Tag Archives: register of deeds

The risk in buying inherited real estate

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Buying real estate is always an important decision because it involves a significant investment. Thus, you should always think about the consequences and know exactly what you risk in your case.

Each case has its own set of problems. Today I want to consider a very specific situation: the children or the surviving spouse inherit a house or an apartment, where the deceased person had his or her permanent residence. During the signing of the necessary notary documents, to reduce the high Spanish inheritance tax, heirs are happy to listen to the proposal for including a declaration in the document of acceptance of the inheritance saying that they have no intention of selling the property in the next five years: this way, it will save quite a large sum for payment of the tax or even pay nothing, and the instrument of acceptance of the inheritance may also be registered in the land registry without problems.

As time passes, the heirs forget that at the time of the acceptance of the inheritance they have signed this declaration to take profit of this exemption from the tax, which was notarized, and then someone appears offering  a very reasonable price for the property (it has happened often so in the golden days, long before the crisis began). Then the heirs decide to sell, and therefore the buyer acquires the property and agrees to pay a high price. It can even be possible that a bank finances the operation with the warranty that the property the buyer is going to acquire is theoretically free from encumbrances. But this is not quite true: there are responsibilities in respect of the property, which are recorded in the register of deeds but of which very often no one thinks (nor the buyer who acquires, nor the notary who certifies the transaction, neither the bank who risks his money): State tax authorities have the right to review the tax declarations filed in each transfer of ownership, and if they do not agree with the calculation and the amount paid at the time of the acquirement, they can unilaterally make a new calculation of the tax, having the warranty, that the property is encumbered in any case to cover potential liabilities to tax authorities, regardless of who nowadays the owner is.

This would mean in our example that the tax authorities could present to the buyer a nasty surprise if it turned out that the conditions for exemption at the time of acquisition of the property by inheritance have not been met: as the real estate acquired by inheritance using the tax deduction should now be charged with a liability to which the current owner has nothing to do. And the tax, which is calculated by the tax authorities unilaterally to be paid by the children or the spouse of the deceased person, the former owners of the property, may represent a high percentage of its value.

That is why we always recommend not signing any contract or pre-contract of sale without first checking with the lawyer the problems that may arise in each case. This case is just one example of the many troubles, lying in wait for buyers at the time of signing the contract without diligence. However, there are many other cases, which include a big risk. The tax authorities are currently in need of resources due to the crisis and have at their disposal a large number of idle officials, who are currently engaged in audits of all types of legal transactions in the last four years (inheritance, sale, donation, etc.), looking for an excuse to be able to submit payments of additional taxes that are still enforceable, and require the additional appropriate amount.

Carlos Prieto Cid – Lawyer

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Incoherent land information systems in Spain

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In Spain, it is often the case that entries recorded in the cadastre and the land register (register of deeds) are not identical and the two registries can often contradict the actual plots on the ground.

The reason for this is that the sources of the information differ: in the land register, only information contained in official documents is recorded (e.g. notary certified contracts or judicial decisions); however, the information in the cadastre is submitted and recorded by municipality officials or the tax office.

The function of the information also varies: in the land register, a private individual enters the information which he wishes to defend with the guarantee of the official register; in the cadastre, the administration prepares the information necessary for the calculation of taxes and the enforcement of its own demands.

This potential contradiction is not the only difference between the Spanish and other foreign land registers: another and very important difference in the Spanish land register is the mandatory recording of a building’s description, including details of the construction areas, with a notary certificate, while in other foreign land registers (like in Germany, for example), only the explicit size of the plot (without any description of the buildings) is recorded.  Significantly, this means that if alterations are made to the building, its altered condition must also be updated in the land register with a retrospective notary “New Works Declaration”. However, this is often not done, either through ignorance, a reluctance to pay the notary, tax and registry costs, or more usually because (new) building has not been granted.

Nearly all contracts of sale for property are dependent on the funding of the buyer.  This funding is usually granted by a bank, but always with the guarantee that it is recorded in the land register as a mortgage on the purchased property.  It is therefore very important that the information recorded in the land register does not conflict with reality because any information missing from the land register can mean that the financing bank will not cover the purchase price agreed for the property (this price is agreed irrespective of what is actually stated in the land register). Therefore, if you are intending to put a property on the market as a seller, it is advisable to find out all entries in the land register and cadastre and compare them with the actual plots.

Providing that the correct measurements are recorded in the cadastre, it is relatively simple to amend the land register.  With existing (or older) valid building permission and construction final approval documented by the municipality, things can move forward quickly.  It becomes difficult however when a building or part of a building exists which has not been recorded and for which there is no official approval.  Then only the lengthy and expensive route of gaining planning and building permission through an architect remains.

The situation is different when not only the factual information, but also the legal information recorded is incorrect: this often occurs in the case of inheritances which have not been formalised or when the buyer has not notarized the signed contract of sale.  Because only information contained in official documentation can be recorded in the land register, private contracts of sale cannot be registered.

Carlos Prieto Cid – Lawyer

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The donatio mortis causa

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The death is not predictable, but in certain cases we should be aware of the end, for example in cases of high age or severe disease. In Catalonia the law gives us an almost unknown possibility of partitioning our heritage and foreseeing its costs in advance.

This method is called donation mortis causa and it has many advantages compared to a common donation. The donation mortis causa is a kind of donation which could always be used if the object of the donation is real estate in Catalonia. It has many advantages in comparison to a common donation or the regular heritage. But you have to keep certain rules to ensure its acceptance by authorities.

Mainly it is a donation where the transfer of property at first does not occur but it takes effect in the moment of the donator’s death. The Spanish common law (that is the civil law of the regions of Spain with no own law, such as Catalonia) doesn’t really regard it as a donation: it is simply considered parallel to a legacy. But in Catalonia there is an own legal instrument which admits the donatio mortis causa under the following conditions:

  • Free revocability for the donator, which also means that the transfer of property at first doesn’t occur.
  • Its ineffectiveness if the donee predeceases, which means that the expectation is ineffective if the donee dies before the donator. In this case the property remains at the donator without any limitations.

The most important advantage in comparison to the common donation is a fiscal one. In case of the common donation the tax becomes due in the moment of the property transfer. In case of a donatio mortis causa the due date is not before the death of the donator.  And, on the other hand, the common donation is liable to the gift tax. At this kind of tax there is no amount of exemption allowed. But the donatio mortis causa is treated by authorities in the same way as a legacy, which means that it is liable to the inheritance tax. Here we can take profit of the legally alllowed amount of tax exemption.

But there are even more advantages in comparison to other possibilities of property transfers in the occasion of death, especially the simplicity of handling. It is neither necessary to define the successor exactly, nor to constitute who has to pay out for a certain legacy nor has the efficacy of the testament to be confirmed. This is especially important in cases of property transfers in case of heritage by foreigners. Here the law of the foreign country is always applicable. This is a point where foreign authorities come into play and make things more complicated. With the donatio mortis causa we avoid this in the moment of the formation of the contract and also in the moment of the enforcement of the property transfer as well. The title of ownership is created according to the rules to the lifetime of the donator. And for the enforcement  of the property transfer only the death certificate is needed (and no other documents else).

Carlos Prieto Cid, Lawyer

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Legalization of buildings outside the law

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Traditionally it has been possible in our country to legalize buildings outside the law through the mere passage of time. However, the Law 8/2011 has added new requirements when recording new buildings in the register of deeds, giving more legal security to the system.

When selling a property, the buyer usually requires financing. To obtain financing is not only very difficult nowadays, due to the current banking situation, but also virtually impossible if the buyer can not offer a mortgage to the bank that lends him the money. To make it possible for the bank to register the necessary property mortgage, the real value of the estate to be charged should be reflected in the register of deeds. This is only achieved when the elements that provide greater value to the property, that is, the existing buildings on it, are properly registered. To register these edifications, a notarial declaration of the new building is always been necessary and this document must be submitted to the register in order to be recorded, accompanied by many documents to control its urbanistic legality.

Despite this, there was always a back door to buildings that violated the law, which could end up sneaking in urban registration of the property, with the economic and financial consequences discussed above. The mere passage of time with no reaction of the relevant planning authorities, the municipalities, leads to the possibility of regularization of these illegal edifications. As the deadlines for the sanctioning procedures passed and the planning authorities could no longer prosecute these buildings, they could end regularized, if certain conditions were met. But in the present days, the last reform of the Land Act we mentioned above, has added a key requirement, prior to the possibility of recording the irregular building in the register of deeds: we should show a municipal certification defining the content of the situation outside the law of the building we intend to record.

Article 20.4 of the Act indicates that
“4 …. in the case of constructions, buildings and facilities for which no appropriate measures to restore legality involving urban demolition can be taken, because the relevant limitation period has passed, the registration record of the completion of the work shall be controlled by the following procedure:

  • a) the notary deeds with the statement of a new building can be recorded in the Land Registry if they are accompanied by a certificate issued by the City Council or by a competent technician, or a descriptive notarized certification of the property or a cadastral descriptive and graphic certification of the property, when these documents confirm the completion of the work in a specified date and the description coincides with the title. For this purpose, the Registrar shall verify if there is a notation in the Register of Deeds because of the initiation of an urban discipline procedure for the property subject of the construction, building and installation in question and that the site is non demanial or affected by easements for public use.
  • b) The registration entry will record the outside-the-law position of all or part of the construction, building and installation, in accordance with applicable urban management. It will be necessary to provide the administrative act by which the situation is declared outside management, with the proper delimitation of its contents.
  • c) The Registrar shall report to the City the respective entries in the cases included in previous issues, and such notification will be recorded in the inscription”

This new regulation, in force throughout the state, which requires prior to registration the provision of a municipal certificate on the content of urban illegality is coherent with the goal to be reached with the law of passing “registration measures designed to ensure and strengthen certainty in the real estate contracts and business, through the Land Registry” and “emphasizing on register protection measures which aim to prevent and prosecute in the future situations that occur today and that are impacting very negatively on investment in real estate, both domestically and internationally“.

Let us hope that eventually these legal measures have the desired effect and strengthen the security image as necessary to encourage property investment, especially by foreigners.

Carlos Prieto Cid, Lawyer

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The reintroduction of Spanish Wealth Tax

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A few months ago, US President Barack Obama announced to Congress: ”This is not class warfare, it’s math.” If the crisis leads to a fall in revenue for public authorities, spending must either be cut or taxes increased.

If we assume that governments cannot cut back on social services because the social rights they have achieved should not be touched due to the crisis, then new tax increases become necessary. Instead of raising existing taxes, the former Spanish government had preferred to try to maintain the level of revenue it needs by reintroducing a recently-abolished tax: the IMPUESTO DE PATRIMONIO, or Wealth Tax.  This tax was never actually abolished, although the full rate was indeed scrapped in 2009 with a 100% rebate. The government has therefore simply done away with this rebate in order to reintroduce Wealth Tax.

The tax applies from 18 September 2011, although the concession is scheduled to increase once more in 2013. This means that Wealth Tax declarations need only be submitted for the years 2011 and 2012 (due on 31 December each year). It is important to remember that non-residents are also obliged to pay this tax. Declarations must be submitted to the tax office each year together with the income tax declaration.

The most important changes to the rules on Wealth Tax introduced in the Real Decreto-ley 13/2011 are the following:

1. Tax allowance on residences: the maximum rate for tax exemptions on the value of the own residence (for residents) has been raised to €300,000 (previously €150,253.03).

2. General tax allowance: unless the autonomous communities rule otherwise, the general tax threshold is €700,000.-

Whether these new rules and the reintroduction of the tax will have any real impact or affect public authorities’ revenues is debatable. It appears that the Socialist Party intended to make political capital through the reintroduction of a ‘tax on the rich’ (elections took place in a short time after de tax reform and they were a spectacular failure for the Socialist Party anyway ), but the real impact of the tax’s reintroduction will not be able to solve the difficult situation surrounding the public finances.

Carlos Prieto Cid, Lawyer

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Save taxes by planning your inheritance

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After years giving advice to foreign residents with property in Spain, we can offer our experience to those with a little forethought who want to save their loved ones a lot of problems and, above all, a lot of money, by planning the inheritance. A good tax planning can significantly reduce expenses and taxes payable by the heirs. This is true in all cases, but especially when dealing with a legacy of non-residents, that is, assets in Spain who are or have to be registered to the name of people without tax residence.

If you have property in Spain (real estate or personal property, such as deposits in banks or cars) you must expect that your descendants or the people you have appointed in a will as heirs, will have to arrange various legalizations after your death to officially become ownerships of the inherited assets (so that the heirs of these estates can actually take profit of them, that is, sell them or obtain a mortgage). Each of these instruments is taxed. If we want to avoid problems to our heirs, we can plan a few things so that our heirs can simplify everything at the moment of the acceptance of inheritance.

A possibility is to try to transfer the property during our life to save taxes: but we must be sure which taxes are also to be paid in the case of a free transfer or a donation of real estate, to avoid that this transfer of ownership in lifetime does result more expensive than the acceptance of inheritance in case of death. In a purchase contract, there is another tax, but it can have also as a result a very significant amount. As a rule, in case of non-residents who have purchased the property many years ago, the sales tax can be cheaper than the gift or inheritance, but each case must be examined separately.

For non-residents it is a typical procedure to pass the net property to the younger during the life of the older ones. We recommend to formalize a transfer of bare ownership, because despite the age of the parents it is a bit cheaper anyway than to sell the whole property (nuda proprietas or bare ownership plus usufruct) and much cheaper than a gift or an inheritance of the object (pay attention: we are talking exclusively about non-resident: for the resident, thanks to the recent tax reforms, the inheritance is seen as the best mode of transmission as a rule). If we formalize a sale of the bare ownership to the eventual heir, the taxable return for the transfer (that means the purchase price declared in the deed), is the value of this bare ownership, actually the result of the full value of the property minus the value of the usufruct, because the older ones just maintain this usufruct on and what the purchaser gets then is only the bare ownership (ownership without usufruct). We save taxes because the value of the usufruct is deducted, although this value is usually very low due to the age. The usufruct, which is not transferred in this moment, can be deleted after the death of the parents without tax costs.

In any case, it is highly recommended to get advice from a lawyer, as only he can provide proper advice and legal assistance when translating the will of the parties in the legal and technical language, formalizing the definitive agreements, preparing the deed of the notary and foreseeing the fiscal implications of the business. We want to reiterate that the role of lawyer and notary in Spain is totally disconnected (unlike in other countries). Here in Spain, the notary must never represent the interests of a party, even consultation is not allowed. He is only one official, who certifies the businesses that are already negotiated, accepted and formalized and who controls that all required taxes are properly paid by the parties. For this very reason, the involvement of a lawyer is so important, because he represents only your interests and gives you independent advice.

Carlos Prieto Cid, Lawyer

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The role of the lawyer in the sale of property

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In the glorious years of the housing bubble, when everything was easily bought, lawyers played an essential role in advising buyers to purchase property with all guarantees. Now that everything is being sold, our role is still essential to prevent a sale from being frustrated by legal reasons.

An ordinary person takes only very few times during his life the decision to buy or sell a property. However, there seems to be no awareness in the society that, before making this fundamental decision is wise to consult with an attorney. All the contrary, the general idea is that one should only go to a lawyer to solve legal problems and not, as it should be, to try to avoid them. That is why we lawyers often find customers that come to our office once they have already signed a contract, thinking that with a magic wand we can resolve a problematic situation, which would never have happened if they had consulted us on time.

Among the professionals involved in the decision making of a real estate purchase contract, the lawyer is the only one who can give advice with the warranty that this is only his role and that is why he gets paid, with the absolute independence of the one who knows that is going to collect his fees whether the operation is performed or not. In short, the lawyer is the only professional who can calmly tell his customer: do not sign! That’s why taking advice from a lawyer before signing a contract for purchase and sale of real estate is essential and the sooner you come to him, the better.

In real estate market intermediaries tend to avoid the intervention of lawyers, because they think it increases the costs of the transaction and therefore it reduces their room for maneuver. But the reality is quite the opposite: the costs of our intervention are very profitable. We can actually give many examples of real estate transactions that would have failed if there had not been an immediate intervention of lawyers. The most common problems that we solve are:

• problems with the matrimonial regime applicable
• a necessary formalization of an acceptance of inheritance,
• buildings awaiting a declaration of new construction (even if they have been legal built, but not registered)
• fiscal and money laundering control problems specific to non-resident sellers or non-resident buyers,
• special powers necessary to formalize the operation, when the contract parties cannot be present at the formalization of the purchase contract…

But the range of possibilities is enormous and each of these issues can cripple sales management until making it impossible, especially at the present time, because of the lack of buyers and the oversupply of housing available to the market. Furthermore, experience in international operations with nonresident buyers or nonresident sellers is at the moment crucial, as the housing market mainly offers its stock to potential foreign buyers from countries increasing their capacity and interest in purchasing property in Spain (Russians, Swiss, Indian, Chinese, etc.)…

The failure of a real estate transaction means for the real estate brokers involved an effective cost in time, dedication, displacements and risk analysis, and these costs have no compensation if the operation is not actually performed. The causes of such a failure are often legal issues that only an attorney skilled in the art would have foreseen early enough to provide possible solutions and avoid the loss of the buyer. Or, if not feasible any of the proposed solutions, the lawyer could advise to abandon the operation on time, before incurring further unnecessary costs. Working with real estate agents or other intermediaries in the housing market is an important opportunity for business and the synergies it generates are very helpful both for lawyers and for the agencies involved, providing their common customer the benefit to be able to buy or to sell with guarantees and to mature his decision with all the necessary information.

Carlos Prieto Cid, Lawyer

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Buying property without risk

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Before buying a property in Spain or signing a contract agreeing the sale of a property, it is important to be aware that, without the necessary guarantees, this signature can represent a major risk. The cost of consulting a lawyer is very small compared with the substantial costs arising from any possible legal proceedings resulting from a legal dispute. However, legal disputes are very easy to avoid if you receive the correct advice beforehand.

The services of a lawyer during a transfer of ownership can cover the following:

Prior inspection of the property:
– Register details: ownership, description, liabilities and tax liabilities
– Cadastre details: description, cadastral value
– Tax details of the property: outstanding tax
– Urban planning details of the property: valuation, planning, liabilities, legality of new building
– Horizontal ownership details: debts, special taxes and duties
– Condition of the building: implementation and monitoring during the preparation of a survey report
– Property value: implementation and monitoring during the preparation of a valuation report

Regulation of register, cadastre, tax and planning details

Financing and tax analysis of the project

Foundation and registration of a company with the tax office

Registration of natural persons with the tax office

Supervision of mortgage financing

Preparation and legalisation of documents
– Arrangement of power of attorney
– Application for apostilles
– Request for simple and certified translations

Drafting and verification of the private contract of sale, option contract, service contract etc.
– Drafting and negotiation
– Verification
– Guidance when signing the contract or signing in the name of the client by means of the power of attorney

Drafting and verification of certificates (for purchase, mortgage, acceptance of inheritance, building project etc.) together with the notary.
– Preparation and verification of documents necessary for issuing the certificate
– Drafting of the proposal and verification of the certificate text drawn up by the notary, based on the project
– Guidance when signing the contract or signing in the name of the client by means of the power of attorney

Processing of tax declarations and payment of tax

Entry into land register

Contracting party’s change of contracts with energy/water suppliers and phone companies etc.

Guidance in negotiating with the following persons/organisations:
– Seller/buyer
– Estate agent
– Builders
– Chief architect and technical architect
– Notary
– Registry officials
– Valuer
– Surveyor
– Bank
– Insurance company
– Property management
– Tax office
– Local council and other public authorities

Carlos Prieto Cid, Lawyer

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