Checking an apartment in the European Union before buying: which documents are requested before the deposit
Checking an apartment in the European Union before buying: which documents are requested before the deposit
An apartment in the European Union can be checked in full without leaving Ukraine: everything that protects the buyer is in the documents, not in the walls. A viewing settles the question of whether you like it — and today a video viewing settles that. Below — exactly what is requested before the deposit, in what order, and what to do if the money has already been paid.
Which documents are checked before buying an apartment abroad
Seven documents are checked, and all seven are read before the deposit is paid. The check runs along three lines at once: the property, the seller and the deal itself. A viewing covers none of them.
What is requested:
• a register extract: who the owner is and since what date;
• records of encumbrances: a mortgage, a pledge, a seizure;
• court disputes — against the seller, not the property;
• the permit putting the building into service;
• the cadastral number and floor area;
• certificates on debts for utilities and owners' association fees;
• the right to sell: a spouse, shares, heirs.
The documents are read twice: at the written opinion stage, when the property is only being chosen, and again before signing. The register is a living thing, and an entry can appear in the gap between those two points.
What the seller should show before the deposit
Before any money changes hands, three documents are usually shown: the register extract, the ownership document and the permit putting the building into service. It costs the seller nothing and poses no risk to them. A refusal to show them does not prove a problem in itself, but it means you are paying blind.
It matters who exactly requests the document. A scan you are sent shows the state as of the date of the scan, while the register shows the state as of today. Between those dates, entries appear on the property that will not be in the set you were sent. What you are sent is information for a conversation. What you request yourself is a check.
How to check whether the building has been put into service
It is checked by a document, not by the fact that people live there. The permit putting the building into service is a separate paper with a date and a number. The fact that people live in the building, the lights are on and the elevator works does not replace it and does not prove it exists.
A building formally accepted into service and a building that people have simply moved into are different legal situations, and they affect the registration of ownership differently. For our properties the building has already been put into service, so we show the document rather than naming an expected completion date. The difference between "completed" and "will be completed" is the difference between ownership and a promise.
How to check the seller: the right to sell, shares, heirs
The seller is checked separately from the property. A person can be the owner and still not have the right to sell alone. A court dispute is brought against a person and reaches the apartment later — so records are searched by the seller's name, not by the apartment's address.
What is looked at:
• the basis of ownership: how and when the property came to the seller;
• marital status and whether the spouse's consent is needed;
• whether there are shares and other owners;
• inheritance grounds and possible claims;
• open court cases in the seller's name.
A claim by an heir or a former spouse does not come out of nowhere: it is visible in advance, in these same documents. After ownership is registered, the dispute goes on with your involvement and at your expense.
Do an apartment's debts pass to the new owner
Some debts do — those tied to the property rather than to the person. These are utility arrears and owners' association fees. They follow the apartment, and the new owner finds them on their own account.
That is why the check includes requesting certificates on the state of payments: one for utilities, one for the association. This is the most boring item on the list, it is skipped more often than the others, and it regularly turns out to be the nastiest discovery after the deal.
A debt found in time is not a reason to walk away from the property. It is a reason to recalculate the price or to have the arrears paid off at the seller's expense before signing. A debt found after the deal becomes your expense.
What a power of attorney for buying real estate abroad says
A power of attorney is a document with a ceiling, not permission to do "anything." It sets out the specific property, the maximum price, the term of validity and an exact list of powers. The representative cannot buy a different property, pay more than the stated amount or act after the term has expired.
The order here is the reverse of what is usually done: the power of attorney is drawn up after the written opinion, not before it. First it becomes clear what is being bought and on what terms — and only then are the powers granted.
There are three ways to carry out the deal, and we name them openly: in person, by power of attorney and through a management company. The chosen method is fixed in the written opinion before the deal.
What to do if the deposit has already been paid and there was no check
The situation can be fixed, and there is a workable procedure for it. The check is done after the fact — it is exactly what determines whether there are grounds to demand the money back and what to rely on.
The procedure:
1. The property's documents are pulled — the same seven, as a complete set.
2. What was signed is read, along with the terms on which the money was paid.
3. The finding is compared against the refund terms.
After that there are usually three options: a refund, if there are grounds; negotiating the price, if the finding lowers the property's value; walking away from the property and accepting the loss, when letting it grow would cost more than stopping. In all three cases the document comes first and the conversation with the seller second: a conversation without the document in hand leads nowhere.
For the future, the rule is simple. A clause on returning the deposit if encumbrances are found is written into the agreement itself and before the money is transferred, not at the moment of a dispute.
On this route, order matters more than speed. The opinion comes before the deposit, the deposit before the contract, the repeat extract before the signature. A deal assembled out of order gets reassembled, and that is the most expensive rework of all the ones we see.
For a sense of the amounts: a comparable two-room apartment in the European Union costs €200,000–300,000. Our property is about €100,000 with a down payment of 30%, that is, around €30,000. The remainder is paid in installments over 36 months interest-free, and ownership passes immediately. It is precisely these €30,000 that the documents listed above protect. From there the route follows the usual order — a company, rent, fully legal income, an employment contract, a card — and after three years, given LAWFUL grounds, the owner obtains European Union citizenship.
Three things can be checked before the first conversation. All matters in Romania are handled remotely by our management company. The work is done officially under a contract that sets out the timelines, the amount and the procedure. The company's licenses are publicly available on the website.
The bank makes the decision on a banking transaction, and the company gives no guarantee of passing the check. The company does not advise on other jurisdictions.
The entry point to the route is a free compliance assessment with a written opinion. It is free and mandatory before the deposit. As a result, you receive a recommended bank, a list of documents for your source of funds, an assessment of the origin, the timelines and the purchase structure. And a straight answer: whether this structure suits you.