The economic crisis and its checkmate to our traditional inheritance system: should we not restart the game? Introduction of gender perspective in the subject of Succession Law

This paper aims to criticize the outdated Spanish regulation that gives heirs unlimited responsibility for the debts of the deceased in case of inheritance acceptance. Only through the benefit of inventory, which has some difficult requirements and limited time, can the heir limit his liability up to the value of the estate. The economic crisis has increased the number of inheritances with unaffordable debts and, due to that, the number of inheritance repudiations has increased fourfold. But there is another problem: sometimes it is difficult to get to know the existence of debts, and our regulation does not provide any solution for this situation. That is why we consider it is time to promote a new regulation.