A Comparative Analysis of Recent Modifications to Several Legal Regimes for Apartment Co-ownership

Abstract

On 5 February 2018, the Belgian government submitted a draft bill to the Chamber of Representatives for a Law containing various provisions on civil law and amending the Judicial Code in view of promoting alternative forms of dispute resolution. This bill, referred to hereafter as the ‘Law of 18 June 2018’ was approved by the Belgian Parliament on 7 June 2018 and published in the Belgian Official Gazette on 2 July 2018 (Law containing various provisions on civil law and amending the Judicial Code in view of promoting alternative forms of dispute resolution, 18 June 2018, Belgian Official Gazette, 2 July 2018, p 53455.). The Law of 18 June 2018 has introduced numerous changes to the Belgian Civil Code (BCC), in particular to the section on apartment co-ownership (Arts 577-3 to 577- 14 BCC). Most of these amendments came into force on 1 January 2019 (For the transitional provisions, see Art. 179 Law of 18 June 2018.). In France, the Apartment Ownership Law of 10 July 1965 has also recently been amended by the Law Loi portant Evolution du Logement, de l'Aménagement et du Numérique (ELAN) of 23 November 2018 (Law ‘ELAN’ on the evolution of housing, development and digital technology, 23 November 2018, French Official Gazette, 24 November 2018.). Meanwhile, the French Ministry of Justice has been planning a structural reform of the regime for apartment co-ownership by resolution (‘par ordonnance’) since 2017. As a result, the French government now faces a very complex legislative situation, since in the next few months, it intends to carry out a major reform of the apartment co-ownership regime while at the same time having to amend the existing Apartment Ownership Act in order to implement the ELAN Law (D. TOMASIN, ‘Les dispositions de la loi ELAN relatives à la copropriété’, (1) AJDI 2019, p 40.). Finally, the Dutch apartment legislation has also been subject to some interesting modifications in the last few years, such as the obligation for apartment owners to contribute a fixed amount to the reserve fund (Law amending Book 5 of the Civil Code in connection with improving the functioning of owners’ associations, 29 May 2017, Stb. 2017, p 241.). By no means is this contribution intended as an exhaustive analysis of the recent changes to these three different legislations. The main objective of this publication is to give a general overview of some interesting developments regarding apartment co-ownership legislation in Belgium, France and the Netherlands, using the recent Belgian reform as a starting point for the comparative analysis.