WILLEMSTAD – Complicated inheritance disputes, a shortage of notaries and lengthy government procedures are preventing residential properties across Curaçao from returning to the housing market, sometimes leaving homes abandoned for decades.
Johan van Megesen raises the issue in an opinion article published on Economenclub.com, the website of Dutch Caribbean Economists, under the title “De Curaçaose woningcrisis: kijk eerst naar onszelf.”
According to Van Megesen, unresolved estates are among the structural obstacles contributing to Curaçao's housing shortage. While attention often focuses on foreign property investors and rising real estate prices, he argues that weaknesses in the island's legal and administrative systems are keeping existing homes out of reach.
The problem frequently begins when a property owner dies without leaving a will or when the estate is never formally divided among surviving relatives.
Over time, the number of heirs can increase substantially. Children inherit shares in the property, and when they die, their descendants may inherit those interests.
After several generations, a single property can have dozens of legal heirs living in Curaçao, the Netherlands or elsewhere.
Some heirs may be impossible to locate, while others may be unaware that they have an ownership interest. Disagreements about selling, renovating or dividing the property can create further complications.
Van Megesen explains that these circumstances can leave homes trapped in undivided estates, making it difficult or impossible for anyone to sell or develop them.
He also identifies serious administrative delays.
Before an inheritance can be settled, notaries often need birth certificates, death certificates, civil registry information and other official records to establish the identities and legal rights of the heirs.
Obtaining those documents can take months and, according to the article, sometimes longer than a year.
A shortage of active notaries adds to the difficulties. Van Megesen describes inheritance files involving individuals who died as far back as 1949 or even 1895, illustrating how long unresolved ownership arrangements can survive.
When heirs cannot agree, cases may also require judicial intervention, creating additional delays before a property can be transferred or sold.
Curaçao's Civil Code already contains a legal mechanism under Article 3:200a that can help address certain long-standing undivided ownership arrangements. A court may appoint a liquidator to facilitate a resolution, including the sale of property where legally appropriate.
However, Van Megesen argues that the existence of a legal mechanism is not enough if the institutions responsible for implementing it lack sufficient capacity.
He proposes a coordinated approach involving more efficient civil registry services, faster judicial procedures and enough notaries to process outstanding cases.
He also calls for reforms that would prevent future generations from inheriting the same administrative problems.
Under his proposal, estates containing real estate should be settled within a reasonable, enforceable period after the owner's death. Ownership would either be formally transferred to the heirs or the property sold.
Such a requirement would represent a significant change in how Curaçao handles inherited real estate and would require careful consideration of property rights, inheritance law and the circumstances of individual families.
Van Megesen's central argument is that the housing shortage cannot be resolved through construction alone if existing properties remain legally inaccessible.
For the government, his analysis raises a broader question: whether improving the administration of inheritance and property ownership could become an important part of Curaçao's housing policy.