Conciliation: two heirs

Conciliation: two heirs

"I was served with a summons to appear at a conciliation hearing, following a request from my neighbour for a neighbourhood problem concerning the house that belonged to my late husband and of which my two adult children and I are the sole heirs. Shouldn't my neighbour also have taken my children to court? If so, when can I take action?

When a married person dies, the spouses' matrimonial property regime is dissolved. In other words, the spouses' property is divided up according to the rules of the matrimonial property regime to which they were subject. The deceased spouse's share becomes part of his or her estate. At the time of your husband's death, you and your children automatically acquire the entire estate, in varying proportions depending on whether or not your husband had drawn up a will. Until the estate is divided, you and your children form a community of heirs, which has no legal personality. You jointly own and dispose of the property forming part of the estate. This means that, with a few exceptions, you must act and be sued jointly for the assets making up the estate. Summonses to appear must therefore be addressed to each of you, unless a joint representative has been appointed. Your neighbour's claim therefore had to be made jointly against you and your children. This irregularity means that her claim is inadmissible.

You should already raise this argument at the conciliation hearing, to avoid a ruling on the substance of the dispute being made by the conciliation authority, if it is empowered to do so, without taking account of this ground of inadmissibility. If this is not the case and your neighbour receives authorisation to bring the case, despite this irregularity, she may lodge an application with the Court of First Instance. You will then be given a deadline by which to respond. It is at this point that you will have to raise the ground of inadmissibility. It should be noted that you will have the option of asking the judge to limit the proceedings initially to the question of admissibility, but it is better to include this request in the response so as not to risk letting the time limit you have been given run out.

In short, you must raise the ground of inadmissibility at the conciliation hearing and if, despite this, your neighbour is granted leave to introduce, you will have to raise this ground in your reply brief to be sent to the Tribunal.