Inheriting Property in St. Kitts and Nevis When You Are Not a Citizen

If you are not a citizen of St. Kitts and Nevis and someone has left you a house, a plot or any other property here, you have one year from the date of their death to do one of two things: sell it, or get an Alien Landholding Licence to keep it. Miss both and the property can be taken by the government. The year can be extended if you ask, and on Nevis the licence fee is waived for many heirs of Nevisian families. This guide explains each step in plain terms.

Who this applies to

Anyone who is not a citizen of St. Kitts and Nevis. That includes a son or daughter born and living in New York, Toronto or London to Kittitian or Nevisian parents who never registered them as citizens, a spouse from another country, and a friend or relative from anywhere else in the Caribbean. The law calls all of these people aliens, and it does not matter how long your family has owned the property.

One check comes before everything else. If one of your parents was a citizen, you may be entitled to citizenship by descent, and a citizen needs no licence at all. A local attorney can tell you in a short conversation whether that applies to you. It is worth knowing before you pay a fee of 10% of the property’s value.

The rule

The Aliens Land Holding Regulation Act says that a non-citizen may not hold land in St. Kitts and Nevis without a licence. The Act says land, and in law that word covers whatever stands on it, so a house, a shop or an apartment counts the same as an empty plot. It then makes one exception for inherited land. Land that comes to a non-citizen under a will, or under the rules that apply when someone dies without a will, is safe if, within one year of the death, either the land is sold or the heir obtains a licence. The Governor-General can allow a longer period where that is reasonable.

The clock starts on the day the person died. Not on the day the will is read, not on the day the court confirms the executor, and not on the day you first hear about the property.

Why a year is shorter than it sounds

Before property can be sold or transferred, the estate has to go through the court. If there is a will, the executor named in it applies for probate, which is the court’s confirmation that the will is valid and the executor may act. If there is no will, a close relative applies for letters of administration, which does the same job. Either process in St. Kitts and Nevis can take a year or more on its own, and until it is finished nobody can sign a transfer of the property.

So the practical advice is simple. As soon as you know you are inheriting, have the attorney handling the estate write to ask for an extension of the year. Ask early, while the year is still running. An extension is far easier to obtain than forgiveness after the deadline has passed.

Option one: sell the property

Once probate or letters of administration are granted, the property can be sold, either by transferring it to you first or by the executor or administrator selling it directly out of the estate. The sale is registered at the Land Registry in Basseterre, or the Nevis Land Registry in Charlestown for property on Nevis. The Act places no restriction on your right to sell during the year, and it says nothing about the money from the sale, so the proceeds are yours once the sale completes.

Three costs and one timing point come with a sale.

Stamp duty is paid by the seller. It is 10% of the sale price across most of the country and 12% of market value on the South East Peninsula. As the heir selling, that comes out of your proceeds.

The attorney’s fee for the sale runs on a scale, roughly 1% at ordinary prices. The estate’s own legal costs for probate are separate.

If the buyer is also a non-citizen, the buyer needs their own licence before the sale can complete, and on St. Kitts the published time for that is three months. A sale to a foreign buyer inside your twelve months is tight. Selling to a citizen is faster. Either way, the extension request matters.

Option two: keep the property

To keep it, you apply for an Alien Landholding Licence in the ordinary way. On St. Kitts the fee is 10% of the value of the property, with a minimum of EC$750, and the application goes through the Ministry of Sustainable Development, the Legal Department, Inland Revenue and the Land Registry, taking about three months. You will need a police certificate from where you live, a certified copy of your passport, the survey plan and legal description of the property, and a sworn statement that you have no criminal record. Our full guide to the Alien Landholding Licence in St. Kitts and Nevis walks through every step and cost.

There is no discount for inheritance on St. Kitts. The fee is the same whether you bought the property or your grandmother left it to you.

Nevis is different. Since 21 January 2025 the Nevis Island Administration waives the 10% fee for anyone without St. Kitts and Nevis citizenship who has a Nevisian parent, grandparent or great-grandparent, and it processes those applications within fourteen days. You still apply and still hold a licence. You do not pay the 10%. For a family house in Gingerland or a plot at Jones Estate left to children abroad, this is the answer to the whole problem, and it costs the price of the application rather than a tenth of the property.

What happens if you do neither

The property becomes liable to be forfeited to the Crown, which means taken by the government. This does not happen automatically. The Attorney-General has to apply to the High Court for a judgment declaring the forfeiture, and until that judgment exists you remain the owner on paper. Once the judgment is made, however, the government’s ownership is treated as having started on the day your year ran out, and anything you did with the property after that date falls away with it.

In plain terms: after the deadline you may still appear to own the property, but you cannot safely sell it, because any buyer’s attorney will see the problem and refuse to complete. It is stuck until you either obtain a licence or the government acts.

Two situations people miss

Property held by an executor for years. The Act also forbids anyone from holding land in trust for a non-citizen without a licence, and it makes no exception for executors or administrators. An estate that sits unadministered for years with a foreign heir is not a safe place to leave things. Wind the estate up or get the licence.

An inherited mortgage rather than property. If what you inherited is a loan secured on someone else’s property, the rule is different. The mortgage is never forfeited and there is no one-year clock, but you cannot foreclose or take possession of the land without a licence. You can collect the repayments; you cannot enforce.

What to do in the first month

Get a copy of the death certificate and the will, if there is one. Find out whether you qualify for citizenship by descent. Instruct an attorney in St. Kitts or Nevis to start probate or letters of administration and, at the same time, to request an extension of the one-year period. Decide whether you want to keep the property or sell it. If it is on Nevis and you have a Nevisian parent, grandparent or great-grandparent, gather the birth certificates that prove it, because that lineage is what earns the fee waiver.

Frequently asked questions

If you have inherited property on either island and want to know whether to sell it, keep it or let it, tell us where it is and when the death occurred, and we will tell you how much time you have and what each route costs.