Future of the Euromortgage conceptPart 1: Solutions in selected European countries

Abstract

Since the 1960s, there has been discussion regarding the introduction of a flexible real estate pledge law in Europe that could serve to ensure security above all for cross-border loans. Although this issue is not currently undergoing detailed analysis, due to a number of significant changes in variousEuropean legislations, including in Polish law, anticipating new solutions in mortgage law, it is worth considering anew whether they and which ones might constitute a possible model for future security in rem in European Union law. The first section of the article outlines the historical background of solutions breaking with the Roman model of accessory pledge rights, and presents a few selected modern mortgage systems, in which there has been a significant departure from the principle of pendency of collateral security on real estate above all the German, Slovenia, Swiss, French, Estonian and Hungarian systems. Slovenian practice may be taken as an example of solutions that have not worked out in practice due to abuses related to the establishing of a non-accessory pledge right to the detriment of creditors seeking the satisfaction of other debts from the property of the owner of the encumbered property.