# Inheritance Orders & the Registrar Process

After a death, the estate is released only once the right order is issued by the Inheritance Registrar (הרשם לענייני ירושה). Picking the wrong order is the most common time-waster.

## Which order do I need?

| Did the deceased leave a will? | Order | Hebrew | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|
| No will | Succession order | צו ירושה | Declares the legal heirs and their shares by law. |
| Yes, and it covers the whole estate | Probate / will-execution order | צו קיום צוואה | Gives the will binding legal effect and distributes per its provisions. |
| Yes, but it covers only PART of the property | BOTH orders (Section 66(b)) | צו קיום צוואה + צו ירושה | A probate order over the willed part, a succession order over the remainder. |

**Partial wills (Section 66(b)).** ציווה המוריש חלק מנכסיו, יינתן על אותו חלק צו קיום, ועל הנותר צו ירושה. A will that disposes of the apartment and is silent on the bank account, the car, or a later-acquired asset is a partial will, and it is common. The family must apply for both orders, and the legal heirs have to be set out for the intestate remainder exactly as in a no-will file. Confirm what the will actually covers before choosing; treat an unread or uncertain will as the partial case.

Both are filed with the **Inheritance Registrar**, online at the Registrar portal (inheritance.justice.gov.il). The Registrar issues most orders.

A will is inert until its order issues: under Section 39 no right can be claimed under a will, and it cannot be relied on as a will, unless a probate order has been granted.

**Deposit and evidence (Sections 21(b) and 22(f)).** A will deposited with the Registrar and kept in deposit until the testator's death is prima facie evidence (ראיה לכאורה) that the person named in it as testator made it, and that it was made no later than the day of deposit. A will made before an authority carries the same prima facie effect as to its maker and as to the day and place stated in it. Neither cures a formal defect nor forecloses a challenge; both shift the burden onto whoever disputes authorship or date.

## Which forum: Registrar, Family Court, or religious court

The default is the Registrar. Section 67א lists the ONLY grounds on which a pending application is transferred to the **Family Court**:
1. an objection to the application was filed;
2. the State or one of its institutions is a party to the application;
3. the Attorney General or their representative saw fit to open a proceeding on the application or to join one;
4. the Public Trustee (האפוטרופוס הכללי) represents a person whose property it manages;
5. the Registrar saw fit to transfer the application to the court.

Grounds 3 and 4 are the ones that bite in ordinary family files: an estate with a minor heir or an heir under guardianship commonly ends up in court through them. "The will looks defective" is NOT a transfer ground.

A **religious court** (rabbinical, sharia, druze) is a third forum. Under Section 155 it may issue a succession order or a probate order, but only where every party concerned has expressed written consent.

If a fee was already paid to the Registrar and the matter then moves to court under Section 67א, that payment counts as a fee paid to the court (regulation 6 of the fee regulations). The applicant does not pay twice.

## The online application steps
1. Open an application on the Registrar's online portal.
2. Identify the deceased and (for a succession order) the legal heirs, or (for a probate order) submit the ORIGINAL will.
3. Pay the fees (see the schedule below).
4. The Registrar publishes a notice and sets a period for objections, which by law cannot be shorter than two weeks and in practice is 14 days. An objection (התנגדות) can be filed within that period as long as the order has not yet been issued.
5. After the objection window the order is issued. Orders are now issued digitally only; the Registrar does not print orders or hand out copies at its offices. The digital order is emailed automatically to the applicant or their lawyer. Onward transmission is per-body and is NOT automatic on grant: under the Registrar's guide (מדריך לזוכיו של מנוח שהותיר צוואה, תשפ"ד-2023), the order is sent directly by the Registrar to banks, insurers and the relevant government bodies (the Land Registry / Tabu, the Ministry of Transport, the Israel Land Authority, the Tax Authority, the Corporations Authority and others) only once a בקשה לפעולה has been filed. The point of the mechanism is that the heirs then do not have to present the order to get service from those bodies, and the order cannot be forged, but it is triggered by the family, not by the grant.

## The full fee schedule

These are the amounts in the תוספת to תקנות הירושה (אגרות הרשם לעניני ירושה), התשנ״ח-1998, as updated for 2026. Quote the mechanism, not only a single number, because the figures change annually.

| # | Action or service | Fee (NIS) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Application for a succession order or a probate order | 597 |
| 2 | Application to correct or cancel a succession order or a probate order | 597 |
| 3 | Application to appoint an estate administrator (מנהל עזבון) | 597 |
| 4 | Making a will before the Inheritance Registrar | 280 |
| 5 | Depositing a will | 126 |
| 5א | Depositing a will where the testator deposited no earlier will in the preceding five years | Exempt |
| 6 | Application to correct a clerical error in a Registrar decision, filed within 30 days of the decision | Exempt |
| 7 | Inspecting a file held in the Registrar's archive | 32 |
| 8 | Certified copy of any document in the Registrar's file | 6.1 per page |
| 9 | Any other application for an action or service not listed in items 1 to 8 | 280 |

Three rules that sit on top of the table:
- **Online filing costs 85% of the listed fee.** This is why an online succession-order application is quoted at 507 NIS: 597 reduced to 85%. A manual filing pays the full 597. A represented applicant must file online.
- **A separate publication fee of 66 NIS** applies to a succession-order or probate-order application.
- **The amounts change on 1 January each year** by the CPI movement published the preceding November, rounded to the nearest whole shekel.

Fee exemptions (regulation 4): the State and anyone authorised to represent it, the Public Trustee, the National Insurance Institute, a local-authority welfare officer acting in that capacity, and an applicant for a succession order who is the spouse, child, father, mother, or sibling of someone who died as a result of war operations (after 29 November 1947), as a casualty of a hostile act, or in military service.

## Legal heirs when there is NO will (Section 11)
The surviving spouse takes the household chattels including the family car. Of the REST of the estate:
- with children (or their descendants) OR with the deceased's parents: the spouse takes **one-half**;
- with the deceased's siblings (or their descendants) or grandparents: the spouse takes **two-thirds**;
- if none of those relatives survive: the spouse takes the **whole** estate.
The remaining share goes to the first surviving class: children split it equally; if there are no descendants, the parents and their line; then grandparents and their line.

### Representation: who steps into a predeceased heir's place (Section 14)
- **Section 14(a), the rule.** A child of the deceased who died before them leaving children is replaced by those children, and the same applies to the children of any relative of the deceased who died before them.
- **Section 14(a), the closing limb.** These provisions do NOT apply where the deceased left a spouse together with parents or grandparents as described in Section 11(a). So where a surviving spouse stands alongside the deceased's parents or grandparents, the children of a predeceased parent or grandparent do not step up into that share. State representation as an unqualified rule and you get this configuration backwards.
- **Section 14(b).** Children inheriting by representation split equally between them what they take that way. A predeceased child's share goes to that child's own children, not to the surviving siblings.
- **Section 14(c)-(d), as amended in 2024 (תשפ״ד-3).** Where an heir found unfit to inherit (פסול לרשת) is the deceased's child or that child's descendant, the unfit heir's children DO inherit in their place, unless the court is satisfied the deceased wished otherwise. Where the unfit heir is any other relative, their children do NOT inherit in their place, unless the court is satisfied the deceased wished they should. The default flips with the line.

This is the core of Section 11. For the exact split in a specific family, the succession-order application asks for the family structure and the Registrar applies the law.

**The apartment proviso.** The two-thirds branch carries a condition that is easy to miss and often decides the outcome: if on the eve of the death the spouse had been married to the deceased for three years or more and was living with them at that time in an apartment wholly or partly included in the estate, the spouse takes the deceased's ENTIRE share in that apartment, and two-thirds of what remains of the rest of the estate.

**Marital property comes first.** Section 11(c) deducts from the spouse's share anything due to them on a ground arising from the marriage, including a כתובה, but expressly excludes what is due under חוק יחסי ממון or a property agreement. That marital-property entitlement is ranked as an estate debt under Section 104(a)(4), which means it is settled BEFORE the estate is divided among heirs. Describing the spouse's position as "half" without this understates it.

**Unmarried partners (Section 55).** Where a man and a woman lived a family life in a shared household without being married to each other, and at the time of death neither was married to anyone else, the survivor is treated as though the deceased had left them by will whatever they would have taken by law had the couple been married. This yields to any contrary provision, express or implied, in a will the deceased actually left.

## Disclaiming a share (Section 6)

An heir who does not want the share, typically because the estate may be insolvent, files a written disclaimer (הסתלקות) with the Inheritance Registrar, or with the court once the file has moved there under Section 67א. The constraints:
- It is available only after the death and only while the estate has not yet been distributed.
- It may cover the whole share or part of it, or a whole or partial legacy under a will.
- The disclaimer is retroactive: the heir is treated as never having been an heir to that extent.
- It CANNOT be directed to a person of the heir's choosing. A disclaimer in favour of another person is permitted only where that person is the deceased's spouse, child, or sibling.
- A conditional disclaimer is void.
- A minor or a person declared legally incompetent needs court approval to disclaim.
- Section 7(c): an heir who has already transferred or charged their share in the estate has lost the right to disclaim it.
- Section 6א (added 2024) widens the permitted beneficiaries of a disclaimer where the deceased died in the war or in a hostile act, allowing it in favour of family members listed in Section 10 and of the deceased's former spouse or child.

## Tax on an inheritance

There is no estate tax and no inheritance tax in Israel. The Estate Tax Law 1949 was repealed for the estate of anyone who died after 31 March 1981, and from 1 January 1988 the repeal was extended to estates of those who died before that date. Receiving an inheritance, whether cash, securities, or real estate, is not itself a taxable event.

The exposure arrives later, when an inherited asset is SOLD: מס שבח (land appreciation tax) on real estate, or capital gains tax on other assets, can apply, and the reliefs available to an heir are their own subject. Route that question to a tax professional; it is outside this skill.

## Two limits and one reassurance
- **Maintenance from the estate (Section 56):** a spouse, children, or parents who genuinely need support are entitled to maintenance from the estate, whether it passes by law or by will. A will cannot simply cut off a needy dependent.
- **No forced heirship:** otherwise a testator is free to leave their property to whomever they choose; Israel has no fixed "reserved portion" beyond the maintenance right above.
- **Debts:** heirs receive what remains after the estate's debts. Until the estate is divided, heirs answer for its debts only out of estate assets (Section 126). If the heirs divide after inviting creditors (Section 99 or 123, a public notice giving at least three months) and paying the debts known at the time, an heir is liable for an unpaid debt only if it is proved they knew of it, and only up to what they received (Section 127(a)). If they divide WITHOUT inviting creditors and without paying the known debts, each heir is liable for the unpaid debts up to the value of the WHOLE estate at the time of division, except that an heir who proves they did not know of a particular debt at the time answers for it only up to what they received (Section 128(a)); the burden of proving values is on the heir (Section 128(b)). If the debts may exceed the assets, get advice before accepting; an heir can disclaim their share (הסתלקות) instead of taking on a negative estate. Estate administration itself belongs to `israeli-estate-settlement-navigator`.
- **Outside the estate entirely (Section 147):** amounts payable on death under an insurance contract, a pension fund, or a provident fund are not part of the estate unless the contract stipulates that they go to the estate. They pass to the beneficiaries (מוטבים) named at the institution, and neither the will nor the succession order redirects them.

## After the order: the family home in detail

Work in this order, because each step changes the answer to "can the other heirs force me out?".

1. **What is actually in the estate.** Only the deceased's share of the flat. A surviving spouse who is a registered co-owner (or who proves co-ownership on the facts, which is fact-dependent and needs an advocate) keeps that share as their own property and inherits on top of it. A claim under the Property Relations Law is NOT co-ownership of the flat: it is a monetary balancing claim, paid out of the estate as a debt before the heirs take (Section 104(a)(4)), and it gives no co-owner standing in a partition. An intestate spouse with children who co-owned the flat 50/50 therefore ends up with about three quarters of it, not one quarter.
2. **How the estate division runs.** Heirs divide by agreement or by court order (Section 110(a)). If they divide by agreement, Sections 112 to 117 do not apply (Section 110(d)). If the court divides, it follows the will's distribution directions unless there are special reasons, and applies Sections 112 to 117 only where the will gives none (Section 111(c)).
3. **Inside a court-ordered division (not a division by agreement, Section 110(d)).** An indivisible asset goes to the heir who bids highest, at no less than market value, credited against that heir's share; it is sold only if no heir wants it (Section 113(a)-(b)). And the spouse, children and parents who lived with the deceased-owner in the flat may stay as tenants of the heirs who receive it, at a rent fixed by agreement or by the court (Section 115(a)); on the heirs' application the court may limit that to those with no other home, or to part of the flat including the kitchen and service rooms (Section 115(b)).
4. **After registration as co-owners.** Any co-owner may demand dissolution of the co-ownership at any time (Land Law Section 37(a)); an indivisible flat is sold and the proceeds divided (Section 40(a)), by execution-style sale unless the court orders another way (Section 40(b)). Whether the Section 115 tenancy can still be raised once the heirs are registered and a Land Law dissolution suit is filed is not settled by the text of either statute. Do not present the two as layered protections: tell the user to get an advocate's advice BEFORE signing a division agreement or registering at the Tabu.
5. **Transitional stay regardless.** Anyone who lived with the deceased in the flat (owned or rented) may stay three months after the death, an heir six, and use the household chattels (Section 108(a)).
6. **Planning it in the will.** A testator who wants the spouse to keep living in the home must provide for it in the will; one statutory tool is a successive-heir clause (יורש אחר יורש, Section 42). The first heir may deal freely with what they receive, and the second takes only what remains (Section 42(b)). Whether a will giving the flat outright to the children defeats the spouse's Section 115 tenancy (as a distribution direction under Section 111(c), or as a gift that removes the flat from the division) is arguable; the prudent reading is that it likely does. This is a drafting decision for an advocate.

## When to send the user to a lawyer
- An heir disputes the will or the heirs (an objection is likely).
- The estate has a business, foreign assets, a trust, or debts that may exceed assets.
- Minor children need a guardian appointed.
- The will's validity is in doubt (form defects, capacity questions, duress or undue influence under Section 30, or a beneficiary who took part in making it under Section 35).
- An heir is a minor: dealings in a minor's flat, registration-dependent acts, and any legal act between the minor and the parents or the parents' relatives other than receiving gifts (which includes a division agreement between a widowed parent and minor children) need advance approval (Legal Capacity and Guardianship Law Section 20(a)(1), (2), (5); since the 2024 amendment the request goes first to the Public Trustee under Section 74א), and a minor's disclaimer needs court approval (Section 6(c)).
- A co-heir wants to sell the family home over the objection of the spouse living in it (Land Law Sections 37 and 40; Succession Law Section 115).