How to Resolve Inheritance Disputes When a Gift Contract Is Void in Vietnam

Ms. Mai (name changed), a Vietnamese American, asked DEDICA:

"My father passed away early this year in Ho Chi Minh City without leaving a will. When I came back for the funeral, the family discovered that my youngest brother had received the entire house from him under a 'gift contract'. The contract was signed while my father was hospitalized after a stroke and no longer lucid; my mother co-owns the house but never signed or was even consulted. My brother has already transferred the title into his name and is now listing the house for sale. I live in the US and can only spend a few days in Vietnam each trip. I don't know whether we can reclaim the house and divide it as inheritance, or where to even begin. I hope the lawyers can answer my questions."

DEDICA ADVISES Inheritance disputes arising from a void gift contract, as in Ms. Mai's case, are among the matters DEDICA handles most often for families with relatives settled abroad: the deceased never clearly disposed of the assets, one family member quickly "formalizes" ownership, and everyone else is left unsure where to begin. The answer turns on six distinct issues: (1) whether the gift contract falls under any ground of invalidity; (2) if it is void, whether the asset returns to the estate for division among heirs; (3) whether the limitation periods for filing suit are still open; (4) which court has jurisdiction and how the proceedings unfold; (5) how to stop the house from being sold while the dispute is pending; and (6) how an heir living abroad can carry out all of this. DEDICA walks through each issue in turn so that Ms. Mai, and anyone in a similar position, has the full picture before acting.

Grounds that render a gift contract for real estate void

A civil transaction is valid only when it meets all the conditions under Article 117 of the Civil Code 2015: legal capacity, voluntariness, content that does not violate statutory prohibitions, and the form required by law. Missing any of these, the transaction is void under Article 122. For real estate, the formal requirements are strict:

The Land Law 2024 repeats the notarization or certification requirement for contracts gifting land use rights (Point a, Clause 3, Article 27), and only allows a gift where the land already has a Certificate of title (the "pink book"), is free of disputes, is not seized for judgment enforcement, and remains within its use term (Clause 1, Article 45). In practice, disputes revolve around four groups of invalidity grounds:

• The donor could not perceive or control their actions at the time of signing. This is the ground closest to Ms. Mai's situation: her father signed the contract while hospitalized after a stroke. The law distinguishes two scenarios: a person already declared by a court to have lost civil act capacity who nonetheless transacts alone (Article 125), and a person with no such court declaration who was nevertheless not lucid at the very moment of signing (Article 128). The second is far more common, proven through medical records, treatment files, witness testimony or forensic assessment.
• Disposal of marital common property without the other spouse's consent. A house acquired during the marriage is, as a rule, common property; the husband alone signing away the entire house exceeds his authority.
• A sham contract, meaning one created to conceal another transaction or to evade obligations toward a third party (Article 124), for example a "gift" used to shelter assets from creditors.
• Deception, threat or coercion at signing (Article 127), or a forged signature.

Ms. Mai's situation presents several potential grounds at once: the father signed while no longer lucid, the mother co-owned the house but never signed, and a certification carried out in a hospital calls for a close review of procedure. Not every ground needs to succeed: it takes only one ground accepted by the Court for the contract to be void. The decisive factor is evidence, which is why assembling the file must come before any hard-line declarations to the other side.

What happens to the house once the gift contract is declared void

Article 131 of the Civil Code 2015 spells out the legal consequences: a void transaction creates, changes or terminates no rights or obligations of the parties from the moment it was entered into; the parties "restore the original state and return to each other what they have received". In plain terms: legally, the house is treated as if it had never been gifted. Ownership returns to Ms. Mai's parents as it stood before the signing date, even though the brother managed to transfer the title, because the Court may also annul an unlawfully issued Certificate within the same case (Article 34, Civil Procedure Code 2015).

The deceased's share then becomes the inheritance estate:

Applied to this situation: the house is the parents' common property, so the father's estate is half the value of the house; the other half remains the mother's and is not divided. With no will, this estate passes by operation of law (Article 650) to the first order of heirs, comprising the spouse, surviving birth parents and the children, each taking an equal share (Article 651). The youngest brother still receives his share like every other co-heir; what he loses is only the "entire house" that the void contract once handed him.

One misconception needs correcting in both directions. First: "the title has already been transferred, it's done, nothing can be reclaimed". Not true. Registration does not "cure" a void contract; if a ground of invalidity is proven, the Court declares the contract void and annuls the issued certificate. The reverse: "as long as the title was never transferred, we are certain to get the property back". Equally wrong. Case Precedent No. 52/2021/AL of the Council of Judges of the Supreme People's Court addressed precisely this situation:

That is, where the contract was validly notarized or certified, the donor never changed their mind before death, and the failure to register was due only to an objective procedural obstacle, the Court must recognize the contract as effective, and the asset does not return to the estate. The crux of this type of dispute therefore lies not in "whether the title has been transferred", but in proving whether the contract suffers from a substantive ground of invalidity: intent, awareness, the co-owner's consent, and the validity of the notarization or certification step.

Limitation periods: two clocks running side by side

This case involves two different legal claims, and each runs on its own limitation clock. This is the point many people mistakenly merge into one:

One procedural detail that few articles mention, and it is worth a great deal: under Clause 2, Article 184 of the Civil Procedure Code 2015, the Court applies a limitation period only at the request of a party, and that request must be made before the first-instance court issues its judgment. In other words, an expired period does not automatically defeat the claim; even so, betting on the other side forgetting to invoke the limitation period is a poor strategy.

Filing procedure and the competent court

Good news for those far away: all three claims (declaring the gift contract void, annulling the Certificate issued to the donee, and dividing the estate) are resolved together in a single civil case. Disputes over inheritance and disputes over civil transactions both fall within the jurisdiction of the courts (Article 26, Civil Procedure Code 2015), and the court resolving the dispute has the power to annul an unlawful individual decision, including a land use right certificate, within the same case (Article 34).

As for where to file, because the subject of the dispute is real estate, there is no choosing a court by place of residence:

An important update that many older articles have not yet caught up with: from 01/7/2025, Vietnam's court system no longer has district-level courts; first-instance civil disputes are heard by the Regional People's Court of the place where the property is located (Article 35, Civil Procedure Code 2015, as amended and supplemented in 2025). A typical lawsuit proceeds as follows:

1. Gather evidence before filing: the father's medical and treatment records for the period when the contract was signed; the notarization or certification file (who certified, where, and whether the signer was present); documents proving the house is the parents' common property; papers establishing the family relationships of the co-heirs. Where a forged signature is suspected, a forensic examination can be requested.
2. File the statement of claim with supporting documents at the Regional People's Court of the place where the house is located; advance the court fees as notified by the Court.
3. The Court accepts the case and holds the evidence disclosure session and mediation. Quite a few cases end at this step with a renegotiated division, far faster and gentler than a trial.
4. First-instance trial; if an appeal is lodged, the case moves to the appellate level.
5. Judgment enforcement: annulment of the certificate, re-registration of ownership and division of the estate under the judgment.

In practice, the time from filing to a final, enforceable judgment is measured in years rather than months, especially where forensic assessment is needed or the other side appeals. That is one more reason to assemble the evidence cleanly from the start instead of drip-feeding documents upon the Court's requests.

Stopping the house from being sold to a third party during the dispute

The detail "my brother is listing the house for sale" is the most urgent part of Ms. Mai's question, because the law protects good-faith purchasers who rely on an issued certificate:

In everyday terms: if the brother manages to sell the house to a buyer who did not and could not know about the dispute, and that buyer relies on the already transferred title, the sale may be upheld by law; the family can no longer reclaim the house. The co-heirs would then be left only with claims against the brother for restitution and monetary compensation, an option that is both hard to enforce and means losing the very house tied to the family.

The tool that shuts down this risk is provisional emergency measures: together with the lawsuit, the claimant may ask the Court to order a "prohibition on transferring property rights in respect of the property in dispute" (Clause 7, Article 114, Civil Procedure Code 2015). Once this order is issued, the land registration office and notarial organizations will not process any sale, gift or mortgage of the house until the case is resolved. In parallel, lawyers typically send written notices of the dispute to the land registration office and the notarial practices in the area, adding a practical layer of protection while waiting for the Court to accept the case.

Options for heirs living abroad

Around 70% of DEDICA's inheritance clients live abroad and cannot stay in Vietnam to pursue litigation; procedural law has a ready answer for this. Ms. Mai does not need to be present throughout the process: she can authorize a lawyer in Vietnam to act on her behalf in the proceedings, from filing the claim and submitting evidence to attending mediation and hearings. A power of attorney executed in the US must be notarized under the law of the place of execution and consularly legalized to be recognized by Vietnamese courts (Article 478, Civil Procedure Code 2015); if executed at a Vietnamese diplomatic mission in the host country, the legalization step is waived. This entire file can be prepared remotely, and it is exactly the part DEDICA guides clients to get right from the start so the Court does not return the file over paperwork defects.

Another common worry: "I now hold US citizenship, can I still receive my inheritance share of a house and land in Vietnam?". Foreign citizenship does not extinguish inheritance rights; the only question is the form in which you receive them. For persons of Vietnamese origin like Ms. Mai, the Land Law 2024 is explicit:

That is, if she is permitted to enter Vietnam, Ms. Mai can fully hold title to the share of the property allocated to her. Where an heir does not qualify to own housing in Vietnam, the law still preserves their interest through its value: the estate share is transferred and the heir receives the proceeds (Clause 3, Article 44, Land Law 2024). Many DEDICA clients choose this route outright: receive the inheritance share in kind, then sell it and remit the money abroad under the lawful foreign-currency transfer procedure. That is a separate topic DEDICA will analyze in another article.

If your family is facing a questionable gift contract (signed while a loved one was gravely ill, missing a co-owner's signature, or suspected of forgery), send DEDICA a copy of the contract, the certificate and a brief description of the circumstances of signing. DEDICA's lawyers will assess the grounds of invalidity and the remaining limitation periods, propose an overall strategy, and represent clients living abroad under power of attorney through litigation and judgment enforcement, until your inheritance share is actually in your hands.

This article is for general reference as of its publication date; every case turns on its own facts, so please consult DEDICA's lawyers directly for advice tailored to your situation.