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28th March 2024
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HomeArticlesState must find a solution for Title Deed mess

State must find a solution for Title Deed mess

THE ANXIETY and stress levels of tens of thousands of foreign property-owners would have peaked after reading that the government has no plan for tackling the problem of the Title Deeds.

Some 100,000 home-buyers have been waiting for Title Deeds for their properties for years and had pinned their hopes on the government’s pledge to help.

These hopes were dashed after Tuesday’s report that new legislation regarding the issuing of Title Deeds will only apply to future property purchases and have no bearing on old transactions.

It means that buyers remain at the mercy of the developer who sold the property to them and the banks that hold their Title Deeds as collateral for loans. It is a terrible predicament for buyers; despite having paid for a property in full they do not legally own it and cannot sell it or use it as security for a loan.

News about the government’s inability to tackle the problem was conveyed to the British High Commissioner by Interior Minister Neoclis Sylikiotis, who offered to meet representatives of the interest groups. But what would be the point of such a meeting, considering that Sylikiotis has nothing constructive to propose? Would he make more well-meaning promises that he would be unable to keep?

The Cyprus government has only itself to blame for the Title Deed mess. It had given assurances that it would tackle the problem, not aware of the complexities and naively believing there was a quick-fix solution. But when technocrats started studying the matter, it must have become obvious that no law could sort out the mess created by a system that safeguarded the interests of the banks, helped developers raise funds and totally ignored the interests of property-buyers. Any attempt to help buyers obtain their Title Deeds would leave banks with unsecured loans worth hundreds of millions of euro and the collapse of the property market.

Sylikiotis should have asked his technocrats to study the matter and the options open to the government before making any public promises, because good intentions count for nothing. The government is now being accused by some buyers of “stringing them along with lies,” despite the fact that this practice was the norm for more than 20 years and nobody was willing to touch it.

The truth is that a no-pain solution does not exist and the government will find it very difficult to appease the thousands of property-buyers waiting for their Title Deeds.

Property buyers, meanwhile, are perfectly justified to protest about this unacceptable situation and to put pressure on the authorities to come up with some kind of arrangement that offers a little protection to them. It might not be the best solution possible but it would be better than nothing, which is the case at present.

Copyright © Cyprus Mail 2009

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