Last Will and Testament

zak023 said:

Is a Last Will and Testament drawn up in the USA ammended to include Dominican holdings valid in the DR ? Is it a matter of having to do it all over again in Spanish ? Or just added on to the original document?

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Have a knowledgeable attorney review your will to see if it is in compliance with Dominican law. The fact that it is in English is not a problem, but there are certain things that the will must contain.

I am not an attorney, however, my wife and I had Fabio Guzman, the attorney who answers questions in this section, review our will. Even though it was in English, he said it met the conditions necessary for a will to be valid in the DR.

I too have been dealing with Guzman Ariza & Asociados recently. As far as I am aware, `foreign' wills and testaments are recognised in the DR, but they are still bound by the laws of the DR. For example, if you hold real estate as an individual and not a corporation, your estate will be subject to the `forced heirship' laws of the DR whereby you have to apportion a certain percentage of your estate to your heirs (depending on how many you have....). You cannot just leave 100% of your estate to your partner as you would in the US or UK.

I am arriving from the UK shortly and shall be arranging for Guzman Ariza to draw me up a will as I don't currently have one drawn up at all. If I did already have one I too would ask Guzman Ariza to check over it for me to put my mind at rest.