What you need to know when buying an apartment in Ukraine
Acquisition of real estate in Ukraine costs a considerable amount of money and is associated with many risks. You need to carefully understand all the process and approach the procedure for buying a home responsibly so that everything goes smoothly. Let us tell you in this guide how the process of the purchasement of a flat goes in 2024 in Ukraine.
What you need to do before buying an apartment: to check the property, owner and documents
The first thing the buyer should do is to check the legal purity of the property they like. What to do:
make sure that the housing is not under arrest and does not act as collateral;
find out if a minor child is registered in the apartment and if he is a co-owner;
check whether there are third parties who also have rights to the property, and whether they gave their consent to the sale;
make sure that the house is not included in the list of buildings that are planned to be demolished.
You can correctly analyze the living space with the help of a notary. The specialist will check registered people in the apartment, the presence of an arrest, temporarily deregistered people, whether there is a deposit or third parties claiming to purchase. If there are any problems, the notary will refuse to certify the transaction.
Before concluding a preliminary contract, it is worth checking data of the owner of the apartment. To begin with, it is worth making sure that the seller’s passport data exactly matches the information in the title documents for real estate. The description in the technical documentation must correspond to reality: layout, floor, number of rooms, area.
When making a purchase and sale of an apartment, you should ask the seller for a certificate of family composition. If there are registered minors, you can directly ask how this will be resolved.
The seller must not have external signs of alcohol or drug addiction, arouse suspicion in terms of mental illness. Find out if there are other owners of the apartment, and if so, whether they agreed to the sale. If the property was obtained by a court decision, you need to make sure that the deadline for appealing this decision has already passed.
Which documents do you need to buy a flat
Requesting an extract from the State Register is the first step for further processing of documents for the purchase of a flat. From the document you can find out who the owner is, whether there are any burdens. If everything is fine with the living space, you can sign a preliminary contract with a notary.
What documents will a buyer need to purchase a home:
passport (for a minor – a birth certificate);
marriage certificate or divorce certificate;
written consent of the spouse – if both are involved in the transaction, this document can be omitted;
permission from the guardianship and guardianship authorities – if an apartment is bought for a child.
The seller is also preparing his package of documents. What the owner have to provide:
title documents;
extract from the Register of property rights;
passport, identification code;
written consent of the spouse;
technical passport for the apartment;
marriage certificate or divorce certificate;
permission from the guardianship and guardianship authorities – if there are minor co-owners;
information about the composition of the family;
conclusion on the valuation of real estate;
refusal of the co-owner of the priority right to acquire a share of the apartment – if part of the property is sold;
certificate of no outstanding utility bills.
The documents collected by the seller have to be checked by a notary. If everything is fine with the papers, you can proceed to signing the contract.
How does a purchase deal of flat goes
The final check of documents and certification of the transaction is carried out by a notary. Only after that, the agreement gets legal force and ownership passes from one party to another.
The process of buying a flat in Ukraine usually runs as follows.
The property, owner and documents are checked. The living space should not be under arrest or bail, it has all the necessary papers.
A preliminary contract is signed. This document acts as a guarantee that the parties will fulfill their obligations.
Documents are being prepared for the conclusion of the transaction. The necessary papers are collected by both the buyer and the seller, after which they are provided to the notary.
The real estate purchase agreement is concluded. Ownership passes to the buyer.
The payment for the purchased apartment is carried out.
The services of a notary and a lawyer are paid (if he also takes part in the transaction).
What is a real estate purchase agreement
The procedure for buying an apartment most often involves the execution of two contracts: a preliminary and a main contract of sale. By signing a preliminary contract, the seller and the buyer confirm their intention to conclude a deal. The document fixes the cost of the property, the payment procedure and other important nuances. During the signing of the preliminary contract, the buyer transfers the deposit to the owner. Most often it is 10% of the cost of the apartment.
A real estate purchase agreement is a document containing information about the transfer of ownership of a flat from one person to another. The contract is drawn up at the notary during the conclusion of the purchase and sale transaction. After signing and notarizing the document, the information about the new owner is entered into the electronic Register of property rights. The original contract of sale and its certified copy, as well as an extract from the register of registration are transferred to the buyer.
Why do you need a lawyer or realtor when purchasing a flat
Buying a flat on your own is quite realistic, without using the services of a realtor or a lawyer. But if there is no experience in acquiring real estate, you want to speed up the procedure and protect yourself from the actions of scammers.Help of experienced professionals will not be superfluous.
A lawyer will help you follow the procedure for registering a property. This specialist is competent in checking, collecting and preparing documents. He can also help in non-standard situations, when there are controversial issues regarding the transfer of property rights. But the lawyer does not search for suitable objects.
Often, lawyers are contacted to obtain a certificate of tenants registered in the apartment, to check the object for the absence of burdens, mortgages or arrests, and utility bills. Another reason to contact a specialist is to draw up a contract of sale and make sure that the transaction is safe. A real estate agent can help with these matters.
If you cooperate with a qualified realtor, you can limit yourself to only his services, without also contacting a lawyer. The realtor will save the buyer time, effort and money. The agent will quickly find a suitable apartment, agree on its purchase on favorable terms, check the legal cleanliness of the property, help draw up all the documents and conclude a deal. With an experienced realtor, the buying process will be much easier and calmer.
Differences of purchasing a flat in a new building
When buying off plan flat, two main stages can be distinguished: investing funds and waiting for the house to be put into operation and registration of ownership of the property.
The first stage of acquiring a flat in a new building includes the signing of an investment agreement. To conclude an agreement, you will need a passport, identification code, money and the consent of the spouse. Written consent can be provided already at the stage of registration of ownership.
Before proceeding with the procedure for registration of ownership, you need to obtain a technical passport for housing. Ownership can be registered with local authorities or through a notary.
For registration, you need to submit the following documents:
passport and identification code;
Marriage certificate;
passport and spouse identification code;
investment agreement;
certificate of share payment;
act of acceptance and transfer of housing;
technical certificate;
documents on house commissioning and assigning a postal address.
After verification of documents and registration of ownership, the buyer of primary housing receives an extract from the register, which confirms that he is the owner of the purchased property.
Features of the registering a flat in the secondary market
If a decision is made to buy real estate on the secondary market, a real estate purchase agreement is mandatory to conclude a transaction. A preliminary contract is not always concluded, but at the request of the seller and the buyer. If the buyer has definitely decided that he wants to buy a specific housing space, but he will be able to deposit funds a little later, he can draw up a preliminary agreement on his intentions to purchase an apartment.
Typically, a preliminary contract is concluded for a period of not more than 30 days. During this time, the seller will have time to collect all the documents and discharge the registered family members from the apartment, and the buyer will resolve payment question.
When everything is ready, the buyer meets the seller at the notary to conclude a contract of sale. The contract must be carefully read, especially what is written in small print, and make sure that there are no gaps in it that can be used to enter new information. Based on the contract of sale, the buyer receives ownership of the apartment, so it is important to avoid moments due to which the document may be invalidated.
How the settlement goes when buying a property
When signing the contract of sale, the buyer pays the seller an amount equal to the value of the property or less if a deposit was previously made. You can transfer funds before signing the contract, but there are risks for the buyer, since in fact the seller will have both money and property rights. If you pay for an apartment after the conclusion of the contract, then the seller risks: the document has already been signed by him, but the money has not yet been received.
The optimal solution is to transfer the money to the seller after the contract is signed by both parties, but not yet notarized. Also, a notary’s deposit, through which payment can be made, will help to secure all participants in the process. The buyer transfers the funds, the parties sign the contract, after which the seller receives the money.
How much does it cost to register a flat
The cost of the property is not all the costs that the buyer will have to bear in order to become the full owner of the flat. Part of the costs can be covered by the seller, and some of them simply include them in advance in the cost of living space.
What are the costs of registering a property:
state duty – 1% of the amount of real estate (there are benefits for certain categories of sellers and buyers);
tax to the Pension Fund – 1% of the cost of the apartment;
notary services – the cost of a public notary may be less than a private one, although there may be more queues for the first one, approx cost goes from 1000 UAH;
realtor services – real estate agent commissions are 2-5% of the value of the property;
registration of ownership – the final amount is affected by the urgency of the procedure, so it can range from UAH 180 to UAH 8,800.
Family members of military personnel, participants in the liquidation of the Chernobyl accident, veterans, people with disabilities of I-II groups are exempted from paying taxes when buying a home. Any benefits cannot be automatically extended to the other side of the transaction.
Some of the above costs might be taken by the seller. This may apply to realtor fees, especially in cases where agents on both sides work through a partner sales system.
The seller also has his own expenses associated with the execution of the purchase and sale transaction. These include personal income tax, state duty and military tax. The seller is not required to pay personal income tax if he sells real estate for the first time or if the apartment was bought more than 3 years ago.
Purchasing of property is not difficult if the procedure is accompanied by experienced professionals or the buyer himself already has experience in this area.
