Which family members are protected by the family home's exemption from creditors?

Two classes, and only one of them has conditions

Article 154 names the husband and wife, or an unmarried person who is the head of a family without qualification — they are beneficiaries by their position. The second class is defined by relationship and then narrowed twice: their parents, ascendants, descendants, brothers and sisters, whether the relationship be legitimate or illegitimate, who are living in the family home and who depend upon the head of the family for legal support. Relationship alone is not enough. A relative must be both resident and dependent, and a relative who is one but not the other is outside the list.

Legitimate or illegitimate makes no difference

The article says so expressly, and it is one of the places where the Code refuses to sort a household by the circumstances of its members' birth. An illegitimate child living in the house and depending on the head of the family is a beneficiary on the same terms as a legitimate one. What is not on the list is equally telling: relatives by affinity, cousins, and household members who are not related in one of the named ways do not become beneficiaries by living there, however long they have. The list is a list of relationships the law already attaches a support obligation to, which is why it stops where it does.

Why the list decides whether the house is protected

Being a beneficiary is not merely honorary. The family home stays exempt from execution so long as any of its beneficiaries actually resides in it, so the list is what keeps the exemption alive after the household changes. A house where the spouses have died but a dependent grandchild still lives is a different case from one occupied by a tenant or a friend. That is also why the two conditions — residence and dependence for legal support — are the facts a creditor will attack first. The question is asked about the day of the levy, not about the day the family moved in.

Establish the household, person by person

If the exemption is being tested, set out who lives in the house, how each is related to the head of the family, and what each depends on him or her for. Birth and marriage certificates establish the relationship; residence is shown by the ordinary paper of daily life — identification, school records, bills, barangay certification. Dependence is the element people neglect: an adult sibling with an income of his own living in the house is a resident but may not be a dependant, and the difference can decide whether the house is protected.

Cases citing this provision

These Supreme Court decisions cite the provision above. We list them so you can read them yourself; the summaries of what each decided are not ours to give.

• Perla G. Patricio vs. Marcelino G. Dario III, et al, G.R. No. 170829, November 20, 2006 — read the decision on LawPhil →
• Mary Josephine Gomez et al., vs. Roel Sta. Ines, et al, G.R. No. 132537, October 14, 2005 — read the decision on LawPhil →
• Cesar D. Taruc vs. Angelina D. Maximo, Maricel Buenaventura, George Jordan, and Jennifer Burgos, G.R. No. 227728, September 28, 2022 — read the decision on LawPhil →
• Jesus Nicardo M. Falcis, III vs. Civil Registrar General, G.R. No. 217910, September 3, 2019 — read the decision on LawPhil →

Related provisions

• Family Code, Article 154 — Beneficiaries of the Family Home