A pre-contract represents the agreement of the will of both parties to later, at some point, conclude the main contract. The pre-contract is binding if it contains the essential elements of the main contract and must be concluded in the form required by law for the main contract. Otherwise, it will not produce legal effects.
When it comes to a pre-contract for the sale of real estate, it must be concluded in the form of a notarially confirmed (solemnized) document, and it must contain the identification of the real estate that will be the subject of the sale, as well as the designation of the purchase price. In addition to indicating the essential elements of the sale contract, the pre-contract may include additional content. The seller and the buyer are not obliged to enter into the pre-contract; they do so when the contracting parties wish to achieve absolute legal certainty before proceeding with the sale. Therefore, in practice, it often happens that the pre-contract also defines obligations that the seller must fulfill before concluding the main sale contract. For example, a pre-contract for the sale of real estate may stipulate the seller’s obligation to obtain an occupancy permit for the property being sold before concluding the main sale contract. Or, if there is a registered usufruct right in favor of a third party or another encumbrance on the property, the pre-contract may require the seller to have that encumbrance removed before proceeding with the main sale contract. A pre-contract for the sale of real estate is most often concluded when the subject of the sale is an apartment under construction or when the real estate is being purchased with a loan.
If one party does not wish to proceed with concluding the main contract, the other party has the right to request, through legal action, that the main contract be concluded, and this right can be exercised within 6 months from the expiration of the deadline set for the conclusion of the main contract. The pre-contract is not binding if the circumstances have changed so significantly since its conclusion that it would not have been concluded at all had those circumstances existed at the time.