by admin The Ministry of Digital Government is trying to put an end to the suffer of taxpayers who want to buy or sell properties, but need to collect numerous supporting documents. Again, this process has been severely delayed. The government was expecting to introduce a fully operational electronic transfer system in early 2022, yet this is still unavailable. As it stands today, landlords need to physically collect 17 or even more documents from various government bodies, which are mandatory to sell their property. This results, at best, to the completion of the transfer process within a month. If the government’s new digital services work properly, they will assist private parties and investors who wish to buy property, in order to save o lot of hours of bureaucratic hassle. It is noted that last year there was a huge problem with most municipal offices in the country, which could not issue municipal tax certificates on time. This resulted either to the cancelling of many property sales, or to the production of additional delays to the transfer process, as other municipal certificates would expire by the time the municipal employees could produce the notorious municipal tax certificate. Such certificates usually last for a month and then need to be re-issued.
With the creation of the Electronic Real Estate Transfer File, in combination with the electronic submission of transfer tax returns, parental benefits and donations on the myProperty platform of the government (AADE), the whole bureaucracy is meant to stop. The scheme has already been introduced in the Recovery Fund with a decision signed by the Deputy Minister of Finance, Theodoros Skylakakis, which states that the government’s goal is the full ‘electronisation’ of the property transfer process. More specifically, the scheme envisages the development of an online platform for the management of unique electronic real estate transfer files, which will ensure a faster and safer transfer process in real estate, in a totally electronic manner.
Today, Greece is at the bottom of the world’s real estate transfer list, as the volume of bureaucracy required to sell any property, is larger even compared to countries such as the Solomon Islands, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Ghana, Cambodia and Somalia. This situation deteriorates worse from year to year, as new supporting documents are added to the total bureaucracy. According to the latest annual report of the World Bank for the ease of doing business, Greece is 156th among 190 countries. It is still required to collect 11 different documents and certificates (in reality it is over 17) for the purchase and sale of a single property. Today, interested parties need at least 26 working days to gather these required documents in order to begin the property transfer transaction, a performance which is the worse among all EU member states. In Norway, for example, there is a single-step procedure that takes three working days; in Portugal there is a single-step procedure that takes ten working days; and finally, in the Netherlands property transfers require five documents, which are issued in 2.5 working days. According to the mean of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), there are 4.7 documents that require 23.6 days to complete a transfer between OECD countries. It must be noted that in Greece, the purchase and sale of a property in recent years requires additional documentatio which was not there before. Such documents include the ownership tax payment certificate (ENFIA), the energy efficiency certificate, the non-urban-violation certificate, etc.
The Electronic Property Transfer Folder will be activated by the end of 2023 and will be accompanied by the following actions: (1) Interconnection of the e-Permits system with other systems (EFKA, Fire Service, HEDNO, Forest Service and DESFA).(2) Digitisation of the inspection procedures of the Fire Service. Abolition of the notification of the surface of the building to HEDNO and completion of the unification of the system of declaration of square meters in the municipalities. (3) Adoption of legislation to create a framework for secure transactions in movable assets. (4) Operation of an electronic platform for obtaining a construction permit. (5) Operation of an electronic platform, which will offer to the buyers the ability to meet all the requirements for the transfer of real estate on the internet. The e-transfer platform will be set up by the Ministry of Digital Government and will operate on the digital portal of the State gov.gr. Through this new platform, all the supporting documents required for the preparation of real estate transfer contracts will be collected electronically. Dozens of supporting documents, certificates and other documents required today for a property transfer, issued by relevant state bodies (AADE, Land Registry, Technical Chamber, EFKA) will be collected electronically and registered in the electronic file of the property-to-be-transferred. The electronic collection of documents and certificates will be done by the notary who will be authorised by the transaction parties. Through the new electronic application, the notary will be able to request and print issuance and tax certificates, produce relevant information documents from AADE, e-EFKA, the Hellenic Land Registry, the Technical Chamber, etc; request corrections in relation to information of the above documents; and finally, post such documents on the electronic platform. The notary will be help legally responsible for the validity of such information.
Original source:
https://www.capital.gr/agora-akiniton/3640255/metabibasi-akinitou-xoris-ti-sullogi-dikaiologitikon