Conversation and document review
We establish what actually matters to you: money, a particular asset, speed, or avoiding conflict. That determines the strategy.
PRACTICE / 06
Family disputes, division of assets and inheritance matters
A calm approach to matters that are rarely discussed calmly.
- Matters
- Family and inheritance
- Format
- Agreement or litigation
- Consultation
- Free with an engagement
Family and inheritance matters are almost always about property and relationships at the same time. Sometimes it is better to agree and sign than to spend three years dividing a flat in court and lose more than the dispute is worth. Sometimes there is nobody to agree with and rights have to be secured quickly.
We say plainly which of those your situation is, and we run the matter to the end — including enforcement of the judgment.
What we do
- Draft prenuptial agreements and agreements on the division of property — before marriage, during it and on divorce.
- Handle divorce proceedings, including where children and property are in dispute.
- Act in proceedings to have a marriage declared invalid.
- Divide matrimonial property, including businesses, participation interests, real estate and joint debts.
- Handle inheritance matters: acceptance of an estate, restoration of a missed deadline, challenges to a will, division of the estate, disputes over the compulsory share.
- Handle other private client disputes: housing, employment, credit, insurance and customs.
- Protect consumer rights: refunds, penalties and compensation.
- Recover debts under promissory notes, loans and contracts — from the demand letter through to work with the bailiffs.
- Challenge refusals and decisions of public authorities, and their failure to respond to citizens' applications.
- Appeal judgments to the appellate and cassation courts and seek review on newly discovered grounds.
Typical situations
- A divorce where the main asset is a business or a shareholding and your spouse is understating its value.
- The property is registered in the names of your spouse's relatives, so formally there is nothing to divide.
- You missed the deadline for accepting an estate because you did not know the deceased had died.
- A will has surfaced that the family had never heard of, made shortly before death.
- A bank or an insurer is refusing to pay, relying on a clause of the contract you are seeing for the first time.
Commercial disputes in Russia are heard by the arbitrazh courts — the state commercial courts, not private arbitration tribunals; disputes involving individuals go to the courts of general jurisdiction.
HOW THE WORK IS ORGANISED
How the work is organised
The out-of-court route
We prepare an agreement or a proposal to the other side. If there is any chance of closing the matter without court, we try that first.
Court
Claim, interim relief over the disputed property, expert evidence and valuation, conduct of the case at first instance and on appeal.
Enforcement
We register the rights, obtain the writ of execution and work with the bailiffs. A judgment that is not enforced is not yet a result.
RESULTS
Cases from this practice
Family law2026
4children — each one's interests reflected in the new order
Child maintenance redistributed after the eldest child came of age
Our client has four children, two from a previous marriage, for whom he paid maintenance under a court order. When the eldest son turned 18, the payments for the other children did not recalculate automatically — only a court can change the amount. We prepared the claim, ran the proceedings and in July 2026 obtained a new judgment with the recalculation. The parties' names are not disclosed.
Read the case
Civil disputes2021
3instances completed
Claim on a 2010 loan defeated on limitation grounds
Our client was sued on promissory notes dating from 2010 that had been assigned under an assignment agreement. We pleaded limitation, lost at first instance and secured the complete reversal of the judgment on appeal; the cassation court upheld that decision.
Read the case
Civil disputes2021
RUB 50,000+advance payment recovered
Advance recovered and contract terminated over a defective advertising structure
The customer paid for the manufacture and installation of an advertising structure but received a result with substantial defects. The contract was terminated, the advance and interest recovered, and the judgment upheld on appeal.
Read the case
QUESTIONS
Frequently asked questions
Is a spouse's business divided on divorce?
A participation interest acquired during the marriage forms part of the joint property. The dispute is usually not about that but about the value of the interest and what happened to the company's assets in the past year — which is why we bring a valuer in alongside the family lawyer.
How long after divorce can property be divided?
Three years, but the period runs from the moment you learned that your right had been infringed — for instance when your former spouse disposed of the joint flat — rather than from the date of the divorce. Delay is still unwise: proving what the property consisted of becomes harder over time.
What can be done if the deadline for accepting an estate has been missed?
The court can restore the deadline where the reason for missing it was legitimate — for example, you neither knew nor could have known of the death. The application must be made within six months of that reason ceasing, so we take these matters on quickly.
Can the dispute be resolved without going to court?
Often yes: by an agreement on the division of property, a prenuptial agreement, a maintenance agreement or an agreement on dividing the estate. We always cost that option first — it is cheaper, faster and keeps family matters out of open court.
What happens at the first consultation on a family matter?
It is a conversation and a review of the documents you have. We establish what actually matters to you — a specific asset, money, speed or avoiding conflict — and propose a strategy on that basis. With an engagement the consultation is free.
PRACTICE SERVICES
Individual services
01 / SERVICE
Divorce
You have decided to divorce, but your spouse objects, has gone silent or lives abroad, and the children, maintenance and the flat still need sorting out.
02 / SERVICE
Division of marital property
The marriage is ending, the joint property is in one spouse's name, some has already gone to relatives, and the mortgage is still running.
03 / SERVICE
Child support and maintenance
The other parent does not pay, pays on the minimum wage, or is demanding more than you can afford.
04 / SERVICE
Determining where children live
The parents have separated and cannot agree who the child will live with or how the other parent will see them.
05 / SERVICE
Prenuptial agreements
A marriage contract makes sense when one spouse has a business, substantial pre-marital assets, a mortgage or debts.
06 / SERVICE
Entering into an inheritance
Someone close to you has died, and the inheritance has to be dealt with: gathering documents, finding the assets and meeting the deadlines.
07 / SERVICE
Inheritance disputes
The heirs cannot agree who gets the flat, someone is hiding assets, or someone is claiming a share the others believe they are not entitled to.
08 / SERVICE
Challenging a will
A will has surfaced that the family knew nothing about, or it was made shortly before death in favour of an outsider.
NEXT STEP
Let us look at your situation
The consultation is free when an engagement is signed: we tell you whether the matter has prospects and roughly what running it will cost.