Guidelines For Foreigners When Buying Property In Tunisia

New rules on Permission, Authorizations, limits and exceptions

I) Formalities and procedures

A) The purchase of the property requires permission to be obtained from the Governor

Buying a property in Tunisia for a foreigner shall be subject to prior authorization to be given by the governor of the region where the property is located. Despite this, in recent years more favourable legal provisions have been recognized as regards certain land and real estate operations carried out by foreigners.

Before requesting the permission of the governor, it is essential to draw up a preliminary deed of sale. It must provide a reasonable period (between 3 and 6 months for example) that allows the purchaser to obtain the aforementioned authorization. At the same time, the preliminary deed must provide provisions for the case in which the authorization is not granted. As in Italy, the buyer's promise to purchase may be accompanied by a deposit as a percentage of the total sales price. The same deposit can be reclaimed, partly or wholly, in the event of failure to complete the sale.

In order to ensure that the procedure related to the purchase is correctly carried out it is advisable to seek the assistance of a professional in this sector, a real estate agent or better yet a lawyer appointed by one of the parties. The latter, in fact, can provide assistance for the best possible preparation of the file the authorization of the governor and to facilitate the completion of administrative procedures.

The deposit for the purchase request must be accompanied by several official documents starting from the purchaser's identification documents.

In the case that the authorization is granted, the final contract of sale may be stipulated in order to proceed, within sixty days, to the registration and entry of the sale to be carried out in the competent "revenue agency and land registry.

It has to be pointed out that the above-mentioned request for authorization may be granted or rejected (although in practice the latter rarely occurs).

In case of granting, the final purchase contract can be signed and authenticated only after completing the registration and transcription procedures.

In the case where the authorization request is rejected it will be impossible to complete the sale. In this case, it will be possible to recover the deposit only if, in the preliminary act, the is a clear precise clause that foresees the refund.

In some cases, particularly in tourist...

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