How to confirm and prove relationship with the deceased

At least once in his life, a citizen is faced with a situation where he needs to document the existence of a family connection with a loved one. At the same time, few know what documents confirm the relationship.

Their list depends on the degree of blood relationship between the persons and the circumstances in connection with which the papers were required.

Such confirmation may not be available for various reasons (loss of documents, damage to them, etc.). In this case, the citizen needs to restore them or prove the relationship in another way.

Why are family ties established?

In the Russian Federation, entering into an inheritance is possible on two grounds: a will or the fact of kinship with it. If a will was not drawn up during the lifetime of the deceased, establishing the first degree of relationship will allow you to claim the largest part of the inheritance. It is important to complete the procedure within the time limits provided by law so as not to miss the deadline for the division and transfer of the assets of the deceased person.

Timely confirmation of rights will allow:

Receive your due share of the inheritance.
Exclude the transfer of property to the state if the deceased had no other relatives.

The law establishes the order of priority in accepting inheritance. Even if a will has been drawn up and a person’s last will has been announced, it will still be necessary to establish the fact of relationship.

How to establish the degree of relationship

The heirs are legally called upon to accept the property of the deceased according to the established order (Articles 1142–1145 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation), covering 5 degrees of kinship:

The first priority is parents, spouse, children (in case of death of the latter, grandchildren).
The second is brothers and sisters (after their death - nephews), grandfathers, grandmothers.
The third is aunts and uncles (their children are by right of representation).
Fourth - third degree of relationship (parents and grandparents).
The fifth is cousins (grandparents, grandchildren), that is, the fourth degree of relationship.
Sixth - cousins, great-grandchildren, nephews, aunts and uncles.
The seventh and eighth stages provide for the entry into inheritance of persons not included in the family tree of the testator.

To confirm your compliance with the current line of inheritance, the successor must establish the degree of relationship with the deceased. As mentioned above, the preferred method for this is documentary evidence. But in practice it cannot always be applied. There are cases when a certificate is lost and it is impossible to obtain a duplicate. In such a situation, the heir can do the following:

Collect strong evidence of family ties to the deceased. For this purpose, you can contact the archives of the registry office, enterprises, government agencies and other official structures, which may contain the necessary information, as well as undergo a genetic examination.
Interview witnesses and take written testimony from them in favor of the fact being established.
Draw up a corresponding statement of claim in the district court at the place where the inheritance case was opened.
Obtain a court order and, if the outcome is positive for yourself, begin to prepare the missing documents.

Establishing a relationship with the testator goes smoothly only if all the necessary documentation is in the hands of the heir. Otherwise, the successor will face a difficult, sometimes dead-end search for ways out of this situation: tedious and often fruitless walking through various authorities, collecting evidence and trying to understand the intricacies of the claim proceedings. The lawyers of the portal https://ros-nasledstvo.ru can significantly facilitate these tasks and speed up obtaining a positive result. You can get a free consultation from them by filling out the form below.

FREE CONSULTATIONS are available for you! If you want to solve exactly your problem, then

describe your situation to a lawyer in an online chat;
write a question in the form below;
call Moscow and Moscow region
call St. Petersburg and region

Save or share the link on social networks

(
1 ratings, average: 1.00 out of 5)
- FREE for a lawyer!

Write your question, our lawyer will prepare an answer for FREE and call you back in 5 minutes.

By submitting data you agree to the Consent to PD processing, PD Processing Policy and User Agreement

Useful information on the topic

How to restore the missed deadline for accepting an inheritance

The law limits the period allotted for accepting an inheritance to 6 months from...

How to challenge a will for an apartment?

According to Article 62 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation (Civil Code of the Russian Federation), citizens...

How to properly draw up and write a will

The provisions on the will are contained in the third chapter of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation. According to…

What documents are needed to bequeath an apartment in 2021

The reason for drawing up a will is the desire of the testator to clearly identify the future owners...

Heirs of the first stage

The Civil Code of the Russian Federation defines two options for inheritance: by will and...

Inheritance of a privatized apartment after the death of the owner by law and will

After privatization, the apartment used on the basis of a social tenancy agreement passes...

Options for establishing kinship

There are several options for resolving the issue. Establishing kinship in court in legal practice occurs regularly. The issue of transfer or transfer of inheritance can be opened only after receiving the death certificate of the testator. The original document is provided to relatives, and therefore there is no need to prove family ties. The remaining relatives (not the first priority) receive copies of the certificate. It is issued by the registry office, but only after confirmation of family ties with the deceased.

Documents are restored in two ways:

After going to court.
At the registry office after contacting the archives.

It is impossible to obtain a death certificate of the deceased in any other way. The law suggests restoring legal rights in pre-trial or judicial proceedings.

When is it necessary to confirm relationship?

The fact of relationship between the heir and the testator can be established after checking the documents proving their identity. You can also confirm your relationship with a deceased citizen by presenting to the notary a certificate from the registry office, a marriage certificate, a document issued by a foreign state, an extract from the birth register, a court decision, etc. Problems when obtaining a certificate of inheritance may arise if:

the necessary documents have not been preserved or have been lost;
the surnames of the heir and the testator do not match;
there was an error or typo in the document;
the heir and the testator have the same surname containing the letter “e”, but for one of them it is printed with an “e”.

Recently, the likelihood of situations arising where an heir needs to prove kinship with a deceased citizen has decreased significantly. This is due to the transition to electronic document management in government agencies. But the occurrence of such a problem cannot be completely ruled out.

Pre-trial resolution of the issue

To obtain proof of relationship, a person must contact the registry office archive. This is only possible if:

Previously issued documents were lost, damaged and cannot be restored. In this case, the request can be sent through a notary office.
The certificate issued earlier contains a typo or error. It is impossible to use the document as evidence when establishing family ties until corrections and adjustments are made. The data is stored in the registry office, where you should contact if such situations arise.

To restore or correct the certificate, you must draw up and submit an application.

Pre-trial determination of kinship

Going to court will most likely not be necessary if you still have papers that record the fact of your relationship with the testator. First of all, these are civil passports and birth certificates.

Even if the documents are lost, the necessary information must be stored in the archives of the registry office. In this case, the interested citizen should apply there to obtain a certificate confirming that he is a relative of the deceased. Before the civil registry office was formed in 1918, the corresponding entries were made in the parish registers. During the time of Tsarist Russia, churches were endowed with such functions. Later, all records were transferred to the archives of the registry office.

To re-receive documents proving kinship with the deceased, you can contact not only the registry office, but also the MFC located at the place where the inheritance was opened. If you do not have a properly certified document in your hands, which sets out a previously rendered court decision, you will need to contact the court where the case was heard to obtain a copy of it.

If the heir or his deceased relative has changed his last name, it will be necessary to provide a document confirming this fact (for example, a marriage certificate).

Order of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation dated October 1, 2018 No. 201 establishes the following forms:

Application for issuance of a repeated birth certificate. Form No. 25; Application for issuance of a repeated adoption certificate. Form No. 27; Application for issuance of a repeated certificate of name change. Form No. 29.

How to confirm relationship with mother or father

The need to confirm your relationship with your mother or father may arise if you have different surnames. In this case, you will need to prepare papers with which you can confirm the fact of the change of surname. In particular, such documents include a marriage certificate. You can also confirm the fact of a change of surname in connection with the conclusion of a marriage union using a certificate received from the registry office.

Sometimes there are annoying mistakes and typos in personal identification documents. The heir may face considerable difficulties, even if his last name differs from the parent’s last name by only one letter. In this case, to make the necessary corrections, you should also contact the registry office and submit an application with a request to change the spelling of your last name to its correct version.

The issue of the letters “e” and “e” deserves separate consideration. From the point of view of the rules of the Russian language, these are completely different letters, but from the letter of the Federal Notary Chamber No. 279/06-06 dated February 15, 2013, it follows that in documents these same letters should be considered equivalent. But this recommendation only applies if “e” instead of “e” in the spelling of a surname does not interfere with the correct identification of a citizen. If the notary cannot clearly establish the identity, the interested person will have to visit the registry office and submit an application to correct the surname or name.

How to confirm relationship with a brother or sister

In a situation where the heir needs to prove that he is the brother or sister of a deceased citizen, he will need to present his birth certificate, as well as the same certificates of the testator and parents. In addition, you can also show the pages of the parents' passports (if they are alive) with a record of the children.

If the parents are no longer alive or the necessary documents are missing, you will need to go to the registry office and request a certificate confirming the relationship.

How to confirm kinship with a nephew

In accordance with Part 2 of Art. 1143 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, nephews inherit the property of a deceased relative by right of representation. Let us explain what this means with a specific example. Let’s say that two brothers, an uncle and a father, die as a result of an accident. At the same time, the father has no other brothers and sisters. There are also no other first-line heirs. After death, the property that belonged to him, by law, should have passed to his brother, but since he also died, not the brother, but the nephew, would inherit by right of representation.

In order for a nephew to confirm his relationship with a deceased relative, he must present to the notary the birth certificate of his uncle and a similar certificate of the parent who did not live to accept the inheritance. If the necessary papers are not available, you can get a certificate from the registry office.

In what cases can nephews claim an inheritance, read → here

How to confirm relationship with a grandson

The legislation also classifies grandchildren as heirs by right of representation (Part 2 of Article 1142 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation). It follows that to prove kinship, birth certificates of the heir, as well as his deceased parent and grandmother (or grandfather), will be required.

For more information on how to enter into an inheritance for grandchildren after the death of a grandmother or grandfather, read the article: When grandchildren have the right to inheritance

Going to court

This option is suitable for heirs who do not have direct evidence of kinship with the testator. This option is also considered in cases where it is impossible to restore damaged or lost documents. To go to court you need:

Prepare an evidence base. This category includes personal correspondence with the deceased, which talked about kinship. The court also considers the testimony of witnesses, neighbors and other citizens who are ready to confirm the relationship.
Draw up and submit an application to the courts.

Establishing kinship for inheritance through the court will take some time. In the application, the plaintiff must provide evidence that it was not possible to restore the documents in any other way. It is necessary to provide official refusals that were received by the plaintiff after applying to government authorities. It is important to exclude emotions, hypotheses, and unnecessary information from the document. The application must contain substantive data, as well as excerpts from laws and references to regulations.

Important! Before applying, you must pay a state fee in the amount prescribed by law.

Algorithm for proving kinship through court

What to do if the fact of relationship needs to be proven in court? An algorithm of actions is provided for this:

preparation and submission to the court of an application to establish kinship;
preparation of a package of documents required for submission with the application;
submitting the collected material to the court and paying the state fee.

To avoid mistakes in paperwork and loss of time, it is recommended to contact a lawyer.

The collected information is submitted to the district court. Then you just need to wait for the decision made on this issue. The presence of the applicant at the court hearing is not required.

The court's decision may be:

Complete when the court fully recognizes the relationship.
Partial, when the court recognizes the relationship, but the plaintiff’s ability to perform any actions is limited.
Negative, that is, kinship is not recognized.

You can receive the resolution by mail or by coming for it yourself. If the result does not satisfy the plaintiff, it can be challenged in the regional court. The deadline for filing an application to challenge a court decision is 10 days.

If a relationship is established with a deceased relative, a third person may be involved in the process - the mother, father, wife or child of the deceased.

Procedure

To establish family ties, you should follow a certain procedure:

Contact an experienced lawyer who will help you collect all the documents confirming your relationship with the deceased. Specialists of the Legal Support Center in Krasnodar will help at every stage of the procedure.
Assess the evidence base. If the documents are not enough, it is necessary to supplement the package with new information.
If it is possible to restore the certificates, you will need to contact the registry office. You must contact the authority that has the necessary information. You can contact the institution not only after a personal appeal, but also through personal correspondence.
Receive a copy of the documents from the registry office after submitting the request and transfer it to the notary authority.
The last resort if there is no result is to go to court. Our company’s lawyers will assess the applicant’s chances and help draw up evidence and a statement.
After evaluating the evidence, the court makes a decision. If it is positive, they issue a corresponding document, which the applicant for the inheritance must hand over to the notary.

Only an approximate procedure is indicated. In each individual case, it is necessary to take adequate measures based on the prevailing circumstances.

Required documents

Establishment of the fact of relationship is carried out after submitting a package of documents. They are different for each case. The list of evidence includes:

Passport with a record of spouse and children.
DNA analysis results.
Medical reports.
Personal correspondence.
Certificates of family ties.
Certificates of birth of children, marriage, etc.

All specified documents must contain information about relationship. The closer the family ties, the fewer documents will be required for confirmation. It is more difficult to prove blood ties for women and men who changed their last name upon marriage.

Services of a lawyer in inheritance cases

Services of a family lawyer