Buying our house illegally

04/29/2012 - 11:33

Hi,Buying our house illegally, through no fault of our own. I don’t know if this helps anyone out there who has had similar difficulties but here goes. When we bought our farmhouse in Abruzzo 2004, the notary failed to take notice of a law that had been passed in 2001 which stipulated that our type of house must have a minimum of 3 hectares of land attached to it, where we, in fact, had only 1500 square meters, because we have less than the minimum amount of land, as required by the law, we cannot now sell it.Our first option would have been to pursue the Notary, but, as I am advised by our lawyer, this would probably take a minimum 5 to 6 years and cost at least 10,000 to 20,000 euro with, of course, no guarantee of success at the end of it.Next we could try and purchase separately the balance of land required that surrounded us, the land owner was quite clear, no chance.Finally, the only other option has been to try and find a solution with the help of our comune where they may be willing to make some modification to the law in the province.If we had been on our own in this I can’t even begin to imagine the outcome, but in a way we got lucky having discovered there are at least 10 other property owners in our area with the identical problem so there is pressure on the comune to help rectify the situation for us all. But it’s already been going on for over 2 years now and no end yet in site. For anyone concerned they too may have fallen foul of this law I believe it comes under the following heading: Copia dell’art.24 del P.T.P. approvato con Delibera Prov.le n.20. del 30/03/2001. As far as I am aware it only refers to rural farmhouse properties purchased since 2001 and any notary (except the one we used) should be able to advise if firstly, your property comes into the relevant category affected by this law and secondly, if your final act complies with it.

Topic

Legal

Location

Abruzzo

Comment

there is a local site where your information may be more useful www.abruzzolutelu.com/forum

The link you need is - www.abruzzolutely.com

Thanks esme I can't copy and paste in this forum. Its not very userfriendly

I have no probs whatsoever copying and pasting to any of the very friendly and helpful people on this Forum ?! S

It just not very friendly in general Rickardo.

Me neither.

So sorry to hear of your problem Bellante,but thank you for the information.Was this law for the whole of Abruzzo or just your commune?This will raise issues with our purchase, now we will check this out with our notary!!

I’m afraid I don’t know if the law applies only to Abruzzo, or the problems only exist in our comune. Best of luck with your notaio.

Because of your browser security settings, the editor is not able to access your clipboard data directly. You are required to paste it again in this window. Please paste inside the following box using the keyboard (Ctrl+V) and hit OK Managed it at last, simple enough I suppose but simpler still on other sites Can I ask how the original poster found out that they had bought illegaly? Did it only come to light when reselling? Is the illegality that your house is still registered as a farmhouse although you did not buy the required amount of land with it? Is it not possible to re-register it with a change of use at the comune now? Sorry lots of questions

I've had a small look into this (it is all about keeping 'traditional' farming landscapes agricultural) but the interpretation (and the date at which this law could come and bite you, even the dimensions of the area deemed 'a farm') depends not only on your provincia but also your comune. In Italy, the date of the approval of a regulation can frequently be years ahead of the date of its implementation, so it's not a certainty that your notaio got it wrong. There is a possibility that by varying the comune PRG (akin to the Local Plan in UK terms) that you may, eventually, find that you are let off the hook. (From my google searches, it does seem to be a question of particular relevance to Abruzzo.) Anyway, hard luck, and hopefully with time it will get resolved so that you can find a buyer.

I’m sure you are right, it may indeed not be certain the notaio who got it wrong ( and I’ve seen pigs flying that prove this could indeed be the case) but does it excuse him from not replying to any correspondence on the matter, or is he just keeping his head below the parapet? As to varying the comune PRG have you any idea just how long this could take? No and neither does anyone else either, especially the comune. Yes ok notaries and lawyers everywhere can make mistakes as we all do. Yet in England you would probably feel more confident that a straightforward procedure exists to rectify those mistakes and relatively quickly, whilst in Italy not only do things take sooooo much longer, in my experience straightforward doesn’t seem to exist. Who’s a sceptic? Anyway thanks for your good wishes, I’ll even try and stop sticking pins into things.

Bellante . Welcome to Italy but I can assure you it DOESN'T get any better... We all, I'm sure, have a tale of woe regarding Red Tape, Bureaucracy, and damn right Rudeness when it comes to Officialdom in Italy, but like the scales of Justice, it's all blind to opinion.

We all, I'm sure, have a tale of woe regarding Red Tape, Bureaucracy, and damn right Rudeness......... I had a real smile when I read the above on your post Flip as I am currently trying to get visas organised for me and three others - one an Irish national - to go to Lagos in Nigeria as we are doing some restoration work in the Cathedral there. Talk about red tape, bureaucracy and damn right rudeness!!! This has been worse than anything I have encountered in Italy. We are due to fly next Tuesday but unless certain jobworths get there act together we will not be doing so. Needless to say, after a three week stay in Lagos I will be flying to Italy to spend a couple of weeks in my home there, relaxing in the silence and beauty of the surrounding mountains and enjoy the heat minus the humidity of Lagos. Mind you I love my job and having been there before, met some lovely people and enjoyed my stay in Lagos, I am looking forward to going - once I get our visas!! Maralyn