Building Permit required

[Mollie the cat]

We have been living here for 13 yrs, we have only just found out we have not got a building permit!! Does anyone know the procedure for obtaining one please?

[Keithcaley]

Are you sure that it is a Building Permit that you lack, and not 'Final Building Approval'?

Lack of a Building Permit would most likely mean that your house was built illegally!

There are on-line articles describing the planning / permission process, and here's a brief description: -

"All construction activity is subject to a building permit issued by the District Office or Municipality in North Cyprus. Before obtaining the building permit all prepared plans and drawings must be signed by an accredited architect and must then be submitted for a visa by the Chamber of Architects and Civil Engineers.

The Building Permit process requires a full set of electrical drawings that must be followed exactly. There is no building control inspector actively engaged in the control of standards during the actual property construction phase. Therefore unless you are able to regularly check yourself, or employ someone to monitor the construction activity of your villa or house, you are largely in the hands of the construction company."

If it really is a 'Building Permit' that you need, then you first of all need to seek legal advice - preferably not from the incompetent / corrupt advisor that you used for your house purchase, and preferably one from a completely different city - Nicosia or Famagusta for instance, where the Avukats are not all in the pockets of the Builders and Estate Agents

[Mollie the cat]

Keith,
Thank you for your comprehensive reply. This all stems from the fact we started to apply for a gas permit. As you may know one of the requirements is a copy of the building permit, we do not have one on in the villa and to be honest have never had the need until now to look for one!
We were directed to a department where they "should" have had the record however, as some times happens here, no records and the Cyprus shrug of the shoulders.
It now sounds like a difficult process to get one from your explanation!!

[Keithcaley]

Have you got your Koçan, containing a description of your house - i.e. number of rooms, etc?

[tomsteel]

Mollie, who built/developed the villa? Is/are it/they still trading? If so, I would suggest a contact there first. If not, I would suggest a plea for help from a reputable construction company for advice. I cannot recommend one as I do not now where you live, but my neighbours to the east of Girne
swear by Carringtons' support.

[Mollie the cat]

Keith,
We have the Kocan which states we have the land but not the villa!
Tomsteel,
Thank you we will start to dig deeper, including the estate agent, advocat, Etc.

[Keithcaley]

Good Luck!

[Mollie the cat]

We will need it, what is very odd, the guy at the office could not understand how we have proper electric (not builders electric) and water without a builders permit.

[Keithcaley]

Mollie, when you say "We don't have a Building (not builders!) Permit, do you mean that 'the authorities' - for instance, the Land Registry, or the local Belediye - have told you that your house does not have a Building Permit, or just that you yourselves don't happen to have a copy of it (if one does, in fact, exist) ?

[Mollie the cat]

Keith,
We certainly don't have a copy of it! You are right, the local Land Registry looked but could not find it on their data base. They said that the records were transferred from one office to another in 2008, but the "data" should be digitally recorded on his machine. We suspect at this time it does not exist unfortunately.

[Keithcaley]

Mollie, while there is still a (very) slight doubt about the existence of the document, I would follow Tom's suggestion in post 5, and ask your Builder / Developer if you can contact them, and ask them the question. It may be all above board, and the Land Registry may simply have 'lost' it.

I'll keep my fingers crossed!

[turtle]

Does your advocate not have all your details on file from original purchase ?

[Tojo]

Keith, I have read your link in your first post and it appears to refer to the South, have I mis read it?

[Dalartokat]

Keith, I have read your link in your first post and it appears to refer to the South, have I mis read it?

The article is about the South side and the mention of the person Nigel Howarth on the page confirms. Nigel Howarth is a property advisor, well respected and gives advice on another forum in the South, but I know of a couple of people in the North that have also sought his advice. Keith will explain why he has used this article no doubt.

[Keithcaley]

Tojo, I'm going to pot!

I found a couple of on-line articles which basically said the same thing, and simply chose the one that gave the clearest description - but didn't notice that it related to the South!

However, it is remarkable how alike the two sides' systems are, when I read through them, there certainly wasn't anything that I spotted on a 'quick scan'...

Anyway, thanks for pointing it out, I've deleted the link now, as the text that I posted does give an adequate description of the process.