Arhivski vjesnik, Vol. 49 No. 1, 2006.
Professional paper
Land registry book reform and digitizing project
Ljiljana Antonić
Abstract
The Republic of Croatia (RoC) and International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) signed the Loan Agreement between the RoC and IBRD for the Real Property Registration and Cadastre Project (RPRCP). The Agreement on the RPRC Project defines the general project objective, which is the establishment of the efficient land registration management system with the aim of improved land market functioning through improving the land registration and cadastral system. The Agreement also stipulates the activities to be implemented by the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) and State Geodetic Administration. The MOJ implements the components of the real property registration system development. With a purpose of developing the real property registration, the Ministry of Justice has carried out a series of activities in order to establish an efficient land registration system and harmonize land registry and cadastral data. The reform of the real property rights system started with enacting the Law on Ownership and Other Property Rights (Official Gazette, 91/96, 68/98, 137/99, 22/00, 73/00, 114/01), the Law on Repurchase of Apartments with Tenancy Rights (25/93,48/93, 1/94, 44/94, 47/94, 58/95, 11/96, 68/98, 96/99), the Act on Compensation for Property Seized During the Yugoslav Communist Rule (92/96, 92/99, 80/02, 81/02) as well as other laws. By enacting the Law on Ownership, a new real property system was introduced, the basis of which is private ownership. Although public ownership of real property was annulled, there is still a parallel institute of ownership as long as public ownership is registered in the land registry books, since private property right is registered in the land registry books at the request of customers. Registered holders of rights for managing and using the real estates are obligated to submit to the competent land registry courts a proposal for deletion of public ownership and registration of private ownership/property on their behalf. In transitional and final provisions of the Law on Ownership and Other Property Rights, the legislator prescribed who and under which preconditions acquires the ownership right for items of public ownership. The real property and LR book system reform started with enacting the Law on Ownership, Land Registration Act and Law on State Survey and Real Estate Cadastre and all by-laws. Within the land registry book reform, numerous activities have been carried out in order to develop a new efficient land registration system and provide legal security in real property transactions and efficient land market. The existing status of registration in the LR books and real estates records in the cadastre required implementation of the reform with the aim of developing an efficient LR books management system. The MOJ implements the reform through seven important components which are preconditions for a successful reform of the real estate registration system: 1. finalization of LR procedures and passing resolutions for cases which are recorded as unresolved cases, 2. shortening the registration procedure in the LR books for the real estates which are recorded in the cadastral records, 3. registering private ownership for estates with registered public ownership in the LR book, 4. computerization of LROs in Municipal Courts, 5. digitization (conversion of manually kept LR books in electronic format), 6. legal and IT education of LR clerks, 7. establishment of the new land registration system and the Land Database. Within the land registration system reform, the MOJ organizes expert workshops and seminars about the land registration system reform. During implementation of the land registration system reform, the procedures of establishing new EDP LR books are performed (EDP-electronic data processing), and until now, after completion of the survey, twenty (20) EDP LR books were established for cadastral municipalities, and establishment of ten new LR books is in progress. The MOJ also implements numerous activities with a purpose of improving the legislative framework in order to create an efficient system for keeping LR books in digital format. Harmonization of real property data in the cadastre and LR books is one of the factors which provides security in real property transactions. Only accurate data about the real estate and ownership rights and other property rights provide land market functioning and legal security in real property transactions.
Keywords
Land Registry System; Digitization; Property Rights; Land Registry Office
Hrčak ID:
6232
URI
Publication date:
11.12.2006.
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