Serbia

Registering Property in

Serbia

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: RSD 20,385,849.34
  • City: Belgrade

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No. Procedure Time to Complete Associated Costs
1 Obtain an extract from the Commercial Registers Agency

The cost consists of RSD 1,500 per extract. Considering the transaction involves two companies, they each must obtain the extract from the Commercial Registers Agency confirming that the persons signing the contract are authorized to sign on behalf of the companies.

Agency: Commercial Registers Agency 		1 day RSD 3000
2 Verify the sale purchase agreement before the court

The sale purchase agreement is verified before the court. The court verifies the documentation, as the notaries do in other countries. In Serbia, the procedure of establishing the notary instead of the court verifications is under way. According to the Law on the Transfer of the Immovable, it is obligatory for the sale purchase agreement on real estate to be verified before the court. Effective as of January 6th 2010, the Sale and Purchase Agreement can be certified only before the Basic Court competent for the territory where the purchased property is located. Prior to this legal reform, Sale and Purchase Agreements could be certified before any Basic Court, regardless of the fact where the property is located.
A lawyer may prepare the sale purchase agreement (charging an additional RSD 15,000).



Agency: Court 		1 day Court fees, depending on the property value and according to the following schedule (with a maximum of RSD 39,000 ): Property Value (in RSD) Court Fees (in RSD) Up to 10,000 980 From 10,000 to 100,000
3 Submit request for registration to the Republic Geodesy Institute

There is a transition from a system where the registration is performed by the Land Register (a court) to a system where it is all handled by the Cadastre (administrative procedure). The new concept is to join legal record keeping (land register) with factual record keeping (old cadastre) providing a unified system for registration of real property. The new real property cadastre is maintained by an administrative body: Republic Geodesy Institute (“RGZ”, through its operational units organized on the territorial principle).
So far, approximately 78% of the municipalities have been covered by the new Cadastre. The urban regions are still mostly covered by the court-led registry. The Real Estate Cadastre and Registration Project, which is currently under way, aims to complete entire process until 2010, when all the process should be administered by the Cadastre (see www.rgz.sr.gov.yu).


Agency: Republic Geodesy Institute 		1 day RSD 3,900 (Land Registry) or 6,163 (Cadastre)
4 Submit an application to Tax Authorities to approve transaction value and authorize payment of transfer tax

The parties submit an application to the local Tax Authorities in order to get approval of the sale price that will be used to calculate the transfer tax. The parties have 10 days after the sale contract has been verified by the court to submit this application. The request will be approved in a few days and then the parties have 15 days to pay the transfer tax.

Agency: Tax Authorities 		1 - 3 days no cost
5 Pay the transfer tax

The tax is paid on a commercial bank into the account of the local Tax authority.

Agency: Commercial Bank 		1 day 2.5% of the property value estimated by the Tax Authority
6 The Cadastre makes a decision on the title

The time will depend on which agency takes charge of the registration. Registration in the Cadastre takes so long due to the back log in updating records for previous years. Once this transition is complete, the system should work more efficiently than the old system. This procedure may last between 30 and 180 days depending on the respective cadastre municipality within the territory of the City of Belgrade.
When the new Cadastre is established in a certain area, the Land Registry ceases to exist in the same area.
(footnote: This case is assuming the registration takes place in the Cadastre, the new system being implemented)

Agency: Cadastre or Land Registry 		5 days expedited procedure at double cost or 30-140 days (Cadastre) RSD 780 administrative fee
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