Real estate gifts between spouses are rooted in marital identity and possess dual attributes of identity ethics and property circulation, representing a typical issue in marital and family property disputes. China’s current legislation does not provide special regulation for such acts. Judicial practice has long applied the rules of general civil gifts, overemphasizing the validity of registration and the right of arbitrary revocation under property law, while ignoring the particularity of marriage, the value of housework, and the reasonable reliance of the donee. This has led to problems such as conflicts in legal application, inconsistent judicial standards, and imbalanced interest distribution. In terms of nature identification, real estate gifts between spouses are fundamentally different from ordinary civil gifts and spousal property agreements. Their core feature lies in being based on marital continuity, family mutual assistance, and emotional maintenance, rather than mere gratuitous transfer. Regulating such gifts solely by property law fails to reflect the ethical characteristics of the marital community and can hardly balance autonomy of will and transaction security. Therefore, the nature identification should abandon the unitary approach and adopt a dualistic distinction path to differentiate between pure gratuitous gifts and identity-based gifts between spouses according to the specific facts of the case. In judicial adjudication, a unified subjective-objective standard should be established. Based on the parties’ true intentions, judges should comprehensively consider factors such as the duration of marriage, the source of the real estate, and the family contributions of both parties to avoid mechanical application of ordinary gift rules. Judges should also conduct multi-dimensional balancing and flexibly apply the principle of fairness and justice to safeguard the interest balance between spouses. In terms of real right effect, the principle of distinguishing internal and external relations shall be upheld: internally, the true agreement of both parties shall be taken as the basis to protect reliance and dedication within marriage; externally, real estate registration shall serve as the publicity requirement to protect the property security of transaction counterparts. Meanwhile, supporting publicity mechanisms should be improved to enhance the external identifiability of spousal property agreements. In terms of creditor’s rights application, the donor’s right of arbitrary revocation should be strictly restricted, the application of the principle of good faith strengthened, the applicable scenarios of the right of statutory revocation clarified, and the doctrine of change of circumstances introduced to address interest imbalance caused by the loss of marital foundation. By coordinating the application of the Marriage and Family Book, the Contract Book, and the Real Rights Book of the Civil Code, and unifying the standards for nature identification and adjudication, the application conflicts between identity law and property law can be effectively bridged. While protecting individual property rights, the ethical value of marriage and family is highlighted, so as to achieve the coordinated unity of stable marital relations and secure market transactions.

Liu Yiying. A Study on the Legal Nature and Application Rules of Real Estate Gifts among Spouses. International Journal of Frontiers in Sociology (2026), Vol. 8, Issue 2: 20-26. https://doi.org/10.25236/IJFS.2026.080203.

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