“Everything disappeared in a second”

For years, V.B. believed her father’s property would be divided equally among his four children. She was only eight years old when her mother died. Her father had two daughters from his first marriage and also a son and a daughter from his second. He had repeatedly told the children that each of them would receive an equal share of the property.

For V.B., this carried additional weight. As she says, part of the family’s property had also been acquired through her late mother’s contributions.

Before his death, her father drew up a will that, according to V.B., included all four children equally. But several months later, however, as his health deteriorated, the will was revoked. V.B. says her father told her that her half-brother, with whom he was living, had pushed him to change it.

After her father’s death, the family property — including a large house with a yard and a large commercial property in the center of Gjakova — was registered in her half-brother’s name.

For eight months, V.B. and her sister tried to resolve the dispute within the family. At first, their brother promised to compensate them for the house, but refused to negotiate over the commercial property, insisting that it belonged to him because he was the son.

After eight months of waiting, V.B. says he denied ever promising that amount and instead offered what she describes as a “ridiculous” sum.

Now that negotiations have failed, V.B. and her sister have started legal proceedings to seek what they believe is their rightful share.

But seeking justice also comes with an emotional cost.

For V.B., starting the legal process means not only entering a legal dispute, but repeatedly returning to a conflict she had hoped could be resolved within the family.

“It is not only financially costly, but emotionally painful too,” says V.B.

V.B.’s story is not simply a dispute over family property, but a reflection of a wider gap between women’s legal right to inherit and their actual access to family property in Kosovo.

Women remain significantly underrepresented among registered property owners in Kosovo. In 2024, women owned or co-owned around 19.8% of properties recorded in Kosovo’s cadastral registry. By 2025, the figure had risen to 21.5%.

But these figures do not show how much family property women inherit. They also include properties women have purchased themselves, as well as jointly owned property registered in their names and those of their husbands.

To understand what lies behind the numbers, K2.0 surveyed 22 women about their experiences with family inheritance: how property was divided, what explanations they were given, whether they had ever claimed the share they were entitled to and how these experiences had affected their lives.

Of the 22 respondents, 14 currently own property in their name, while eight do not. But owning property does not necessarily mean inheriting it. Of the 14 women who own property, only five acquired it through family inheritance. Seven bought property themselves with their own income, while two co-own property with a spouse or partner.

When it comes specifically to inheritance, nine women said they had never received the share they were entitled to, while in another six cases, the family property has not yet been divided. Only five said they had received a share equal to that of their brothers, while two said they had received a smaller share.

Meanwhile, 15 of the 22 women said they felt free to accept, claim or renounce their inheritance, while seven said they did not. Six women said they had not been informed of their legal rights before a decision was made.

In many of the cases included in the survey, family property was passed on to the son, often without any explanation.

A 54-year-old woman from Prishtina says: “My brother inherited it. While us, the sisters, got nothing.”

Asked why, she says: “No reason was given. It was simply given to my brother.” She describes the experience as leaving her feeling “frustrated, undervalued and unequal.”

For a 45-year-old woman from Prishtina, the message was more explicit. After the family property was passed to her brother, she was told: “You have your own home.”

She says she had to build her life without support from her family.

“I had to start from scratch. I financed everything myself. I never received any help.”

In another case, a 54-year-old woman from Prizren says her brother secretly completed the inheritance proceedings a year after their father’s death, declaring himself the sole heir despite having four sisters.

“He took all the property for himself without our permission,” she says. When asked what explanation she was given, she answers: “Not a single one.”

However, the experiences of the women surveyed vary.

A 39-year-old woman from Prishtina says she received an equal share of the family property without having to ask for it.

“There was no need. Everything had been arranged beforehand.” Her parents had told her and her brother: “You are equal, just as the love, care and security that we have given you and had been equal.”

For a 62-year-old woman from Ferizaj, the impact was simple: “I just feel equal to my brothers.” Her family had mentioned respecting the law as the reason for dividing the property equally.

These cases show that outcomes are shaped not only by what the law provides, but also by how families understand property, equality and women’s place within the family.

Between rights and tradition

The experiences of the women surveyed by K2.0 reflect a broader trend documented by the Center for Information, Critique and Action (QIKA).

According to Kosovo Cadastral Agency data analyzed by QIKA, women accounted for only 17.7% of people who inherited property in 2024, compared with 82.3% men. In 2025, 43,880 inheritance cases were registered for men, compared with 10,042 for women.

For Blenda Asllani, researcher and project manager at QIKA, these figures point to an inequality that continues to be reproduced through the ways property is inherited and gifted within families.

“Property continues to circulate largely along the male lines of the family, while inheritance and gifting continue to function as mechanisms through which men’s economic and social power is reproduced,” says Asllani.

According to Asllani, one of the social norms shaping how women exercise their inheritance rights is the belief that, after marriage, the daughter becomes “part of another household” and that property should remain in the son’s family.

“This social norm also produces another phenomenon documented by the research: families turning their backs on women who decide to claim and exercise their rights,” she says.

The pressure becomes particularly visible when women decide to renounce their inheritance. According to Asllani, such a decision cannot always be understood as a free choice.

“Women’s giving up their right to inherit cannot be understood as a fully free and informed choice,” she says.

In many cases, she adds, women may see giving up property as a way to preserve family relationships.

Inequality can begin even before a woman has the opportunity to make a decision. According to QIKA’s research, in 90–95% of the cases analyzed, inheritance proceedings are initiated by male heirs.

“This creates the possibility that women are excluded from the process from its earliest stages,” says Asllani, while emphasizing the need for institutions to identify and notify all heirs equally.

Inequality, then, does not necessarily emerge only at the moment property is divided. It can begin much earlier: in the way a family thinks about property, in who initiates the proceedings and in how well-informed women are about their rights.

What does the law say?

The experiences described by the women in K2.0’s survey differ sharply from what Kosovo’s inheritance law provides.

According to lawyer Edona Sina, daughters and sons have fully equal inheritance rights.

“A daughter’s marriage, leaving the parental home or the fact that she has started a family of her own does not diminish or invalidate her right to inherit,” says Sina.

When a parent dies without a will, the children and spouse inherit equal shares. But before the inheritance can be divided, it must first be determined whether any part of the property was acquired jointly during the marriage. Property registered in the father’s name may therefore include a share that belongs to the mother.

This is particularly relevant in cases such as V.B.’s, as she says her mother contributed to the purchase of the house and commercial property.

A will does not necessarily exclude a daughter from inheriting either, but that does not mean she will benefit to the same extent as her brother. According to Sina, the difference often lies in how the property is distributed among the heirs.

“In practice, recently, parents have started leaving property directly to their daughters too, but in much smaller shares than what they leave to their sons. For example, if the deceased has two houses, land and a commercial property, the son gets everything, while daughters are left with only a small commercial property shared between them,” says Sina.

Another issue concerns women who “give up” their inheritance in favor of a brother. Sina points out that, legally, this may mean transferring their share of the inheritance to that particular heir, rather than simply renouncing it. Women should therefore understand exactly what they are signing.

The law also provides safeguards against decisions made under pressure. A person renouncing an inheritance must be interviewed separately, without the other heirs present, and the court or notary must ensure that the person understands their rights and the consequences of their decision. If there are indications of pressure, the renunciation should not be accepted.

For Sina, the central problem is not the absence of legal equality, but the gap between the law and its implementation in practice.

“Historically, the problem in Kosovo has not been so much the absence of equality in the text of the law, but the failure to put that equality a reality in practice,” she says.

Family pressure, gender stereotypes, and a lack of legal knowledge continue to shape women’s decisions about inheritance. Sina advises women not to sign inheritance documents they do not fully understand and to seek independent legal advice if they feel under pressure.

In V.B.’s case, what once appeared to be a secure family agreement to divide the property equally ultimately ended up in court. Beyond the house, the commercial property and their monetary value, she says the dispute has changed the way she thinks about what her parents left behind.

“I no longer see it as something my parents left me,” she says. “It feels like, apart from the memories, I have nothing left of my parents. As if, everything disappeared in a second.”

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Author: Donika Gashi