LA RENTA VITALICIA Y EL CONTRATO DE ALIMENTOS: SU RÉGIMEN JURÍDICO Y CONSIDERACIONES JURISPRUDENCIALES.

Abstract

This paper endeavours to analyse the system of rules applicable to two aleatory contracts, the annuity agreement and the lifetime support contract. In the first the debtor undertakes to pay an annuity or yearly income during the lifetime of one or more given persons for a capital in personal or immovable property whose ownership is transferred to the debtor with the payment of the annuity. Act 41/2003 of 18 November on the protection of the assets of persons with disabilities, in articles 1791 to 1797 of the Civil Code, regulates the lifetime support contract referring to conventional support, i.e., support established by an accord, not by law. The regulation implementing the act expands the number of possibilities offered by the annuity for seeing to the economic needs of people with disabilities, and it enables the parties to the contract to quantify the maintenance provider's obligation according to the maintenance recipient's living needs. This paper looks at the concept involved and the natures it may assume, its creation, the effects stemming from the contract and the criteria set in case-law.