Off-Plan Property Purchase — Preliminary Registration as a Protective Mechanism
Buying an apartment off-plan is one of the riskiest transactions on the property market — and at the same time one that must be well protected: the buyer pays for an object that does not yet exist. Precisely for this reason the law on the public registry gives this transaction a special instrument — the preliminary registration of a right to immovable property. This page explains how this mechanism works, which rights it can protect, how priority is resolved and how ownership of an under-construction object is registered.
The off-plan buyer's two principal dangers are a repeated sale of the same object by the developer and the discovery of a bank mortgage or other encumbrance after completion. Both risks are reduced precisely by registration recorded in the registry, and the norms providing this protection are set out below.