Cyprus Property Forum for Buyers, Sellers & Investors

Hi Nigel

I own an apartment in a complex of 20 units. I do not yet have the title deeds but my contract of sale and general agreement with the developer says I pay communal expenses of the whole complex as a proportion of my covered area.

We are an L shaped complex completely joined with 4 town houses and then 16 adjoined apartments over 3 floors. The ground floor is made up of 2 apartments and a communal car park. We have an Owners committee who want to charge the cleaning of the stairwells, corridors, windows and doors etc of the apartment side to only the 14 owners in the first and second floors of the apartments. This would mean I pay a lot more of communal expenses than my covered area and pay more than a town house which is a third larger in covered area than my property. The Owners committee feels that if 75% of Owners agree then they can pass on the charges in this way. Is this correct?

Secondly, does the Committee and all owners have to comply with the law in relation to jointly owned property ie. the complex or can a majority of Owners agree to do things differently?, such as change voting rights.

Hi Susan and welcome to the forum,

The management committee and the owners must comply with the Section 38H(1) of The Immovable Property (Tenure, Registration and Valuation) (Amendment) Law of 1993 – Law 6(1) of 1993, which states:

“The area of a unit consists of the covered area surrounded by the outer walls of the unit and the covered and uncovered verandas and the covered and uncovered balconies of the unit are included therein. Where common walls exist between units or between a unit and a jointly-owned property, the area of these walls shall be distributed equally among the units which have common boundaries or between the unit and the jointly-owned property, as the case may be.”

Section 38K(1) of the same law states:

“The owners of all the units shall participate in the expenses which are necessary for the insurance, maintenance, repair, restoration and management of the jointly owned property and for securing the services prescribed by this Part or by the Regulations. The proportion of the share of each owner in the expenses shall be prescribed by the Regulations on the basis of the area of each unit.”

What the committee can change are the regulations (which along with committee needs to be registered with the Land Registry), but they cannot change the law - which also includes voting rights.

I also notice that you do not have your Title Deeds - as a consequence the Committee has no legal powers & the Land Registry will not accept their registration.

Regards,