The registration of urban lease contracts in the Property Registry

Abstract

The Spanish legal system contemplates the possibility of inscription of lease contracts in the Property Registry to give the right of tenancy an enforceability erga omnes. Royal Decree 297/1996, of February 23, on registration in the Land Registry of Urban Leasing Contracts regulates this issue, although limiting its scope to urban leases entered into as of January 1, 1995 and subject to Law 29/1994, of November 24, on Urban Leases. That norm, which refers to the general notarial and registry legislation, regulates the formal title inscribable in the Property Registry (confirming the general regulation) as well as the circumstances that must express said title and are related to the description of the leased property, the identity of the contracting parties, agreed duration, initial rent and other agreed clauses. The regulation expressly raises the possibility of registering not only the initial lease contract but also subsequent modifications to it (subleases, assignments, extensions and any other modification). The Royal Decree also analyzes the possibility of inscribing the lease when it does not refer to the entire registered property but only to a part of it, without the need for segregation or prior constitution of the horizontal property,  provided that the leased property is sufficiently delimited. Finally, the norm contemplates the ex officio cancellation of the lease registration when its legal or agreed term has been extinguished and no conventional extension is recorded. And the cancellation at the request of a party, by means of a notarial act by which the lessor or lessee notify their will to exclude the tacit extension of article 10 of the LAU.