Inheritance Wars

Joel Ruiz Butuyan

Philippine Daily Inquirer
February 04, 2019

One of the most difficult legal problems for lawyers to solve is a bitter war among
brothers and sisters on inheritance. This has been my experience in my almost 30
years as a trial attorney.

Parents who pass on wealth to their children may be under the impression that
they will leave this world with material blessings bestowed on their children. But
the intended blessing may morph into a curse that causes unending quarrels
among offspring.

There have been several high-profile cases of wealthy families mired in

acrimonious legal battles over inheritance in the past few years. The nastiest of
these cases involve the family of the late Marcos crony Potenciano Ilusorio, where
criminal accusations of kidnapping, false imprisonment, parricide and extortion
were filed between two warring factions of his children.

But inheritance wars are not unique to wealthy families. Even children of modest
families, whose sole asset is the family home, are not immune from vicious
conflicts over inheritance rights.

When one reads the law on inheritance, the rules are crystal-clear on how to
divide a deceased parent’s assets among the heirs. Of the total joint assets of the
parents, one-half is retained by the surviving spouse as his or her conjugal share.
The other half will constitute the estate of the dead spouse that will be inherited
by his or her heirs.

The estate of the deceased parent will be further divided into two: one-half is
considered as the “legitime,” while the other half is deemed the “free portion.”
The legitime will constitute the mandatory inheritance of the children. The free
portion is the part of the estate that a parent can freely give to any person (even
nonrelatives) or institution, by providing so in a “Last Will and Testament” or deed
of donation.

There are situations when the free portion becomes less than half of the estate.
This happens when there is a surviving spouse and/or illegitimate children who
are also entitled to their own legitimes, and which will be taken from the free
portion.

The surviving spouse and legitimate children are entitled to equal amounts of
legitime. An illegitimate child is entitled to half of the share of a legitimate child.

If the law is clear in apportioning inheritance rights, why do conflicts still arise
among heirs? Unfortunately, emotional issues cannot be solved by the
mathematical solutions provided by law. Distressed emotions cloud an heir’s
objectivity and sense of fairness. Conflicts among children arise because of
unresolved bitterness, envious feelings, sentiments of unfairness, or selfishness.

Some children harbor feelings of inequality because one or more of their siblings
received extra support from parents in terms of more expensive education,
sizeable medical expenses, travels and even financial support for a costly wedding.
Another sibling may feel that the lesser fortune he or she has achieved in life
should be compensated by a bigger inheritance share. And a black sheep sibling
may just be so brazenly greedy that he or she wants to claim the bulk of the
estate.

The law provides that expenses for support, education, extraordinary illness and
even wedding gifts given by parents are not generally deductible from a child’s
inheritance share. But the law also provides that these bequests of parental
generosity may still be deductible, first from the free portion, and second from the
legitime share of a child, if the amount is disproportionately substantial compared
to the estate size.

The cold letters of the law on inheritance do not automatically provide an

inheritance distribution formula that is guaranteed to satisfy all the heirs. The
heirs must infuse the cold letters of the law with a warm sense of fairness, equity
and justice.

The moral lesson here is that it is not enough for parents to bestow material
blessings on their children. Most importantly, they must bequeath to their
children the life-affirming traits of empathy, fairmindedness, moral uprightness
and enduring love for each other.