The purchase and sale of property requires smart preparation and proper counselling as it may be extremely demanding.
1. Audit of ownership titles
As soon as the buyer finds the property that meets their expectations they must speak to an attorney in order to conduct an audit of ownership titles. What is an audit of ownership titles?
An audit of ownership titles is the legal process during which the attorney of the buyer heads to the Land Registry and the Cadastral Office to check the following:
- Transfer sequence and order.
- The legality of the manner of acquisition of the closest and most distant predecessor.
- The existence of encumbrances to the property such as mortgages, claims, mortgage prenotations.
- The existence of easements such as usufruct, occupancy.
- The exercise of claims against the property.
It is important to perform an audit of the ownership titles for a period of time of at least 20 years before the date of purchase of the property. After the audit of the property, the attorney takes copies of the ownership titles.
Attention, it is important to conduct the audit of ownership titles twice. Once during the stage of negotiations, i.e. before the deposit of the advance payment, or before the signing of the preliminary contract and once on the day of signing of the contract. The second audit is more concise and its purpose is to detect any changes that took place after the first audit.
2. Check for arbitrations
During the purchase and sale of property it is very important to cooperate with a civil engineer in order to check if any arbitrations or discrepancies of the building permit exist. The Electronic Building Identity is also required, which is a process carried out by cooperating with an engineer.
3. Preliminary contract or private agreement of advance payment and signing of the contract
Before the advance payment is paid from the buyer to the seller, a private agreement of advance payment or a notarial preliminary agreement must be concluded by the attorneys of the contracting parties. The purpose of these documents is to ensure that both contracting parties experience a smooth purchase and sale experience. The buyer will prepay part of the sale price as a guarantee to the seller in order to “bind” the property and the seller is bound to transfer this property to that buyer. These documents include, among others, clauses on the potential insolvency of one of the contracting parties and in general the obligations of the contracting parties until they are bound by the final purchase and sale contract.
The signing of the contract then follows. The contract is drawn by a notary public and is signed by the buyer and the seller. The attendance of attorneys during the signing of the contracts is not mandatory. However, since the purchase of a property is a very important investment, the buyer must have the legal support and guidance of an attorney. Any small legal matter may become an issue and cause enormous problems in the future.
4. Transcription of the contract
All the aforementioned information was related to the attention that the buyer must pay before the signing of the final contract. There is also another important matter that the buyer must pay attention to after the singing of the contract. That is the transcription of the contract. It is the final action to complete a purchase and sale of a property and without it no transfer of ownership of the property to the buyer takes place. The transcription is carried out by the buyer’s attorney to the Cadastre or Land Registry, depending on the stage of cadastral registration of the property’s area. In case that the Cadastre fully operates in the property’s area, then there is a possibility to carry out the transcription online through a specific platform. Otherwise, it is carried out in person.
The transcription of the contract is very important. There have been instances that the buyer failed to address an attorney for the transcription of the contract and, during the time that has passed from the signing of the contract until its transcription, a creditor of the seller (since the seller had debts) proceeded to the registration of a mortgage prenotation on the property. The result was that the buyer ended up with a property that had a mortgage prenotation due to the debts of the seller. If the buyer and new owner wish to remove the mortgage prenotation on the property, they must pay the debt and follow the legal procedures to settle the issue, especially if the seller does not cooperate.
The purchase of the property is not an easy process, the counselling and guidance of the buyer by an attorney is necessary throughout the whole process, that is from the stage of negotiations until the transcription of the contract Non-existent or partial support by an attorney may result in unpleasant surprises for the buyer.
Our office undertakes the support and counselling of principals throughout the process for the purchase and sale for a smooth and problem-free completion of the process for all contracting parties.
Evangelia Souli
Associate Attorney, Anna Korsanou Law Firm
