This may look weird to many of you who often believe that it is better for clients to prepare separate wills for overseas properties. To a large extent, the conventional wisdom in cross-border estate planning is correct, but not necessarily in the case of China.
Main reason is that China private international laws say in a foreign-related inheritance case, the validity of a will shall be determined in accordance with the laws at the place of habitual residence of the testator or the state law of that testator, at the time of making the will or death. This law has indeed handicapped China lawyers in helping international clients in preparing their wills for their China assets if the clients don’t have habitual residence in China.
For example, Peter, a UK citizen, bought a property in Shanghai when he worked in Shanghai, and then he went back to HK for some years losing his habitual residence status in China, and now he wants to write a will for his Shanghai property. If Peter finds me for help, I am not really in a position to offer this help.
For more, please read my blog article at www .sinoblawg.com.
Thanks.