Assets or a specific asset can be passed on to a legal successor both while a person is still alive and following his/her death.

Assets or a specific asset can be passed on to a legal successor while a person is still alive by making a donation. Donations can be made in favour of any person and there are no restrictions in this scope. On making the donation, the donee becomes owner of the object donated. The donor can stipulate that he/she or another person (e.g. spouse, child, third person) should exercise specific rights to the object donated, e.g. right of habitation, right to use that object, etc.

Another form of passing on somebody's assets in his/her lifetime is by concluding a life annuity contract. Under the life annuity contract, the acquirer commits to make a specific monetary and personal performance in favour of the transferor (person entitled to life annuity). The acquirer undertakes to provide the transferor with the means of support for life and, in the absence of another agreement, the acquirer should accept the transferor as a member of his/her household, provide the transferor with food, clothing, accommodation, light and fuel, appropriate help and care in illness as well arrange the transferor's funeral at his/her own expense in accordance with local customs. Contract of annuity payable in money has similar characteristics. The acquirer of assets commits to make a specific periodic performance in money or in fungibles in favour of the transferor and the transferor transfers on him/her ownership of a thing (e.g. of real estate).