Legal and Finance Legal Rules and Regulations of Cohabiting in Greece
Rules and Regulations of Cohabiting in Greece
The legislators in Greece, after too many years of discussions and social protests, decided in the year 2008, to approve and legally acknowledge, the union of two free persons (heterosexuals at the moment).
The Law 3719/2008 which was published in the Government's Gazette on the 26th November 2008, declares the below:
1. Two adults people -heterosexual-, who are not married, nor related, can attend a notary public's office and declare their wish to live together. They sign a specific legal
agreement. The written declaration/agreement becomes valid, upon the registration of it, to the register's office, where they reside. With this agreement, two people, a man and a woman, declare their wish to live together, but, they do not want to get married.
2. The two persons must not be married to others, or joint, with an adoption act.
3. The agreement must be signed by the involved parties themselves and not by giving to someone a specific power of attorney.
4. The cohabiting agreement can be cancelled: a) if the two persons attend a notary public's office and declare their wish to stop living together, b) if one of the two people decides to do so and attends the notary public's office, signs the cancellation document and serves this document to the other party via a bailiff and c) if one of them gets married to another person, or, if they decide to get married either in a church, or in a Town Hall. All above actions a, b and c, must be registered to the register's office where one of them, or, both, reside.
5. By deciding to cohabit, the persons keep their surname and only by the consent of their partner, can use his/her surname in their social life.
6. With the cohabiting agreement or with another one later on, the couple can arrange all their assets which may be purchased during their joint life together. If there is no agreement for these matters, every part has the right to take court actions to legally claim whatever he/she believes he/she entitled, from the other party's acquired assets, during their life together.
7. The party who cannot support herself/himself either from his/her work or existing assets, upon the abolition of their cohabiting agreement, can receive alimony from the other party.
8. The child who was born during the cohabiting agreement, or 300 days from the abolition of it, is declared to have as father, the man whom his mother signed the agreement.
9. The child's surname may be only his/her mothers, or his father's, or both the surnames of the involved parties.
10. The party, whose partner died, has inheritance rights to his/her assets.