This guide explains UAE procedure in general terms. It is general information, not legal advice for a specific estate; the family tree that actually matters is yours, and a UAE-licensed lawyer should run it.
Article 11(2) counts children, one by one
The civil-track default for non-Muslim residents sits in Article 11(2) of Federal Decree-Law No. 41 of 2022, in force since 1 February 2023. Where there is a spouse and there are children, the article gives half the estate to "the husband or wife" and orders that "the other half shall be distributed equally among the children with no differentiation between male and female."
Read that sentence the way a court will. It sorts people into two categories, spouse and children, and it counts heads inside each. A daughter born during your first marriage, twenty years ago, in another country, occupies the same category as the son born in Dubai last year, and each takes an equal slice of the children's half. The published text attaches no marriage condition and no residence condition to the word "children". The whole rule compresses into one line: every child of the deceased is an heir regardless of which marriage they were born into. What the process does demand is proof of the relationship: for a foreign-born child that means a birth certificate translated into Arabic and attested in the country of origin, at the UAE mission there, and at the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
On the personal status track under Federal Decree-Law 41/2024, in force since 15 April 2025, the counting logic is identical and the fractions differ. Article 212(1) gives the wife a quarter if the husband leaves no inheriting descendant and one eighth if he leaves one. The trigger is an inheriting descendant of the husband, whichever marriage he or she was born into, so a child of the first marriage moves the widow from a quarter to an eighth exactly as a joint child would. The children then take what remains after the fixed shares are paid, a son receiving twice the share of a daughter under Article 217(2), and where the deceased also leaves parents, fixed sixths can come out before the children count their residue. The full arithmetic for a specific family runs through Articles 205 to 233 and this piece will not fake precision on it; a lawyer runs your actual heir list through those rules.
The surviving spouse's half has a second destination. It arrives as her own property. When she later dies, her estate passes to her own heirs in the statutory order: her children, her parents, her siblings. Your children from your first marriage are her stepchildren, and a stepchild sits in none of the categories Article 11(2) lists, and outside the definition of an inheriting descendant in Article 207 on the personal status track. Whatever part of your wealth entered her half stays in her household permanently. Nothing in the default routes her half back to your first-marriage children later. For the wider position of the children you raise without a legal tie, see what the default does with the children who are not legally yours.
Both tracks were recodified recently: the civil rules date from 1 February 2023, the personal status law from 15 April 2025. Anything you read that cites Law 28 of 2005 predates the current article numbering.
The Two-Household Split, worked through the family home
The framework this section builds is The Two-Household Split (default outcomes across the common blended configurations, showing the exact fractions and who co-owns which asset with whom the day after the estate vests). It runs the three commonest blended configurations through the civil-track default, using the family home as the asset, because the home is where co-ownership bites first. Assume the villa stood in the deceased husband's sole name; swap the genders freely, the arithmetic holds.
His children, her children, one joint child
He dies leaving his wife, two children from his first marriage, her two children from hers, and one child they had together. His heirs are the wife plus three children: his own two and the joint one. The wife takes half the villa. Each of the three heirs takes one sixth. Her two children from her earlier marriage take no share of his estate. Five children grew up in that house; three of them now own pieces of it.
Children on one side only
He dies leaving his wife and two children from his first marriage, and the couple had none together. The wife takes half; each child takes a quarter. If those children are adults living with their mother abroad, the day-one ownership of the family home reads: widow one half, two adult children of the first marriage one quarter each. The three of them now form a co-ownership none of them designed.
Second marriage, no joint children
Both spouses brought children into the marriage and had none together. On his death, his wife takes half, his children split the other half, and her children take nothing from him. On her later death the mirror applies: her own heirs take her estate, including the half that arrived from him, and his children sit outside it. Each child inherits through one parent only, so the order of deaths quietly decides which household ends up holding the pooled wealth.
One configuration this piece declines to fill in: a second marriage where the deceased has no children of their own at all, only stepchildren. Article 11(2) as published jumps from the spouse-and-children case straight to "if the deceased has no children, the legacy shall devolve to the parents", and the spouse's exact share where a parent or sibling survives is unresolved on the face of the text. That one goes to a UAE-licensed lawyer with the documents on the table, and guessing at it in an article would be malpractice by blog.
Run The Two-Household Split on your own family in ten minutes: find your row, write the fractions next to the names of your actual children, then check those names against your current title deed.
| Configuration | Heirs by default (civil track) | The family home, day one | Who co-owns with whom |
|---|---|---|---|
| His children, her children, joint children | Spouse plus every child of the deceased (own and joint); the spouse's children from a prior marriage are outside the estate | Spouse 1/2; his own and joint children split 1/2 equally (three heirs-children: 1/6 each) | Widow on one deed with the joint child and the first household's children |
| Children from one side only | Spouse plus the deceased's children | Spouse 1/2; two children take 1/4 each | Widow with adult stepchildren, possibly resident abroad |
| Second marriage, no joint children | On each death: the survivor plus that spouse's own children only | Spouse 1/2; his children split 1/2; her children take nothing from his estate, and vice versa | The surviving spouse co-owns with the other household's children; order of deaths decides where the pooled wealth lands |
| No children of your own, stepchildren only | Cascade moves toward parents and siblings; the spouse's precise share here is unresolved on the published text of Article 11(2) | This cell stays empty on purpose. Lawyer, with documents | Unknown until a court rules |
| Any of the above, personal status track | Widow 1/8 (an inheriting descendant from either marriage triggers it); children share the residue, sons at twice daughters; parents can take fixed sixths (FDL 41/2024, Arts 205 to 233) | Fractions depend on the complete heir list | Same co-ownership outcome, different fractions |
The morning after: one villa, several owners
Fractions on paper become signatures in practice. The heir list itself is fixed first: the death certificate goes to a UAE court, and the heirs institute succession proceedings for a certificate of succession (in practice also called a legal heir certificate; some English materials still say Declaration of Heirs), the court document that establishes who inherits and in what shares. Everything downstream keys off that list. Onshore UAE property carries no right of survivorship: the deceased's share goes through succession and lands on the title deed in the court-determined split. The paperwork runs through the Dubai Land Department's Inheritance Title Transfer service, which requires the Legal Notification of Inheritance, an official letter from the court requesting the transfer, identity documents for every heir, and a No Objection Letter from the lender if the property is mortgaged. The DLD fee is a flat AED 1,000 per property plus fixed title deed and map charges (DLD published schedule, checked 25 July 2026). The output is a new deed carrying every heir's name.
What can the widow do with her half? Sell: a sale by heirs runs through the DLD's own heirs' sale procedure, under which the proceeds reach the heirs through the Department of Trusts, and a residential property needs an approval application to the investigation committee first (DLD service description, checked 25 July 2026). Every registered co-owner is inside that transaction, including the two adult children of the first marriage, wherever they live and however the relationship stands. Refinance or borrow: the title secures nothing new without all its owners, and if the old mortgage is still running, the DLD condition means the transfer itself waits for the bank's letter. Whether a lender will rewrite a deceased borrower's mortgage in the names of a widow and her co-heirs is the lender's decision; the published requirement proves only that nothing moves without its NOC.
Now make one co-owner nine years old. A minor cannot sign, so the minor's share is administered under guardianship of property, an office separate from day-to-day custody. On the personal status track, guardianship over a minor's property belongs to the father, then to a tutor the father named, then to the paternal grandfather, then to the court (Article 129, FDL 41/2024); where the deceased was the father, that list has already lost its first entry. The court appoints and supervises following its own criteria, and any dealing with the minor's share happens inside that file. How a specific sale gets approved, and on whose signature, is a question for your lawyer before you promise a buyer anything. How guardianship of children actually works here covers the people side of the same event.
While the title is working through the court, the deceased's bank accounts sit frozen, joint accounts included: Article 379(4) of Federal Decree-Law 50/2022 obliges the surviving co-holder to notify the bank within ten days of the death and suspends withdrawals from the deceased's share until a successor is appointed. Why the accounts freeze, and what a family can still use covers the cash; the full week-by-week timeline covers the sequence.
Under Article 11(3) of the civil personal status law, where no will is registered, any single heir may ask the court to apply the law that the UAE's conflict rules point to, generally the law of the deceased's nationality. A second wife and the adult children of a first marriage can hold directly opposed views on whether some other country's succession rules would treat them better, and the statute hands that lever to each of them individually. The election is available "unless there is a registered will to the contrary" (Article 11(3), Federal Decree-Law 41/2022).
The families the default already serves
Half to the spouse, half equally to the children is a defensible design, and for many families it is the right one. Where every child in the household is a child of both spouses, the default tracks what most couples would have drafted anyway: the survivor keeps half, the children stand equal, daughters and sons alike. If that describes your family, your children are adults, and the co-ownership mechanics above hold no surprises for you, deliberate allocation buys you little. Some families genuinely have nothing to purchase here.
Much the same holds for a second marriage where both spouses arrived with their assets already separated, each intends their own children to take their own estate, and the third configuration's arithmetic matches the plan. The default will deliver exactly that, provided each spouse accepts that the other's half never comes back across.
Two exposures survive even in those households. A minor child inserts a court-supervised guardianship file between the family and the child's share regardless of how content everyone is with the fractions. And Article 11(3) stays open to every heir until a will is registered, so the settled arithmetic holds only while every heir chooses to leave it alone. Where allocation does need to be deliberate, the place you register it is its own decision: which registry route fits which profile.
Last updated: 25 July 2026 · Changelog: 2026-07-25: first published.
Frequently asked questions
Will my children from my first marriage inherit in Dubai if they live abroad?
By the categories of Article 11(2), yes: the children's half is divided among the deceased's children and the text attaches no residence condition to the word. The work is documentary. A foreign-born child proves the relationship with a birth certificate translated into Arabic and attested in the country of origin, by the UAE mission there and by the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Because no published provision addresses prior-marriage children living abroad in so many words, have a UAE-licensed lawyer confirm the position for your nationality before anyone builds plans on it.
Does my current wife's half ever reach my first children?
By default, no. Her half becomes her own property, and on her death it passes to her heirs in the statutory order: her children, then her parents, then her siblings. Your children from your first marriage are her stepchildren, and a stepchild appears in no default category on any UAE track. If you want value to travel from her household back to yours after both deaths, one of you writes that instruction into a registered will. The arithmetic will never route it there on its own.
Can a registered will leave the UAE estate entirely to my current wife?
On the civil track, Article 11(1) of Federal Decree-Law 41/2022 gives a testator the right to leave a will over the entire UAE property "in favor of anybody he wants", subject to controls in the law's Executive Regulations. That freedom cuts both ways: it can send everything to the current spouse, or it can fix specific gifts for first-marriage children so the two households stop depending on each other's goodwill. A registered will also closes the Article 11(3) route by which one heir could pull the estate toward foreign law. What your home country layers on top is a question for a lawyer there.
How does the counting work if we are Muslim?
The fixed shares of Federal Decree-Law 41/2024 apply. A widow takes one eighth where the husband leaves any inheriting descendant, from either marriage; a widower in the mirror case takes one quarter. The children, again from either marriage, share the residue after the fixed shares, a son taking twice a daughter's portion. Bequests are capped at one third of the net estate, and a bequest to an existing heir generally needs the other heirs' consent under Article 184, subject to a narrow exception where the court acknowledges a likely interest. Article 1(3) lets a non-citizen insist on the application of their own national law; whether and how to use that election is squarely a question for a UAE-licensed lawyer.
Do stepchildren I have raised for years take anything by default?
No UAE default gives them a share: they fall outside the categories of Article 11(2) on the civil track and outside the definition of an inheriting descendant in Article 207 on the personal status track. A registered will can name a stepchild as a beneficiary like any other person, and the gift stands on its own terms. Naming them confers the gift only; nothing in the will mechanism creates parentage, guardianship standing or visa status. If a child you are raising has no legal tie to you, allocate for that child by will; the default will not.
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