Defensive offer, or have house prices become so expensive?

You’re not just exchanging that. You’re also exchanging for cash! Besides: suddenly it’s valuable here? I thought it was just highly rated?! Even if suddenly valuable: sell for 2 million, build/buy a nice house for 500k and live a nice life with 1.5 million... I don’t understand the problem at all. You make it sound in this post like you’d have to sell the palace because of the tax and live in the basement and the difference would be confiscated... such nonsense.

However, such nonsense. I built my own house and am paying it off. I’ll put it this way: in case of an inheritance, I definitely don’t want to sell. I could immediately get rid of the property for the money. But money is worth nothing. Look around, you can get some everywhere and tomorrow you’ll only get half a loaf of bread for it. So selling would be stupid. The plan was renting - but for this the property is way too highly valued, because more than 15 to 20k won’t likely be achieved in rent per year. When would I have paid off the inheritance tax? In 10 years? I’ll be dead sooner and the next one will have the problem again.

There is not only the alternative of cash or an overvalued property. You can use the cash to invest elsewhere, whether in the stock market, another property, gold, Bitcoin, or collectible whisky. With a valuation of more than 100 annual cold rents (if the numbers are really correct), I would definitely set my emotions aside and sell the thing.

If the valuation is more than 100 annual cold rents (if the figures are really correct), I would definitely set aside my emotions and sell the thing.

Why? I'm attached to it. My sister is too. Besides, their grandchildren could live there later if they want to. Why should I have to sell the property to buy a worse one? That seems absurd to me.

Why? I'm attached to it. My sister is too. Besides, their grandchildren could live there later if they want to.
Why should I have to sell the property in order to buy a worse property? That seems absurd to me.

If you haven't been to the tax advisor yet, you should do so as soon as possible. There are certainly options if the current parent wants to consistently minimize the inheritance taxes for you. My mother, for example, does not want that, which is completely fine, it's her house and she earned it.

I once read that parents use the exemptions fully during their lifetime to transfer the property to the child piece by piece. Of course, you have to start early with that

, I’ll quote myself :)

Why? I'm attached to it. My sister is too. Besides, their grandchildren could live there later if they want to. Why should I have to sell the property to buy a worse property? To me, that is absurd.

How do you define better and worse? Financially speaking, a property is already highly valued at 40-50 years of cold rent; in the range of 100 years' rent, it is definitely overvalued. Financially, a property is good when it has a favorable ratio of price to cash flow (rental income or tenant savings, both minus maintenance). If you say you only get €15,000 per year in rent from a property worth €1.5-2 million, then from a financial perspective, that is a very bad property.

Of course, you can also ignore the financial aspect and regard the property as a hobby. I recognize certain tendencies in you for this ("I'm attached to it," "the grandchildren could live there"). Then good and bad are naturally determined by other things, such as a beautiful garden, a pretty facade, or the memory of having your sandbox there as a child. Viewing it as a hobby will cost you so much money, however, that inheritance tax will no longer be your biggest problem. And basically, you have to ask yourself whether the dreams are realistic. Do your children even want to live there someday, or are they drawn somewhere else? When would that even be? Can you live with the idea that for 15 years a stranger will live in the house in the meantime?

So you don’t misunderstand me, I find being attached to one's own home acceptable within certain limits. But everything except the owner-occupied home should be measured against the requirements for an investment. One should not extend the hobby mentality to other properties, especially if one cannot really afford it ("we don’t have money for the inheritance tax").