Transfer house ownership to son

Hello,

I hope you can help me a little...

Currently, I live with my wife in a semi-detached house with 2 apartments.

The upper apartment has been vacant since my 3 sons moved out.
The youngest of my sons now wants to move into the upper apartment with his wife.

He also wants to renovate the house (new windows, attic conversion, waterproof the basement from the outside, extension, etc.).

Now to my questions...

How can I transfer the house to my son in the most sensible way?

I have heard that a usufruct right is more sensible than a right of residence.

And that it should not be registered that my son has to provide for our future care (cancellation of nursing care allowance)...

How do you arrange that with the other two siblings?

Will we then be tenants? Free roommates?

Is a right of first refusal useful for us?


Kind regards
Blumennapf

I hope you can help me a little...

Yes and no - only to a limited extent. Legal advice in Germany is exclusively reserved for the legal professions! The only thing users here are allowed/can do is share their experiences; nothing more and nothing less.

How can I most sensibly transfer the house to my son? ...

The most sensible thing is to consult a notary you trust; quite a few do not charge for a brief initial consultation. Present your situation there – no private life situation is transferable – and consider together with the notary how you can meaningfully prepare your retirement. Everything else is, in my opinion, Russian roulette.

Rhenish regards

Hello Blumennapf,

I can only agree with Bauexperte here. Consulting a lawyer / notary / possibly a tax advisor would be sensible in this case.

When reading the headline, the keywords that immediately came to mind were: gift, allowances, gift/inheritance tax, etc. After reading the text, even more question marks appeared: (lifelong) right of residence (with or without rent payment), potential gift/inheritance disputes, for your son the distinction between renovation costs and the gift amount, etc.

In my opinion, this topic is too complex for our community. Here you need professional advice, which you can only get from an expert. Possibly you also have to consult different advisors, since the lawyer/notary does not advise on tax law and the tax advisor looks at everything only from his perspective (taxes).

Hello,

okay, thank you anyway!

It could have been that you might have had some tips and/or experiences to share...

I just didn't want to go to a lawyer, etc. without having informed myself somehow beforehand...

We were at the tax advisor... here the initial consultation was also free... we roughly learned what options there are. For more detailed advice, it would have cost something. But I think it’s money well spent if you do it right :)

Be sure to get GOOD advice and also play through some scenarios (WorstCase):

what if the son dies, the wife as heir lets the wild times begin and a pig moves in...

My answer should be taken seriously, as there have been situations in my parents' circle of acquaintances where the dignified father no longer felt comfortable "under his roof" after a greedy woman moved in upstairs with his son-in-law. Another friend of my father is also being bullied by his daughter out of his house.
People can be horrible or become horrible!