Lisbon, July 17, 2026 (Lusa) - The Portuguese Government bill to allow the sale of properties in shared inheritance at the request of a single heir was approved on Friday in parliament, in a final overall vote, by the PSD, CDS-PP, PS, IL and JPP.
Chega and PAN abstained, whilst the PCP, BE and Livre voted against.
The bill authorises Luís Montenegro’s government to establish a special procedure for the sale of jointly owned properties and to amend the Civil Code and the Code of Civil Procedure, giving the Government 180 days to do so after the bill comes into force.
The final version includes amendments introduced by the PSD during the committee stage debate in the Committee on Constitutional Affairs, Rights, Freedoms and Guarantees.
The new rules govern special, urgent procedures for the sale of properties forming that are jointly inherited, in cases where there is no agreement amongst the heirs regarding a sale.
The legislation provides that the new regime applies “to all open and jointly owned estates” as at the date the legislation comes into force.
At the suggestion of the PSD, which saw several proposed amendments approved during the committee stage, the family home is excluded from the special procedure for the sale of property, “unless the widow or widower gives their express consent”, with this safeguard also being extended to civil partnerships.
Estates “in a state of insolvency” are also not covered by the special sale procedure, and not merely – as provided for in the Government’s original proposal – situations involving an “agreement of joint ownership” or where “the right to partition” could not be exercised.
The legislation creates the role of an executor with powers of partition, which allows the “powers of administration, liquidation and partition of the estate” to be centralised in a third party, with the aim of speeding up the succession process by removing from the heirs’ remit the responsibility for initiating the partition and defining its terms, as the Government explained in the introduction to the law.
Another new feature is the transfer of the administration of the estate and the duties of the head of the household “to any other person”, provided that the decision is taken by a “simple majority” amongst the heirs, except “where the head of the household is the surviving spouse, and without prejudice to cases where there is an executor with powers of allocation”.
Alongside the bill originating from the government, at the committee stage, Parliament had also approved in early June a draft bill from the Liberal Initiative to establish this possibility of appointing the head of the household by a majority of the heirs – a measure that was formally accepted in committee by the PSD.
Also at the PSD’s proposal, the final version authorises the Government to define the framework governing the role of the executor, “namely, the eligibility criteria and the exercise of the office”.
The legislation also stipulates that the right to the division of the estate may not be exercised if consent has been given for ‘post-mortem’ insemination during “the three years following the opening of the succession or until the full-term, live birth of the unborn child, whilst the insemination procedures permitted under the law are pending”.
The new rules were approved at the committee stage on 3 June, forming part of a legislative package through which the Government aims to increase the supply of homes for sale or rent against the backdrop of a housing crisis.
During the debate preceding the committee stage vote, Social Democrat MP Paulo Marcelo put the number of vacant family homes at 485,000. With regard to rural properties, he estimated that there were “3.4 million abandoned properties with no defined owner, which means that these plots are not maintained or cleared”, making them prone to wildfires.
PCT/AYLS // AYLS
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