Your husband or wife has just died in the house you shared in France. You are British, you live here since Brexit, and the first question that keeps you awake is brutally practical: can anyone force you out of your own home? The children of your spouse, perhaps from a first marriage, are asking about their share. The notaire (the French public officer who settles estates) is talking about an indivision (joint ownership between heirs). And you have received, or fear, a tax bill. This guide answers each of those questions in order, with the exact French rules, the court decisions that interpret them, and the steps that protect you. Every French legal term is explained the first time it appears, so you can use this page directly in your discussions with the notaire and with your family.

Here is the short version before the detail. French law gives the surviving spouse (conjoint survivant) two powerful housing rights over the family home: a free right to stay for the first year after the death, which nobody can take away, and a lifelong right of habitation (droit viager au logement) that you must claim within one year of the death. As a spouse you also pay no French inheritance tax on what you receive, and you can ask the court to allocate the house to you in the partition (attribution préférentielle). But none of this is automatic in practice: the lifelong right must be affirmatively claimed within twelve months, mere silence and staying put are not enough in the eyes of the Cour de cassation (the supreme court for civil matters), and the value of these rights counts against your share of the estate. Read on for the complete picture, including how to challenge an eviction attempt or an inflated bill.

I. Staying in your French home after your spouse dies: the one-year free right and the lifelong right

The death of your spouse does not make you a stranger in your own house. French succession law builds a two-storey protection for the surviving spouse who lived in the home: a first year that is free and unconditional, then a lifelong right that lasts until your own death but must be claimed in time. Understanding the boundary between the two is the single most important thing in this guide, because confusing them is how surviving spouses lose rights they did not know they had to ask for.

A. Can I stay in the house free of charge for the first year after the death?

Yes. If, at the time of the death, you as the surviving spouse entitled to inherit (conjoint successible) were genuinely occupying, as your main home, a dwelling that belonged to the couple or depended entirely on the estate, you have by operation of law, for one year, the free use (jouissance gratuite) of that dwelling, together with the furniture in it that forms part of the estate. That is the rule of article 763 of the Civil Code, and its wording is worth reading in full: “Si, à l’époque du décès, le conjoint successible occupe effectivement, à titre d’habitation principale, un logement appartenant aux époux ou dépendant totalement de la succession, il a de plein droit, pendant une année, la jouissance gratuite de ce logement, ainsi que du mobilier, compris dans la succession, qui le garnit.”

Three features of this first-year right matter enormously in a British-French family. First, it applies “de plein droit”, which means automatically: you do not have to ask for it, the heirs cannot vote it down, and the notaire cannot make it conditional on signing anything. If you were living in the house as your main residence when your spouse died, the right exists. Second, where your housing was provided through a tenancy or through a dwelling partly owned in undivided shares by the deceased, the rents or the occupation payment are reimbursed to you by the estate during that year, as they are paid. So even if the legal set-up is awkward — a lease in the deceased’s sole name, or a house owned partly by your late spouse and partly by someone else — the estate carries the housing cost for twelve months. Third, and most strikingly, the statute declares, in that same article 763, that “Les droits prévus au présent article sont réputés effets directs du mariage et non droits successoraux”, and that the article is a matter of public policy (ordre public). In plain English: the first-year right is treated as a direct effect of the marriage itself, not as an inheritance benefit, and no will, no marriage contract, no family agreement can remove it. A testator who writes a clause purporting to deprive the spouse of the first-year right achieves nothing.

In practice, what should you do during that first year? Live normally, keep evidence that the house is your main home, and use the twelve months as a protected window to organise the rest. Keep utility bills, taxe d’habitation or taxe foncière notices, insurance certificates and any correspondence in your name at that address. If a stepchild or a co-heir tells you to leave or to start paying rent, answer in writing that you rely on the one-year free right under article 763, send the letter by recorded delivery, and show it to the notaire. Do not sign any document presented as a waiver of your rights — an acte de notoriété (the notarial deed that lists the heirs) sometimes contains pre-printed statements about which rights you claim, and you should never sign it without understanding every line. And above all, do not let the year expire without deciding on the second, lifelong right described below, because the Cour de cassation counts that year strictly, as the decisions quoted in the next section show.

One common British worry needs clearing up at this stage: does Brexit change any of this? No. These housing rights depend on your marriage and on occupying the home in France, not on nationality or on European Union membership. Whether you hold a Withdrawal Agreement residence card, a long-stay visa, or dual French-British nationality, article 763 protects you identically. Where Brexit does matter is around the edges — which national law governs the succession as a whole, and how United Kingdom assets and United Kingdom tax interact — and those points are covered in Part II. For the roof over your head in the first twelve months, your British passport changes nothing.

Another frequent question is what happens when the house is not fully owned by the couple — for instance, a property your late spouse owned with siblings, or a house subject to a mortgage. The first-year right still covers dwellings “dépendant totalement de la succession”, meaning homes that fall entirely within the estate, and the reimbursement mechanism covers rented or partly-owned situations. The mortgage itself is a separate matter: the monthly repayments are a debt of the estate or of the surviving co-borrower according to the loan contract and any mortgage protection insurance (assurance emprunteur) often repays the balance on death. Ask the bank immediately for the insurance position, because that determines whether the heirs inherit a house with or without its loan.

B. Can I stay in the house for the rest of my life, and what must I do within one year?

Yes, provided you claim it in time. Alongside the automatic first-year right, French law offers the surviving spouse a lifelong right of habitation over the dwelling, plus a right of use (droit d’usage) over the furniture in it: this is the droit viager au logement, the “lifelong dwelling right”. Article 764 of the Civil Code grants it to the surviving spouse who was genuinely occupying the dwelling as a main home at the time of the death, where the dwelling belonged to the spouses or depended entirely on the estate, and it lasts until the surviving spouse’s own death. Note the opening reservation, however: “Sauf volonté contraire du défunt exprimée dans les conditions de l’article 971”. Unlike the first-year right, the lifelong right can be removed by the deceased — but only by a will made in the strictest form, the testament par acte public, which article 971 defines as a will “reçu par deux notaires ou par un notaire assisté de deux témoins”, received by two notaries or by one notary assisted by two witnesses. An English-style signed will, a French handwritten (olographe) will, or a mere letter cannot validly deprive you of the lifelong right. If your late spouse made an English will leaving “everything to my children”, that clause does not remove your French lifelong habitation right, though it may affect the ownership shares, as Part II explains.

The decisive practical point is the deadline. Article 765-1 of the Civil Code states it in a single sentence: “Le conjoint dispose d’un an à partir du décès pour manifester sa volonté de bénéficier de ces droits d’habitation et d’usage.” You have one year from the death to make known your wish to benefit from these rights of habitation and use. Miss that year, and the lifelong right is lost. The Cour de cassation applies this time limit with real strictness, and two decisions you should know frame exactly what counts as a valid manifestation of your wish.

In the leading ruling, the First Civil Chamber held on 2 March 2022 (pourvoi no 20-16.674) that “le conjoint survivant dispose d’un an à partir du décès pour manifester sa volonté de bénéficier de son droit viager au logement.” The surviving spouse has one year from the death to manifest the wish to benefit from the lifelong dwelling right. Crucially, the Court added: “Si cette manifestation de volonté peut être tacite, elle ne peut résulter du seul maintien dans les lieux.” Even though the expression of that wish may be tacit, it cannot result from merely staying in the property. In that case a widow who had simply remained in the former couple’s house, and only expressly claimed the right years later in court filings, was held to have no lifelong right: staying put, without more, within the year, was not enough.

The companion decision shows what is enough. On 13 February 2019 (pourvoi no 18-10.171), the same Chamber quashed an appeal ruling that had denied the right to a widow, holding: “Qu’en statuant ainsi, alors qu’elle avait constaté que Mme T…, qui s’était maintenue dans les lieux et avait précisé, dans l’assignation délivrée à M. Y… le 19 octobre 2007, son souhait de conserver l’appartement, avait déclaré, dans un projet d’acte de notoriété établi avant toute opposition de son cohéritier, confirmer sa volonté de bénéficier de son droit viager au logement, ce dont il ressortait qu’elle avait manifesté tacitement sa volonté dans le délai requis, la cour d’appel, qui n’a pas tiré les conséquences légales de ses constatations, a violé les textes susvisés ;” Staying plus dated written statements of intent within the year — a summons served on the co-heir stating the wish to keep the home, confirmed in a draft acte de notoriété — that combination works.

The lesson for a British surviving spouse is concrete and urgent. Within the first twelve months, send the notaire in charge of the succession an explicit recorded-delivery letter stating that you claim the droit viager au logement under article 764, keep proof of posting and receipt, and repeat the claim in every succession document you sign. Mention it at the first meeting, not the fifth. If relations with stepchildren are tense, do not rely on conversations; write. A short letter in French, even simply worded, with the article number and your signature, is infinitely stronger than years of undisputed occupation followed by a late claim. Ask the notaire to record your claim in the acte de notoriété itself, and keep a copy of everything.

Two further features of the lifelong right deserve attention. First, its value counts against your inheritance share. Article 765 of the Civil Code provides that the value of the habitation and use rights is set off (s’impute) against the value of the succession rights the spouse receives: if the lifelong right is worth less than your inheritance share, you take the balance from the estate assets; if it is worth more, you do not have to compensate the estate for the excess. In many modest estates where the house is the main asset, this means the lifelong right effectively absorbs much of the spouse’s share, leaving the capital value to the children while you keep the home for life — an outcome most couples would consider fair, but one to understand before complaining that “the children get everything”. Second, the right is flexible: article 766 allows the surviving spouse and the heirs to agree to convert the habitation and use rights into a life annuity (rente viagère) or a lump sum of capital, with the approval of the guardianship judge where a minor or protected adult is among the parties. And where the house eventually no longer suits your needs — too large, too isolated, too costly — article 764 itself lets you let the property for non-commercial, non-agricultural use in order to fund new accommodation, by exception to the usual rules on personal habitation rights. Growing old in Dordogne with the right to move into a town flat funded by renting out the farmhouse is precisely the scenario that provision was written for.

II. Owning the house, paying the tax, and challenging a refusal or a bill

Staying in the home is only half the story. The other half is ownership and money: what share of the French house you actually inherit under forced heirship rules, what tax you pay as a surviving spouse, how the partition can allocate the house to you, and what to do when someone — a co-heir, an estate agent valuing the property, or the tax office — puts an unfair document in front of you. This second part moves from shelter to substance.

A. Will I inherit the house itself, and what choices do forced heirship rules leave me?

French law does not let a parent disinherit children: each child has a minimum guaranteed share called the réserve héréditaire (the reserved portion), and only the remainder, the quotité disponible (the freely disposable portion), can be given to anyone you choose. For a British spouse this is often a shock, because English law starts from testamentary freedom. In France, where your late spouse leaves children, your own inheritance right as surviving spouse is defined by article 757 of the Civil Code: “Si l’époux prédécédé laisse des enfants ou descendants, le conjoint survivant recueille, à son choix, l’usufruit de la totalité des biens existants ou la propriété du quart des biens lorsque tous les enfants sont issus des deux époux et la propriété du quart en présence d’un ou plusieurs enfants qui ne sont pas issus des deux époux.” In English: where the deceased leaves children, you choose between the usufruit (a life interest, the right to use the property and take its income) over all the existing assets, or outright ownership of one quarter where all the children are yours together, and outright ownership of one quarter where at least one child is from another relationship.

Read that carefully if yours is a second marriage or a blended family, the classic British-in-France configuration. Where all the children are the couple’s common children, you have a genuine choice: full life interest in everything, or a quarter in full ownership. Where any child is not the child of both spouses — your spouse’s daughter from a first marriage in England, for example — the life interest over everything is no longer on offer in the same way, and your statutory right is ownership of one quarter, with the children sharing the rest. A will or a marriage contract can improve your position within the limits of the disposable portion, but it cannot remove the children’s reserve. This is why the housing rights in Part I matter so much: even when the capital value largely goes to the children, the lifelong habitation right keeps you in the home.

Which country’s law decides all this for a British family in France? Since Brexit, the answer still runs through the European Succession Regulation No 650/2012, which French courts apply as universal rules: the succession as a whole is governed by the law of the deceased’s last habitual residence, unless the deceased validly chose the law of their nationality in a will or equivalent disposition (professio juris). A valid choice of national law in the will (professio juris) is explained step by step in our companion guide to choosing English law for a French succession, and the practical settlement steps are set out in the official service-public guide to settling an estate. For a Briton habitually living in France, that default points to French law — including the reserve and the housing rights — while a valid choice for English law in the will displaces the French default for the disposable aspects but never removes the French public-policy protections connected with the French home. If your late spouse signed an English will choosing English law without French advice, have a French notaire review how that clause interacts with the French property: the interaction is technical, and it is exactly where cross-border mistakes are made.

Connected to this is the question of your matrimonial property regime, which decides what actually falls into the succession. Many British couples married in England without any contract and assume “English law” governs their property. A very recent decision shows how French courts approach this: on 1 July 2026 (pourvoi no 24-15.575), the First Civil Chamber held that “Par conséquent, la loi de la nationalité étrangère commune de deux époux doit régir, en application du texte précité, le régime matrimonial lorsque les époux n’établissent pas sur le territoire du même État leur première résidence habituelle après le mariage, peu important que l’un des époux ait également la nationalité française.” Dual nationality does not prevent the court from finding a common foreign nationality that points to that State’s law for the matrimonial regime under the 1978 Hague Convention. For a British-French couple, the applicable regime — separation of property, community, or participation — determines whether the house was owned jointly, personally, or through settlement mechanics, and therefore what the “succession” in article 763 even contains. Bring your marriage certificate, any English deed or declaration of trust, and any French marriage contract to the notaire‘s first appointment.

Finally, ownership conflicts after the death usually crystallise in the indivision and its partition (partage). Remember the baseline of article 815: “Nul ne peut être contraint à demeurer dans l’indivision et le partage peut toujours être provoqué” — nobody can be forced to remain in joint ownership, and partition can always be demanded. Any heir, including a stepchild, can therefore force a partition, and a forced sale (licitation) is the ultimate outcome if nobody can buy out the others. Your counterweight is the preferential allocation: article 831-2 of the Civil Code lets the surviving spouse (or any co-owner heir) request “l’attribution préférentielle” of “la propriété ou du droit au bail du local qui lui sert effectivement d’habitation, s’il y avait sa résidence à l’époque du décès, et du mobilier le garnissant”, together with the deceased’s vehicle where needed for everyday life. You can ask the partition to allocate you the house itself, paying a balancing sum (soulte) to the other heirs where the value exceeds your share. Note the boundary set by the courts: on 26 September 2012 (pourvoi no 11-16.246), the Cour de cassation rejected the wife’s appeal, confirming that without surviving-spouse status — in the ruling’s words, “n’ayant pas la qualité de conjoint survivant” — the allocation of the family home in a partition during the marriage is not as of right. The preferential allocation as of right is reserved to the surviving spouse — a spouse partitioning during the marriage cannot claim it. And under article 834, you only become the exclusive owner on the day of the final partition, and you may only renounce the allocation where the property’s value has risen by more than a quarter since the allocation, through no action of yours. If you occupy the house alone while the indivision lasts, the co-heirs may ask for an occupation payment (indemnité d’occupation): article 815-9 states that “L’indivisaire qui use ou jouit privativement de la chose indivise est, sauf convention contraire, redevable d’une indemnité.” The Cour de cassation polices the fairness of that payment — on 12 June 2025 (pourvoi no 23-22.003) it recalled that “Il résulte de ce texte que l’indivisaire qui use ou jouit privativement de la chose indivise est, sauf convention contraire, redevable d’une indemnité”, while quashing a ruling that had charged the payment up to a future partition without reserving the case of an early return of the property to the joint owners. Challenge any occupation bill that runs indefinitely into the future or ignores the periods when the house was genuinely available to all.

B. What tax will I pay as a surviving spouse, and how do I challenge an eviction claim or a tax bill?

The tax answer for a surviving spouse is the best news in this guide: you pay no French inheritance tax on what you inherit from your husband or wife. The official position, published by the Ministry of the Economy, is unambiguous: the surviving spouse or civil partner is fully exempt from succession duties. The surviving spouse or civil partner is fully exempt from succession duties (see the official ministry page on succession duties). This total exemption applies regardless of the amount and regardless of your nationality: a British widow inheriting two million euros of French property from her husband pays zero French succession duty on her share. The children’s shares, by contrast, are taxed under the standard parent-child scale after their individual allowances, and gifts or bequests to non-relatives face much heavier rates. Do not confuse the two positions when the family discusses “the inheritance tax”: yours as spouse is nil.

Exemption from the duty does not mean exemption from paperwork. The succession must still be declared to the French tax office, and the déclaration de succession (estate return) must be filed within the statutory deadline — six months from the death where the death occurred in France — even where no duty is due from the spouse. Late filing triggers interest and penalties, and the notaire normally prepares the return alongside the acte de notoriété. Give the notaire every relevant document early: the death certificate (acte de décès), the marriage certificate with apostille and sworn translation where required, any wills made in either country, bank and investment statements, the property deeds (titres de propriété), and the details of any United Kingdom assets. On the British side, practical guidance on the steps after a death abroad is published by the United Kingdom government (see GOV.UK: what to do if someone dies abroad), and you should also take English advice on whether United Kingdom inheritance tax touches United Kingdom-situated assets or arises from domicile. The two tax systems operate in parallel: French exemption for the spouse does not automatically erase a United Kingdom charge on United Kingdom assets, and treaty relief and unilateral relief each have their own paperwork.

What, then, can you challenge, and how? Three disputes recur for British surviving spouses, and each has a practical remedy. First, an attempt to make you leave or pay. If a stepchild changes the locks, cuts off utilities, or demands monthly “rent” during the first year, that conduct collides with the public-policy first-year right of article 763. Respond in writing by recorded delivery, keep copies, ask the notaire to intervene in writing, and if the pressure continues, instruct a lawyer to seek an urgent court order (référé) restoring your access: judges move quickly where a protected occupant is locked out of the family home. Second, a disputed occupation payment for the period after the first year. An indemnité d’occupation must reflect the property’s rental value and the periods of genuinely exclusive occupation; contest in writing any demand that backdates the charge into the free first year, that values the house above market rent, or that ignores your lifelong habitation right once claimed. The 2025 ruling on article 815-9 quoted above is your authority for requiring the court to account for periods when the property returns to the joint owners’ availability. Third, a tax bill you consider wrong — for example, a demand that ignores your spousal exemption, misvalues the house, or miscalculates the children’s allowances. File a written claim (réclamation contentieuse) with the tax office that issued the notice, within the time limit printed on the notice, attaching the death certificate, the marriage certificate, the acte de notoriété and the valuation evidence, and escalate to the administrative court if the reply is negative. Never ignore a French tax notice because you believe it is “obviously” wrong: challenge it in writing and on time.

A final practical checklist will help you keep control from the first weeks. One, secure the house and its paperwork: change nothing structurally, photograph each room and the furniture, and gather the deeds, insurance policies and loan documents. Two, claim the lifelong right in writing within the year, as section I.B explains, and have the claim recorded by the notaire. Three, clarify the matrimonial regime and any foreign will at the very first appointment, bringing the Hague Convention point to the notaire‘s attention where the marriage has an English dimension. Four, verify every figure before signing: the house valuation used for the set-off under article 765, the amount of any soulte if you seek preferential allocation, and the amount of any occupation payment. Get an independent estate agent’s opinion where the family’s valuer seems high — valuations directly move money between you and the children. Five, diarise the tax filing deadline and answer every administrative letter in writing. Estates where the surviving spouse acts early, in writing, and with dated proof almost never produce the worst outcomes; estates where the spouse waits, trusts verbal reassurances, and discovers the one-year rule too late fill the case reports. The decisions quoted in this guide — the widow who lost everything by staying silent for years, and the widow who saved her right with a summons served within months — show how thin the line is.

Conclusion

A British spouse who loses a husband or wife in France is protected far more strongly than most families realise: a free, unconditional first year in the home that no will can remove, a lifelong habitation right that survives even a hostile family provided it is claimed within twelve months, a full exemption from French succession duty on the spouse’s share, and a preferential claim to be allocated the house itself in the partition. But each protection has a condition attached — genuine occupation as the main home, a written claim within one year for the lifelong right, a surviving-spouse status for the preferential allocation, and timely paperwork for the tax position. The Cour de cassation enforces those conditions strictly, as the 2022, 2019, 2012, 2025 and 2026 decisions quoted above demonstrate. Act in writing, act within the year, verify every valuation and every notice, and challenge promptly anything unfair: the law is on the side of the surviving spouse who uses it in time.

Need a quick opinion on your case

Facing a deadline, an eviction threat, or a tax bill after the death of your spouse in France? Our firm offers a telephone consultation within 48 hours with a lawyer of the firm to review your housing rights, your claim letter, and your next step. Call +33 6 46 60 58 22 or write via our contact page.