inherited land

[jacobant]

Dear experts.

My mother was left a piece of land and she has passed away. I did a search at the land registry in Larnaca and found a lot of pieces of land sill in my great grandparents names dating back to the 1890,s. However I did not find my mothers. I would like to know if I can find out who has this land now. I have no deeds but i do have an old bill of sale to my great grandfather. My impression is that her inheritance was illegally taken.
Also regarding the other pieces my uncles have agreed to split this land once all the legalities have been sorted however 2 cousins of theirs have refused to sign can they still proceed it seems their intent to prevent the family from any conclusion to this.
I would appreciate any advice.

[Nigel Howarth]

Dear jacobant - welcome to the Cyprus property forum,

Resolving this is going to take quite a bit of time and effort - and you're going to need a lawyer.

If you know the precise location of the land that your mother left you, it should be fairly straightforward to find out who owns it. You'll need a cadastral survey plan of the area showing the plot numbers (available from the Land Registry) and then from the plot numbers, the Land Registry will be able to let you know the names of the people in whose name the land is registered. (Note that the Land Registry may not provide you personally with this information - but a lawyer should be able to get the information together with the names of the people who had owned it previously)

Regarding the land that's registered in your grandparents name (I assume they made no Wills - or if they did, you've not been able to locate them?). Most probably you'll need to identify all their descendants, including their cousins up to the present day. Once you've done this, it should be possible to identify what share each of them has in your grandparents land.

(Cyprus citizens cannot leave their immovable property to whoever they wish. Under Cyprus Law there is a system of forced heirship. E.g. If a person dies leaving a spouse and a child then ¾ of the estate passes to the spouse and child in equal shares and the person making the Will has the freedom to dispose of the remaining quarter share as they wish. However, currently under Cyprus law, there is a concession for persons who/or whose fathers were born in the UK or in a Commonwealth country. Providing they have made a Will, such persons are allowed to leave their Cyprus assets to whom they wish on their death.)

There may well be many inheritors of your grandparents land, all of whom have a share in it, and they will all need to agree how it will be treated. They could all agree to sell it, or keep it - some inheritors may sell their share to others, etc. If they can't come to an agreement, the Title Deed with show what share of the land they own.

In the case of the agreement with your uncles I'm afraid that if their cousins, who presumably own a share in the land, refuse to sign there's little that can be done. Perhaps their share they could be partitioned and separate Title Deeds issued. If that's not possible, I don't believe there's any way you can force them into an agreement.

One other thing that may have an impact on your situation is that the Government has been consolidating land. So many small bits of land owned by the same people have been amalgamated into a single piece - but to make this possible, it has involved the exchanging of land between owners. (This could possibly explain what's happened to your mothers' land - it could have been amalgamated with other land in exchange for the land she left you).

This is going to take a lot of time and effort to sort out - as I mentioned earlier, you'll need a good lawyer - and you'll also need the goodwill of the other inheritors of the land.

Regards,

[jacobant]

Nigel thank you for your advice.

I will need to spend time in Cyprus so I can finally put this to bed.

Getting a good lawyer will help, any recommendations?

[Nigel Howarth]

You're welcome.

The British High Commission in Nicosia has published a list of English-speaking lawyers who can help. They've kindly allowed me to put it on my website and you can find it at: http://www.cyprus-property-buyers.com/f ... awyers.doc

You'll notice that one of the lawyers is Louise Zambartas - who helps out in the legal section of this forum. Her firm has both English & Greek speaking lawyers.

Cheers,