Guatemala

Registering Property in

Guatemala

Listed below is a detailed summary of the steps, time and cost involved in registering property, assuming a standardized case of an entrepreneur who wants to purchase land and a building that is already registered and free of title dispute.

The information appearing on this page was collected as part of the Doing Business project, which measures and compares regulations relevant to the life cycle of a small- to medium-sized domestic business in 183 economies. The most recent round of data collection for the project was completed in June 2011.

  • Standard Property Transfer

  • Property Value: GTQ 1,120,658.39
  • City: Guatemala City

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No. Procedure Time to Complete Associated Costs
1 Obtain an property certificate ("Certificacion del historial de la finca") and the cadastral value certificate ("Valor de matricula")

The seller obtains a certificate at the Property Registry in which the buyer can verify that the property is free from mortgages and encumbrances, and to verify that the property is owned by the seller. In order to obtain the certificate the buyer needs to know the registry numbers where the property is registered. Usually this information is provided by the seller. It is usually the lawyer who verifies the books at the registry and obtains this information. This updated certificate of the property will be used later by the lawyer/notary to prepare the public deed.

The seller must obtain the cadastral value of the property from DICABI (Dirección de Catastro y Avalúo de Bienes Inmuebles). DICABI is a national institution containing information based on a “personal registry type” on all the regional registries in the country. In any case, it is very important also to obtain property’s value information at DICABI as the price in the contract for VAT purposes must be set at least equal to the value registered at DICABI.

Both certificates can be requested at the Land registry. Notaries can request them by email and then pick them up.

Agency: Property Registry (Registro General de la Propiedad de Guatemala) (www.registro-propiedad.org.gt) 		3-5 days (depending on length of the real estate file or if it is digitalized) (simultaneous with procedure 2) USD 7 (expenses, depending on length of the real estate file) + USD 20 (legal fees)
2 Lawyer/notary prepares the sale agreement and notarizes it, along with the public deed

If the seller is a registered VAT Taxpayer, the tax must be paid with an invoice, in which the tax is charged.

The lawyer/notary (In Guatemala, the lawyer is also the notary public) prepares the sale agreement and notarizes it by preparing the public deed.
There is a scale in the Notary Bill that regulates the fees, but nowadays since the market has driven prices for notary services down, one will likely pay between $800 and $1000 for such a transaction. The notary will be in charge of buying the state stamps for VAT payment if necessary (12% of transaction value), and adhere the stamps to the Public Deed; it is safer to the buyer to process VAT payment directly in cash. Payments of registration fees (Q.160.00 plus Q 1.5 for each Q 1,000 of transaction value) are made to the notary, who will then pay the property registry.

The documentation shall include:
-Property Title issued by the Real Estate Office (advisable)
-Actualized Certificate of the property issued by the Property Registry (Obtained in step 1)
-Photocopy of the ID of seller and buyer (passport or local ID). In case the seller/buyer is a Company, photocopy of the appointment in which the Company gives sufficient faculties to proceed with the transfer of property. In some cases, a Board of Director resolution may be required
-Invoice issued by the seller or Form in which the Tax Authorities certified that the consumption tax (VAT that is 12% of the value of the transaction) is paid; Nevertheless, the sale agreement must be formalized with the public deed
-Cadastral value (Obtained in step 2)
2 days USD 62.50 + (USD 800 - USD 1000) (notary fees) + USD 65 (tax stamps, copies, and others)
3 Public deed is delivered to the Property Registry for its recording

The public deed is delivered to the Property Registry for its recording under the name of the buyer. It is also advisable to obtain a certificate at the Property Registry to verify that the change of ownership is properly recorded.
The internal procedures conducted by the Property Registry are as follows:
1. Departamento de Reparto –all incoming cases are assigned to the officials (operadores), whose salaries are based on a percentage of the fees. Since 2005, an electronic system is fully implemented to assign cases based on current workload (1 business day).
2. The official registers the property electronically; and issues the case file (expediente)
3. Departamento de Revision (legal assessors) reviews and approves the transaction
4. Accounting department verifies the payment of fees
5. Departamento de Firma Electronica: Registrar or auxiliary registrars (14 full-time and 5 part-time) sign the registration certificate. As of Decree 42-2006, electronic signatures from auxiliary registrars are legally valid. Each one is assigned a unique number by which they can electronically sign, facilitating the registration process.
6. Departamento de Archivo –updates the information in the system
7. Certificate is signed.

Agency: Property Registry (Registro General de la Propiedad de Guatemala) (www.registro-propiedad.org.gt) 		7 days QTG 160 + 0.15% of transaction value (registration fees)
4 Notify the Municipality and DICABI of the transaction

Notify the Municipality and the DICABI of the transaction. Sometimes this information is not updated, so in order to register the transaction it is mandatory to update prior information.
This step is important to update the cadastral value of the property for the purpose of tax collection. There is a small fine if this procedure is not fulfilled, but it has no effect on the validity of the title obtained in the previous step. In 2009, the land registry has started informing electronically the municipalities of the transaction, and plans to implement a similar proces with the DICABI in the future.

In the future it will also be necessary to obtain cadastral certificates of the property in order to comply with the recently approved Decreto No. 41-2005 (Ley de Registro de Información Catastral). The cadastral certificate is a document issued by the Registrar of the Cadastral Information which contains the cadastral information of a determined piece of land.

Agency: Municipality and DICABI (Dirección de Catastro y Avalúo de Bienes Inmuebles) 		10 days no cost
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