Cyprus property legislation held up by Parliament

Ongoing legislation designed to tackle Cyprus’ Title Deed issues and to restore foreign faith in property investment is being held up by Parliament, according to a senior Cypriot minister.   Cyprus’ Interior Minister Neoclis Sylikiotis told reporters that “Before thousands of citizens I am accusing some MPs of trying to thwart the reforms envisaged by the government instead of protecting the public interest.”

Parliament holding up reforms in an election year

My Sylikiotis continued: “Despite the public pledge from House President Marios Garoyian… that the House would approve three of the bills discussed it was then decided to postpone again.”

Thousands of homeowners are therefore facing further delays in sorting Title Deed issues after already fighting for their rights for a number of years.

The minister said three of the five bills already discussed could be passed without affecting the remaining two.  According to Cyprus Property News, ‘Sylikiotis claimed a ‘group of MPs’ were ‘systematically’ trying to waylay the process at the committee stage.’

Cross-party support for reforms makes delays more concerning

Five bills to streamline Land Registry legislation and to ease the country’s Title Deed backlog were tabled to the House last year.  The reforms were discussed at length before being presented to Parliament and had cross-party support which makes the delays more unusual.

The proposals aim to more tightly regulate the property sector by streamlining the issuing of Title Deeds and introducing a town planning amnesty for those developers who have infringed on building regulations.

It is believed that more than 100,000 applications are currently held up over town planning disputes and that 20,000 Title Deeds could be issued every year once the laws are passed.

Changing town planning and property licensing has long been seen as the best way of increasing confidence amongst foreigners looking to buy property in Cyprus.