Conveyance Buy & Sell Property

Buy & Sell Immovable property

Conveyance process in North Cyprus may be different than the formalities in any other country. The below is how it works in North Cyprus.

1.    a) North Cyprus Properties purchased from a Developer

The property purchased may be an apartment or a villa. In either case you need to have your “purchase permission” issued by the Council of Ministers before you may be entitled to request the deeds of the purchased property to be transferred into your name. Your Lawyer should inform you at what stage your Application is with the Council of Ministers.

If your application for permission to purchase has been granted you and your Lawyer should contact the Developer and ask whether the individual deeds of the property purchased has been issued by the Land Registry. If the deeds are issued then your Lawyer will need the following in hand:

1. i) Your Power of Attorney enabling him to do the conveyance (Please note that any Power of Attorney given which is not notarised will not be acceptable at this stage).
2. ii) Latest copy of your passport

iii) Copy of the individual deeds of the property

1. iv) Receipt of the property tax (rates) for the year that conveyance is to take place, issued by the relevant Municipality Office
2. v) VAT invoice

Taxes Payable:

By the Developer – 4.7% of the contract price

By the Purchaser:

1. i) VAT – 5%
2. ii) Transfer tax – 3% (if it is his or her purchase in the TRNC)

iii) Municipality tax

1. iv) Currency exchange difference
2. v) Administration fees & Conveyance fees

(items iii, iv, v above should not exceed a few hundred pounds depending on what date the contracts were signed)

1.    b) North Cyprus Properties purchased from Private Person/s

All the above shall apply with only exception that the Purchaser shall not be required to pay any VAT to the Seller and therefore such receipt will not be required.

Guidance to First Time Buyers

As soon as you express your desire to buy a property with the assistance of our Legal Firm, we shall be sending to you a “Purchase Permission Application Form” with a request to fill it in by yourself and by anyone else that maybe buying together with you. This form has two purposes. One is that we shall use your personal details in preparing your Contract of Sale and also we shall be submitting these details after contracts are signed to the authorities for the purpose of obtaining official permit to legally own the purchased property by you.

The completed form(s) should be returned to us at your earliest convenience together with each intended purchaser’s passport copy (page with picture only). This can be done either by return of e-mail or by fax to 0090 392 227 50 20 or 0090 392 815 04 89.

Following receipt of the above and our checks on the property, the contracts will be prepared by us and e-mailed to you for your approval.

Once contracts are approved by you and your approval is conveyed to us, they will be signed and exchanged by us (no need for you to sign the contract or return such contract or even to come to Cyprus) and a full set of Contracts will be made available  to you. The first instalment for the purchase price and our fees would then become payable.

Soon after the payment of the above indicated dues, our office will file an application to the Council of Ministers asking for the grant of necessary official permit to legally own the property by you and though as from signing of contracts you will be regarded as the owner of the purchased property the Ministerial permission (normally granted within approximately 6 months from the date of application) will enable you to register the property into your name’s when the title deeds are issued by the Land Registry.

In meantime and soon after your decision to purchase a property you are required to apply  to your Police authorities and seek a certificate from them showing whether you have or have not any criminal convictions. It will take your Police Authorities approximately 40 days before they can send to you this certificate and as soon as you receive it, please post the original to us.

Payments

We shall be informing you of the precise figures to pay soon after contracts are exchanged which will be as follows:

1. a) First instalment for the Vendor
2. b) Legal fees (as stated above)
3. c) Stamp duties (This is to pay for legalisation of contract and is 0.5% of contract value + £25 Administration fees)
4. d) Dues required for the Registration of Contract with the Land Registry
5. e) Local bank charges (That is 0.08% of the amount transferred or minimum £21)

While all the above may be paid directly to the Vendors, we shall be happy to accept the payment (and even the rest of the instalment payments) to our client’s account as below and make recorded payments to the Vendors on your behalf at no extra charge to you.

Here are our bank and account details:

BRITISH POUND  ACCOUNT £

EURO ACCOUNT €

US DOLLAR ACCOUNT $

Are there any risks between contract signing and registration?

By a law enacted in 2008 it is now possible and even obligatory to register the Contract of Sale with the Land Registry of the District where the purchased property is located.

The Land Registry will not however accept to register a contract unless such contract is first stamped by the Tax Office. The stamping cost is 0.5 % of the sale value as shown in the Contract of Sale and although stamping of the contract can be done within one month from the date of its signing the Land Registry will not accept to register such contract if registration is attempted after the expiration of 21 days from the date of signing of the contract. It is therefore advised that as soon as the contracts are signed and you are informed by your lawyer of this, you put the lawyer in sufficient funds to pay for the stamping of your contract as well as registration.

Registration of the Contract of Sale with the relevant Land Registry operates as an important security for your purchase in that the Vendor cannot thereafter to re-sell the same property to any other person or gift it and will not be able to e.g. mortgage the property in order to obtain credit from a Bank or otherwise if the property is already mortgaged or has already any impediment on it, the Land Registry will immediately inform your lawyer and ask him whether he still wish to proceed with registration. No doubt your lawyer should refuse this and advise you immediately in order to stop any payment being made to the Vendor.