Reading a marital property agreement

A marital property agreement (huwelijkse voorwaarden) is a notarial deed. It prevails over the statutory starting point, whether that is the full community of an older marriage or the limited community from 2018. Two facts come first in the file: the date on which the deed was executed, and the place where the document lies. The place can be a notary's protocol, a safe or a folder at home. Without those two facts a story about complete separation of property is only a story. Ervazo does not summarise the terms from an heir's memory. The program keeps the deed or the statement that the deed is still missing.

You take the contents from the paper, article by article where it matters for this estate inventory. A periodic settlement clause, a final settlement or an exclusion of a business is in it only if the deed says so. You do not fill in a standard clause because many people know that clause. What you have not read remains an open point with a task: request the deed. A summary someone put on a note years ago may serve as a pointer to the deed, not as the deed itself. Mark on that note that it is not a source for the contents.

Amendments belong with it. The terms may later have been amended by a new deed. The latest deed and the earlier deeds both remain findable, each with its own date. You do not replace the old text with a memory of a conversation at the notary. Also note whether the terms were entered in the matrimonial property register, if you have that fact, and where you got it. If you do not have it, you check rather than ticking it. An entry in the register is a fact beside the deed, not a replacement of the text.

Until the deed has been read, you work with an open regime and with the date of the marriage as the only certain fact if that date is known. A memory of the contents does not count as a reading. You do not divide the house and the accounts as if you already know the terms. Where the deed can be found stays in the file. Ervazo does not make the deed and gives no reading of clauses that have not been entered.