The agreement for the purchase and sale of real estate in the Republic of Serbia is regulated by the Law of Obligations and the Law on Real Estate Transactions. According to the aforementioned laws, real estate purchase agreement must be concluded in writing. The form of the agreement is one of the essential conditions for the validity of the agreement itself.
According to the previously valid Law of Real Estate Transactions, the court could be granted the legal effect of a agreement that was concluded in written form – on which the signatures of the contracting parties were not certified by the court, providing that the agreement was fulfilled in its entirety or for the most part, that the real estate was acquired within the limits of the law, that sales tax has been paid, that the right of first refusal has not been violated and that no other social interest has been violated. This is a type of convalidation – legal enforcement of a contract that was not in full compliance with the law.
After the entry into force of the currently valid amendments to the Law of Real Estate Transactions, this possibility was excluded and now there is an obligation to have the agreement certified by a competent public notary, which means that the parties must sign the agreement in front of a notary public, who will certify their signatures.
The contract should contain basic information about the seller and the buyer, a description of the real estate that is for sale, the price the buyer pays the seller, the method of payment and the payment term, as well as any other conditions agreed between the contracting parties. Real estate purchase agreement should also contain data on possible encumbrances on the real estate, servitudes and other data that may be of importance. The buyer and the seller can also agree on other conditions that will be an integral part of the real estate purschase agreement, but these conditions must not be in conflict with the law.
As a rule, the contract includes the Clause intabulandi, which is an explicit and strictly formal statement a will of the land registry predecessor – the seller, by which he declares that he agrees to transfer his right of ownership to the buyer from the real estate purchase agreement. Clausula intabulandi can be given in the agreement or in a separate submission or document.
According to the regulations of the Republic of Serbia, the buyer does not acquire the right of ownership at the moment of the conclusion (certification before a public notary) of the Real Estate purchase agreement, but when his right of ownership is entered in the public register, which entry is implemented by the Republic Geodetic Institute – Service for the real estate cadastre.
