The two-step bequest

A two-step bequest (tweetrapsmaking) is a clause in a will, not the statutory distribution (wettelijke verdeling). The deed provides that one person benefits first and that another person comes next later. Two steps, not one division on the day of death. In the file you make those steps visible: who the first person entitled is, who the next one is, and the sentence from the deed that says so. You do not replace that sentence with the rules of the statutory distribution, not even if the first person is the surviving partner. Ervazo does not read the clause as a synonym for another system.

The first death opens the first question. What does the first person receive, on the basis of which sentence, and which goods fall under it. That question gets a file of its own or a clearly bounded part of its own, with the date of death of the first person who died. You do not already book the second step as if it settles today. The second person has a position of their own, which arises only as the deed says. As long as the deed has not been copied over, that position too remains a pointer to a sentence still to be read. A family story about two steps is not a clause.

The second death opens a second question, in a second file. Who was the first person entitled, what is still there, and what does the deed say about the next person. You do not merge the two deaths into one estate inventory with one reference date. Goods may in the meantime have been used up, sold or still be present. What of that is established you note, with a source, in the file where it belongs. What is not established stays empty. A balance that sets both deaths off against each other in one go hides the clause. Ervazo links the files with a cross-reference and does not pull them into each other.

Keep the deed with both questions, so that nobody has to retell the clause from memory. The two files stay separate. Each death keeps its own reference date. The date of each deed and the name of the notary belong with them. Whether the two-step bequest in this case does what the family thinks, you leave open. Ervazo does not make the clause and gives no advice about the two steps.