The step-parent and the house

A step-parent does not become owner of the house because he or she lives there. Living there is use. Ownership stands on the title: the Land Registry (Kadaster), the deed of transfer or another document that states the name. In the file you write who is on that document, literally, and you separately write who lived in the house on the day of death. Those two lists can coincide and they can diverge. Ervazo does not put the occupant on the title because the entry would otherwise look uncomfortable. The discomfort is not a transfer of title.

The will can give the step-parent something: a right to go on living there, a legacy, or nothing. Only the deed says that. You do not infer it from the years someone took the children to school. The matrimonial property regime can also affect the ownership, if the step-parent was married to the deceased and the deed or the date brings that along. Even then the source is the deed or the date, not the fact of living together. Note the regime as a line of its own beside the registered names. Three sources remain three sources: title, will, regime.

Children of the deceased do not become co-owners because their step-parent lives there, and the step-parent does not become a co-owner because the children are heirs. Every name on the deed of transfer goes onto the entry for the house. A name that is missing you do not add from the population register. The population register says who was registered there, not who the owner is. Keep a recent document from the Land Registry, or the deed, with the home. Put the date of that document with it. An old feeling that the house belonged to the family is neither title nor a share.

Who may go on living there is a further question and is not the same as the title. That question follows from the will, from the regime or from a decision, not from the key someone holds. The names on the deed of transfer remain the list for the title, even if a step-parent receives the mail. Note the key if need be as a practical fact. It is not a deed. Ervazo makes no transfer and no will.