Family pool (Germany)
Familienpool
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A family partnership or company – usually a GbR, KG or GmbH & Co. KG – through which parents transfer assets to their children gradually while retaining control.
The partnership agreement governs voting rights, withdrawals and restrictions on disposal. Registered partnerships report their beneficial owners to the transparency register.
In practice
A family pool allows assets to be transferred to the next generation step by step and the gift tax allowances to be used again every ten years, while the parents keep control through voting rights and management. What matters is a carefully drafted partnership agreement with rules on withdrawals, compensation and succession, and the question of whether the pool remains a pure asset-holding vehicle or acquires a commercial character. Each transfer is documented with a valuation, the contract and the gift tax return.
Distinctions and common mistakes
A family pool is a partnership or company and therefore different from a family foundation: the assets belong to the partners, not to an independent fund, and no inheritance substitute tax arises. Typical mistakes are partnership agreements without rules for divorce, compulsory shares or the departure of a child, and gifts of interests without a valuation as at the transfer date.
Relevant in: Germany
Related terms
- Transparency register
- Central register of the beneficial owners of companies and other legal entities.
- Inheritance substitute tax (Germany)
- German tax that charges the assets of domestic family foundations every 30 years as if they passed to two children.