NEW AMENDMENT LEGISLATION (ART.10/ 2015) WHICH AMENDS THE LAWS ON THE TRANSFER AND MORTGAGE OF PROPERTY LAWS OF 1965
The new legislation which amends the outdated laws on the transfer of property and mortgaging law of 1965 has been voted unanimously from all the members of the Cyprus Parliament as of the 3rd of September 2015. The new legislation ends the unsolved until now issue for thousands of property purchasers who due to the new legislation are now able to obtain their long overdue title deeds.
This amendment relates to any Contracts of Sale or Assignment Agreements deposited at the Relevant District Land Offices by the 31st of December 2014 or which were deposited via court order. Clients will be able to apply to the Land registry for their title deeds, however, this procedure has no deadline so we kindly ask clients to wait until we have a holistic understanding of the procedure after which we will encourage you to apply.
The persons detailed below are eligible for an application for transfer of property title to the name of the purchaser:
The Head of the District Land Registry “Ex Officio” through his own decree and authority
The Buyer of the property in question
The Seller
The mortgagee (Should this be applicable to the case)
The Debtor (Should this be applicable to the case)
The application is examined should it fulfill the following requirements:
The sales price has been completely paid off (if not then the Head of the District Land Registry Office calls upon the purchaser to settle the outstanding balance within 30 days of the receipt of this notice)
There is a registered title deed for the property
As long as these two requirements are fulfilled and the Head of the District LR Office proceeds with the transfer of title he is obligated to give written notice to the Buyer, Seller, Creditor and any other person to whom his acts and wish to transfer are considered an encumbrance or restriction to with an intention to transfer title after 45 days of the service of written notice to the aforementioned parties where applicable. Within the provided time frame of 45 days the following persons have the right to submit an objection: The Buyer; The Seller; The Mortgagee; Any other person in whose favour an encumbrance or restriction has been put forth (basically meaning anyone who was positively affected by the Head of District LR Office’s decision to transfer title).
Objection may only be submitted on the following grounds:
The contractual obligations have not been satisfied by the buyer to the seller
The agreement between the contracting parties has been deemed void and/or has been terminated via court order.
Should no objection take place or should the objection be invalid then the Head of the District LR Office proceeds with the erasure of the mortgage or the encumbrance and issues the new title deeds in the buyer’s name. The seller or Creditor, or any other person in whose favour an encumbrance or restriction has been put forth can put forth an application to transfer the mortgage or encumbrance to a different property owned by the seller, in the case that the seller has no other property then the Head of the District LR Office accepts to transfer the encumbrance or mortgage to any legal or natural person whom acted as guarantors to the seller with regards to his activities relating to the property in question.
For the transfer of the property in the name of the buyer the Head of the District LR Office serves written notice to the seller and buyer both of whom must proceed with the transfer of title of the property within a 60 day timeframe as follows:
The buyer can make the payment towards the transfer fees as hereunder:
The full dues owed at the discounted rate of 10% if done so within the 60 day timeframe
The full amount due divided into 12 equal monthly instalments, first of which is due on the first day of the first month owed. In this case the Head of the District LR Office transfers the property in the name of the buyer burdening it with an encumbrance equal to the transfer fees with a 50% addition. In the case where the buyer does not make any payment towards the transfer fee owed the Head of the District LR Office proceeds to transfer of title in the name of the buyer with a 50% addition plus any fees already due.
Existing mortgage, encumbrance or restriction that burdens the property is erased by the Head of the District LR Office prior to the transfer of title of the property unless there are outstanding contractual obligations on behalf of the buyer in relation to the payment of immovable property tax (IPT) as per the Law on IPT, Law on Municipal property tax dues, and Law on Councils as well as sewerage dues under the law on sewerage systems!
All the aforementioned have been derived from the actual legislation itself (Art. 10/2015) from the archives of G.KOUZALIS LLC and by no means does this make it correct or final. This is purely our take on the legislation. Do not take this as legally binding or correctly interpreted.
