A relative is claiming their compulsory portion (Pflichtteil) after a death. You want to sell the Austrian house and hear within the family that this automatically entitles them to a certain share of the house or of the eventual sale proceeds. Before this leads to a promise to sell or a payout, claim, ownership and the actual stage of settlement must be clarified separately.
Determine the true content of the claim
Our editorial recommendation: Gather the actual claim and the existing estate documents. Note who asserts which claim and on what basis. A family phrase such as “he gets his share” leaves open whether ownership, status as heir or a monetary claim is meant.
The article does not establish either a compulsory portion entitlement or a specific quota. Nor is a will or a gift definitively classified on the basis of an oral summary. These foundations belong in the relevant estate advice.
What the monetary claim means
§ 761 ABGB determines the payment of the compulsory portion in money and names other possible forms of coverage. When a compulsory portion is asserted, the provision contains a presumption in favour of a monetary claim instead of a legacy (Vermächtnis). [ABGB-761] A claimed compulsory portion is therefore not thereby converted into a land-registry share in the house confirmed by this article.
Which persons are actually owners and which declarations are required for a house sale remain matters for separate examination. The contribution does not claim that every person entitled to a compulsory portion must always be involved in the sale or never be involved.
Do not invent a payment date from the sales calendar
§ 765 ABGB distinguishes the acquisition of the claim by death and the provision there regarding the enforceability of the monetary compulsory portion, which as a rule is only after one year. [ABGB-765] Further questions, such as special agreements or deferral, are therefore not fully examined by that alone.
Let the decisive timings be determined by the concrete case. A hoped-for later house sale is not a blanket statement that an existing monetary claim may wait until then at will. Likewise, an earlier sale alone says nothing about a concretely owed immediate payout.
An invented provisional sale proceeds
An heiress wants to distribute money within the family in advance from planned proceeds. However, the amount, coverage and temporal status of a compulsory portion claim are still open. There are also other unresolved estate items.
She therefore has estate and sales accounting prepared together. The advice determines the actual claim and how to deal with it. A mental division of the listing price by the number of siblings is not used as a finished compulsory portion calculation.
Place the sale on clarified roles
For the next step note who is authorised to sell, which monetary question is open and which funds are actually to be made available. Possible security or payout questions are handled professionally. In this way the sale can be a practical source of liquidity without an unexamined monetary claim being turned into ownership or a hoped-for sale being treated as a payment deferral.