Niki Lauda inheritance, the widow who donated his kidney wins the case: she gets 16% of the assets

Rome, 18 May 2024 – A Birgit Wetzinger, 46 years old widow of Niki Lauda, it is about the 16% of the inheritance of the deceased Austrian pilot, passed away on May 20th five years ago. This was established by the Superior Regional Court. Niki Lauda's widow prevailed in the legal dispute on her mandatory share in the estate of the former Formula 1 world champion who died at the age of 70 in 2019: according to what transpires, the woman asks for an amount between 20 and 30 million euros.

The ruling came about a year after the Lauda Private Foundation Birgit Wetzinger had defined "unworthy of inheritance" and argued that she was not entitled to her mandatory quota because she was suspected of having hidden works of art in his inheritance.

In 2008 Birgit Wetzinger married Lauda, ​​while three years earlier he he had donated a kidney due to an illness that had already affected the former F1 driver for many years, probably as a result of the 1976 accident. 

Niki Lauda had not changed his will after 2007 and, therefore, Mrs Birgit and the twins Mia and Max (13 years old) were not present on the deed, but only the older children (Mathias aged 43 and Lukas aged 45) from the first wife Marlene Knaus.

Birgit Lauda had achieved her first success in May 2023 when the Regional Court for Civil Law Matters of Vienna declared that "she was not unworthy of inheritance and was basically entitled to a mandatory quota.”

The Superior Regional Court has dismissed the appeal opposite, so the widow of the three-time Formula 1 world champion is entitled to approximately 16% of the assets. Now it will be up to the judges to define the exact amount: some hypothesize a millionaire figure preceded by three figures. Finally, according to the portal oe24.at, the widow Lauda could remarry already during the summer with Marcus Sieberer, 55 years old, who lives in Switzerland, a finance expert.