I live with my partner unmarried: what are my rights in Serbia?

What cohabitation is under the law

The Family Act (Porodični zakon, "Sl. glasnik RS", No. 18/2005, 72/2011 - other law, 6/2015 and 109/2025 - other law) defines cohabitation (vanbračna zajednica) as a lasting community of life between a woman and a man between whom there are no impediments to marriage (Art. 4(1)). Cohabiting partners have the rights and duties of spouses under the conditions set by that Act (Art. 4(2)).

Two conditions in the definition decide everything else.

The first is permanence. The law sets no number of months or years; a "lasting" community is assessed on the circumstances: living together and sharing a household, duration, children together, how the couple presents itself to others. A short or occasional relationship without life together is not a cohabitation.

The second is the absence of impediments to marriage. These are the circumstances that would prevent two people from marrying: an existing marriage of either of them (Art. 17), inability to reason (Art. 18), blood, adoptive and in-law kinship (Art. 19 to 21), the relationship of guardian and ward (Art. 22) and minority (Art. 23). In practice the first matters most: if one partner is still formally married to someone else, the relationship is not a cohabitation in the legal sense, so no rights to maintenance or joint property arise from it. Divorce therefore has practical significance for the new relationship too.

Cohabitation is not concluded before a registrar or any other authority and is not entered in any register. It arises from actually living together and ends when that stops.

Maintenance between cohabiting partners

A cohabiting partner who lacks sufficient means of support and is unable to work or is unemployed has a right to maintenance from the other partner in proportion to that partner's means (Art. 152(1)). The rules on spousal maintenance apply accordingly (Art. 152(2)): there is no right where granting it would be an obvious injustice to the other partner (Art. 151(3)), the amount is set according to the creditor's needs and the debtor's means (Art. 160), and maintenance after the end of the cohabitation may as a rule not last longer than five years (Art. 163).

The deadline is what is most often missed. A claim for maintenance by a cohabiting partner may be filed during the cohabitation, or within one year of its end or of the last actual payment of maintenance (Art. 279). Anyone who lets a year pass after the separation can no longer bring the claim.

A waiver of the right to maintenance has no legal effect (Art. 8(2)), so a waiver clause in any contract between the partners is not binding.

Joint property of cohabiting partners

Property that cohabiting partners acquired through work during their community of life is their joint property, and the rules on the property relations of spouses apply accordingly to the property relations of cohabiting partners (Art. 191). The same rules as in marriage therefore apply:

• separate property is everything a partner acquired before the cohabitation and everything acquired during it by inheritance, gift or division (Art. 168), and the partner manages it alone (Art. 169);
• if the value of one partner's separate property increased during the cohabitation, the other has a monetary claim or a share in proportion to their contribution (Art. 170);
• the partners manage and dispose of joint property jointly and by agreement, and a partner may not dispose of their share in it (Art. 174);
• division may be sought during the cohabitation and after it ends (Art. 178), by an agreement in the form of a notarially confirmed document (Art. 179) or in court (Art. 180);
• the shares are presumed equal, and a larger share is proved by reference to income earned, running the household, care for children and property and other circumstances (Art. 180(2) and (3));
• each partner is liable for their own debts, while the partners are jointly and severally liable for debts incurred to meet the needs of their life together (Art. 186 and 187).

The difference from marriage is not in the rules but in the proof. For marriage, the Law on the Procedure of Registration in the Real Estate and Infrastructure Cadastre requires that real estate one spouse acquires during the marriage be registered as the joint property of both spouses, on the basis of the marriage data in the document (Art. 7(5)). There is no such rule for cohabitation, because the cadastre has no way of knowing that the cohabitation exists. A flat bought during the cohabitation and registered in one partner's name only therefore formally belongs to that partner alone, and the other partner proves their share in a civil action: first the existence of the cohabitation, then that the property was acquired through work during it, and then any larger share.

There are two ways to avoid this in advance. The first is to register both partners in the cadastre with defined shares at the time of purchase. The second is a contract on the property relations of cohabiting partners before a notary: Art. 188 on the marital agreement applies accordingly to cohabiting partners, the Notarial Tariff expressly mentions a contract on property relations between spouses or cohabiting partners (tariff item 1), and the cadastre registers a note of a property division agreement between spouses or cohabiting partners (Art. 15(1)(9) of the Law on the Procedure of Registration in the Real Estate and Infrastructure Cadastre). The details are on the page about the marital agreement.

Inheritance: no equality here

The Inheritance Act (Zakon o nasleđivanju, "Sl. glasnik RS", No. 46/95, 101/2003 - Constitutional Court decision and 6/2015) lists as statutory heirs the deceased's descendants, adopted children and their descendants, spouse, parents, adoptive parents, siblings and other ancestors (Art. 8). The first order of succession consists of the deceased's descendants and spouse (Art. 9), and in the second order the spouse inherits half of the estate (Art. 12). A cohabiting partner is not mentioned in those provisions. Nor is a cohabiting partner a forced heir (Art. 39). The only place the Act mentions a cohabiting partner is the ban on acting as a witness to the other partner's will (Art. 113).

The consequence is serious: if a partner dies without a will, their property passes to their children, and if there are none, to their parents, siblings and then more distant relatives. The surviving partner receives nothing, including the share in a flat registered in the deceased's name, apart from what they manage to carve out in the probate proceeding or a civil action as their share of the joint property (Art. 181 of the Family Act also gives the heirs of the deceased the right to division, and joint property is divided before inheritance).

A cohabiting partner's inheritance is therefore arranged in advance, in one of these ways:

• by a will: handwritten, written before two witnesses, judicial or notarial (Art. 84, 85, 86 and 111a of the Inheritance Act); a will may not infringe the forced share of children, parents and other forced heirs (Art. 39 and 40), and the partner cannot be a witness;
• by a lifetime support contract, under which property passes to the provider of support after the recipient's death; it is concluded as a notarially confirmed document (Art. 194 and 195);
• by a gift during life, subject to the rules on set-off and the forced share.

A contract by which the partners would "leave" property to each other as inheritance is not permitted: a contract on inheritance is void (Art. 179).

Tax: the exemption from inheritance and gift tax applies to a first-order heir, the spouse and a parent of the deceased (Art. 21(1)(1) of the Law on Property Taxes). A cohabiting partner is not covered, so a bequest or gift is taxed as received by a person not related to the deceased, at 2.5% (Art. 19(2)).

Children born in cohabitation

A child born outside marriage has the same rights as a child born in marriage (Art. 6(4) of the Family Act). The child inherits the parents in the first order of succession, has the right to maintenance under the same rules and the same position in all proceedings.

The only difference is in establishing paternity. For a child born in marriage the mother's husband is deemed the father (Art. 45(1)), while for a child born outside marriage the father is the man whose paternity has been established by acknowledgement or a final court judgment (Art. 45(4)). Until the father acknowledges paternity, the child is registered with the mother only. Acknowledgement is therefore usually given immediately after birth.

Parents exercise parental rights jointly and by agreement while they live together (Art. 75(1)), as in marriage. If the cohabitation ends, the same rules apply as for divorced parents: joint exercise under an agreement the court finds to be in the child's best interests, or sole exercise by one parent under a court decision, with maintenance and contact with the other parent (Art. 75 to 77 and 272).

Survivor's pension, health insurance and protection from violence

The Law on Pension and Disability Insurance ("Sl. glasnik RS", No. 34/2003 ... 94/2024) expressly includes a cohabiting partner among the family members who can qualify for a survivor's pension, in accordance with the regulations on family relations (Art. 28(1)(1)). The condition is that the marriage or cohabitation lasted at least three years, or that the partner has a child with the deceased insured person (Art. 28(2)). A former partner who was awarded maintenance by a court judgment after the end of the cohabitation can also qualify (Art. 28(3)). The existence of the cohabitation is established in non-contentious court proceedings (Art. 28(4)), that is by a court decision, not by a statement or certificate. The other conditions (age, children) are the same as for a spouse (Art. 29 and 30).

The Law on Health Insurance ("Sl. glasnik RS", No. 25/2019, 92/2023 and 109/2025 - other law) counts a cohabiting partner among the insured person's immediate family, together with the spouse and children born in or outside marriage (Art. 18(2)(1)). The cohabiting partner of an insured person has rights under mandatory health insurance from the day the application for insurance is filed (Art. 19(2)). The law sets no minimum duration of the cohabitation, and the Fund branch checks the accuracy of the data and may ask for evidence (Art. 42(3)).

For protection from domestic violence, the Family Act expressly treats cohabiting partners and former cohabiting partners as family members, as well as persons who live or have lived in the same household (Art. 197(3)). Protective measures are available to a cohabiting partner under the same conditions as to a spouse.

How cohabitation is proved

Since cohabitation is not registered, there is no document that proves it once and for all. It is proved as a fact in every proceeding in which it matters, by the person who relies on it.

In a civil action on the division of property or on maintenance the court establishes the existence and duration of the cohabitation on the basis of all the evidence: registered residence at the same address, witness statements (neighbours, family, friends), a lease or purchase contract in both names, joint accounts, loans and household payments, data on children together, photographs and correspondence. For a survivor's pension the law requires a separate court decision in non-contentious proceedings (Art. 28(4) of the Law on Pension and Disability Insurance). For health insurance the insured person files the application and the Fund checks the data.

Practical steps that make proof easier later: the same registered address, contracts and bills in both names, registration of both partners in the cadastre at purchase, and a contract on property relations before a notary.

When to see a lawyer

A lawyer is useful when real estate or a business acquired during the cohabitation is registered in one partner's name only, when the other partner disputes that the cohabitation existed, or when one partner is still married to a third person. The same applies when a partner dies without a will and the survivor wants to carve out their share of the joint property in the probate proceeding, and when a will or a lifetime support contract is being prepared in a family with children from earlier relationships, where the forced share must be taken into account. The one-year deadline for maintenance after separation is a reason not to wait.

Sources

• Family Act (Porodični zakon, "Sl. glasnik RS", No. 18/2005, 72/2011 - other law, 6/2015 and 109/2025 - other law), Art. 4, 6, 8, 17-23, 45, 75-77, 151, 152, 160, 163, 168-174, 178-181, 186-191, 197, 272 and 279
• Inheritance Act (Zakon o nasleđivanju, "Sl. glasnik RS", No. 46/95, 101/2003 - Constitutional Court decision and 6/2015), Art. 8, 9, 12, 39, 40, 84-86, 111a, 113, 179, 194 and 195
• Law on Pension and Disability Insurance (Zakon o penzijskom i invalidskom osiguranju, "Sl. glasnik RS", No. 34/2003 ... 94/2024), Art. 28-30 and 34
• Law on Health Insurance (Zakon o zdravstvenom osiguranju, "Sl. glasnik RS", No. 25/2019, 92/2023 and 109/2025 - other law), Art. 18, 19 and 42
• Law on Property Taxes (Zakon o porezima na imovinu, "Sl. glasnik RS", No. 26/2001 ... 94/2024), Art. 19 and 21
• Law on the Procedure of Registration in the Real Estate and Infrastructure Cadastre ("Sl. glasnik RS", No. 41/2018 ... 92/2023), Art. 7 and 15
• Notarial Tariff (Javnobeležnička tarifa, "Sl. glasnik RS", No. 91/2014 ... 59/2025), tariff items 1, 2 and 9