a national of an EU member state or habitually resident in one, and the foreign law governing the succession allows no mechanism reserving a share for the children, each child (or their heirs) may take a compensatory levy (prélèvement compensatoire) on the assets located in France at death, so as to be restored to the reserved rights French law would have given them, up to that amount (loi 2021-1109 of 24 August 2021, Article 24; Article 913 of the Civil Code, as amended). In other words, choosing a foreign law that ignores forced heirship does not necessarily defeat a child's reserve where there is an EU connection. The interaction between the choice of national law and this levy is technical, and it has to be decided before the will is signed, not argued over after the death.

Revoking or changing your will

A will can be revoked at any time until death — it is of the essence of a will that you can change your mind. The testator "is always free to revoke his will during his life", and that freedom is a discretionary right that cannot found any action for damages against him (Cass. civ. 1re, 30 November 2004, no. 02-20883). You never sign away the power to make a new will.

Revocation may be express or tacit. Express revocation (Article 1035 of the Civil Code) can result either from making a later will — and, importantly, the later will need not follow the form of the first, so an authentic will can validly be modified by a holographic will deposited with the notaire (Cass. civ. 1re, 9 July 2014, no. 13-18685) — or from a deed drawn up before notaires declaring the change of intention. Tacit revocation, according to the Cour de cassation, can arise from only three causes (Cass. civ. 1re, 8 July 2015, no. 14-18875): the voluntary destruction or alteration of the will; the alienation of the thing bequeathed, which revokes that legacy (Article 1038); and the making of a later, incompatible will. A later will that does not expressly revoke the earlier one annuls only those of its dispositions that are incompatible with the new ones or contrary to them (Article 1036) — so several wills can coexist where their provisions are not in conflict.

Two further points matter in practice. Divorce revokes, by operation of law, the death-time dispositions a spouse made in favour of the other during the marriage, unless the spouse who made them expresses a contrary intention (Article 265 of the Civil Code). And an adult placed under guardianship, who cannot make a will alone, may nonetheless revoke a will made before or after the guardianship was opened without assistance (Article 476). To change a French will, then, the usual course is simply to make a new one — ideally with the same care as the first, and with the new will deposited and registered at the central register so that it, and not a superseded version, is the one the notaire finds.

Legacies and legatees

What a will actually gives away is called a legacy (legs), and the person who receives it is a legatee (légataire). French law distinguishes three categories of legacy (Article 1002 of the Civil Code), and the category decides both what the legatee is entitled to and what share of the estate's debts they must bear. A legacy is a gift the beneficiary is free to accept or refuse; if the beneficiary is not identified, the disposition is not a true legacy but a mere charge on the principal heir.

The universal legacy (legs universel) is the one by which the testator gives one or more persons the whole of the property they leave at death (Article 1003 of the Civil Code). A universal legatee has a vocation to take the entire estate, even though in fact they may take less — where there are reserved heirs, or particular legacies that absorb the estate — or nothing at all. Because they stand in the place of the whole estate, they are liable for its debts (Articles 785 and 1009). Where there are reserved heirs, a universal legatee must ask for delivery (délivrance) of the legacy; where there are none, and in the case of an authentic will, they are seised of right and need not do so (Article 1006).

The legacy under universal title (legs à titre universel) is a gift of a fraction of the property the law allows the testator to dispose of — such as a half or a third, or all the immovables, or all the movables, or a fixed quota of them (Article 1010 of the Civil Code). This legatee takes a defined share, not the whole, and is liable for the estate's debts, legacies and charges in proportion to that share (Article 1012). The particular legacy (legs particulier) is any legacy that is neither universal nor under universal title (Articles 1010 and 1014): it gives a specific, determined or determinable asset — a named property, a sum of money, a life annuity. A particular legatee must demand delivery of the legacy (Article 1014) but, not being an heir, is in principle not liable for the debts of the estate (Article 1024), only for charges accessory to the legacy itself.

One flexibility is worth knowing. Where the estate has been accepted by at least one legal heir, a legatee may, unless the testator provided otherwise, confine their entitlement (cantonnement) to part only of the property left to them (Article 1002-1 of the Civil Code); this partial taking is not treated as a gift by the legatee to the other successors, and the legatee is taxed only on the part they actually take. Two limits bound all of this. A testator cannot bequeath property that is not theirs — a legacy of another's property is void (Article 1021) — and no legacy can encroach on the reserved portion of the reserved heirs; legacies that exceed the freely disposable portion can be cut back by an action to reduce.

Leaving a legacy to charity

A legacy to charity is one of the few ways to give substantially beyond the family with a tax advantage: bequests to recognised public-interest bodies are exempt from French gift and inheritance duty. But not every organisation can receive a legacy, and both the choice of beneficiary and the wording of the gift matter.

French law controls which bodies may accept a legacy (Article 910 of the Civil Code). Any declared association can receive manual gifts without special authorisation; associations declared for at least three years pursuing a philanthropic, educational, scientific, social, humanitarian, sporting, family or cultural purpose may accept lifetime and testamentary gifts, subject to the prefect's power to object where the body is unfit to use the gift for its statutory object; and associations and foundations recognised as being of public utility, together with religious associations, may accept gifts freely, the prefect's power of objection having been removed for them. A legacy can even be left to a foundation that does not yet exist, on condition that it obtains recognition of public utility, provided the application is filed with the competent authority within a year of the death, on pain of nullity of the legacy.

The tax advantage sits in the General Tax Code. Gifts and legacies to public establishments and to bodies recognised as being of public utility whose resources are devoted to works of assistance and charity, to the defence of the natural environment or to the protection of animals, and to declared associations pursuing an exclusive object of assistance and charity, are exempt from transfer duty on gifts and inheritances (droits de mutation à titre gratuit) (CGI Article 795, and in particular its paragraphs 4° and 14°). The exemption is extended, subject to approval, to comparable bodies established in another EU or EEA state (CGI Article 795-0 A). A separate exemption covers the heir or legatee of a work of art, books, collectors' items or documents of high artistic or historical value who gives them to the State within the time allowed for registering the estate (CGI Article 1131).

The exemption also opens a planning route. Because a public-interest body pays no transfer duty, a testator can leave a legacy to such an exempt structure with a charge to deliver to a particular legatee a legacy "net of costs and duties" (Article 1016 of the Civil Code) — the exempt body pays, for the legatee's account, the inheritance duty that would have been due on a direct gift, and keeps the balance. Where the intended beneficiary would otherwise be taxed in the highest brackets — 55% or 60% for distant relatives and unrelated persons — this can leave both the beneficiary and the charity better off than a direct legacy would. It is a technique that only works with precise drafting, which is one more reason to make a charitable legacy in an authentic will and register it.

Frequently asked questions about making a will in France

Do I need a French will if I have a foreign will?

Not strictly, but it is usually wise. A foreign will can dispose of French assets, and a will valid in form where it was made is generally recognised in France. But a foreign will is not recorded in the French central register of wills, so the notaire settling the estate may not find it, and it cannot override French forced heirship on French assets. A French will — deposited with a notaire, registered, and coordinated so it does not accidentally revoke the foreign one under Article 1036 of the Civil Code — is easier to trace and to carry out.

Is a handwritten will valid in France?

Yes. A handwritten, or holographic, will is valid provided it is written in full, dated and signed by the testator's own hand; it is subject to no other form (Article 970 of the Civil Code). It needs no notaire and no witnesses. But it can be lost, destroyed or annulled for a defect, so the sensible course is to deposit it with a notaire and have it registered at the central register of wills. A will that is typed or printed and merely signed is not a valid holographic will.

Can I choose my national law for my French estate?

Yes, through your will. The EU Succession Regulation lets you choose the law of a country of your nationality to govern your whole estate instead of the law of your habitual residence (Regulation 650/2012). A national of a country without forced heirship can use this to leave a French estate more freely. The limit is that, for estates opened since 1 November 2021, an EU-connected child can still take a compensatory levy on French assets to restore their reserved share (Article 913 of the Civil Code, as amended in 2021).

How do I revoke a French will?

A will is revocable at any time until death (Article 895 of the Civil Code). You revoke it expressly by making a later will — which need not follow the form of the first — or by a deed before notaires declaring the change (Article 1035). Revocation can also be tacit, but only in three ways: destroying or altering the will, disposing of the thing bequeathed, or making a later incompatible will (Article 1036). In practice, you change a French will by making a new one and having it registered so it is the version the notaire finds.

What are the types of legacy?

French law recognises three (Article 1002 of the Civil Code). A universal legacy gives the whole estate and carries liability for its debts (Article 1003). A legacy under universal title gives a fraction — a half, all the immovables, and so on — with debts borne in proportion (Article 1010). A particular legacy gives a specific asset, such as a named property or a sum of money, and the legatee is generally not liable for the estate's debts (Article 1014). The category decides both what the legatee receives and what they owe.

Can I leave money to charity in my French will?

Yes, and it can be tax-efficient. Only certain bodies may receive a legacy — associations and foundations recognised as being of public utility, religious associations, and associations whose exclusive object is assistance or charity (Article 910 of the Civil Code). Gifts and legacies to such public-interest bodies are exempt from French transfer duty (CGI Article 795), and a work of art given to the State is likewise exempt (CGI Article 1131). A legacy to an exempt body can even carry a charge to pass an amount on to another beneficiary "net of costs and duties" (Article 1016).

How our French lawyers help with making a will in France

A will that works in one country can misfire in another, and for a foreign owner of French property the stakes are the family home and the estate around it. We advise owners, couples and testators on which form of French will fits their situation, how it sits alongside a foreign will, and how to record a valid choice of national law under the EU Succession Regulation — while making sure the reserved shares of children, and the 2021 compensatory levy on French assets, are properly accounted for. Where a legacy is going to charity, we draft it so the exemption applies and the wording holds.

This article is for general information only. It does not constitute legal advice and does not create a lawyer-client relationship. Whether you need a French will, which form suits you, and how a choice of national law applies depend on your family, your assets and their location. Contact our French lawyers for advice on your situation before acting.