Real estates in Kraków, Poland

and how the notary can help

• The majority of real estate in Poland are disclosed in land and mortgage registers. The registers are held by district courts and are public. They may be viewed free of charge on the website of Ministry of Justice. There is a special form of authenticated deed for property ownership change. It is a formal document prepared not by sides of the deal or their lawyers, but by public notary himself. The notary writes down agreed paragraphs and verifies them according to polish law. This form of document is called „akt notarialny” and is the only possible form for property ownership handover. Before you purchase a chosen real property it is strongly adviced  to check its legal status and potential encumberances. In order to do so, you should obtain the number of the land and mortgage register  and check the entries on the Ministry of Justice website. Public notary also verifies your foreigner status. In polish law A FOREIGNER is either a person with non-polish passport or a company with more than 50% shares in non-polish hands. Some types of properties require special procedures to be bought by foreigners.
• After the real property has been selected, a preliminary agreement is concluded with a seller. It is not required by law to prepare and sign such document at a notary public in the form of a notarial deed, but this is the safest solution. It requires the payment of the notarial fee A list of notaries public associated in the Notarial Chamber in Kraków 
  The preliminary agreement should specify:the price of the flat, the date of leaving the flat by its current owner and the date of payment.
  Signing a preliminary agreement is often connected with making an advance paymentto the selling party (e.g. in the amount of 10% of the total price of the purchased real property). Signing this agreement with assistance of a notary costs you money, but gives you a few advantages:
  1. Formal claim to finalize the deal in Property Registry.
  2. Strong security records, like 777 (there will be separate blog entry about this one in the near future).
  3. You can finalize the deal despite your counterpart would like to back out of it.

• The final sale agreement (akt notarialny) is signed at the notary public (in the form of a notarial deed under pain of nullity). notarial fees and charges is paid for notarial services, in an amount depending on the value of the transaction. This amount can be negociated with the notary in Krakow. Issuing power of attorney („pełnomocnictwo”) – if you like to empower somebody to sign „akt notarialny” in your name, the power of attorney document must have the same strength, so requires another „akt notarialny”. By general guindance the language of „akt notarialny” SHOULD be Polish. Documents signed in a form of „akt notarialny” makes public notary ensures both sides understood the text of the document before putting forward their signatures.
  
  After signing the agreement a tax on civil law transactions has to be paid in the amount of 2% of the value of the purchased real property and is taken by the notary in Krakow. The cost of entry in the land and mortgage register is PLN 200 and, in return for a fee, this can be entrusted to the notary public.  The change of ownership should also be reported at the local municipal office responsible for the location of the real property. Such entry also constitutes information about the new payer of property tax.
  
  More information on buing property in Poland on accace.com