Abstract
This chapter analyses how the Māori legal system has conceptualised family property and then considers how the country’s state national law is attempting to make provision for these Indigenous laws when a couple (where one or both are Māori), upon separation or death of one partner, seek to resolve their legal entitlements to their family property. The family home built on colonially defined Māori freehold land is of particular relevance because the law in this arena provides an interesting illustration of the challenges when two legal systems abut. This chapter concludes with a comparative discussion of how another country is seeking to create a solution to this same issue: ownership of the family home on colonially defined First Nation reserves in Canada.