Restricting access to property: Citizens, owners, residents, and claims to property

Abstract

This article seeks to collate and compare the various restrictions on accessing residential property. These restrictions include those targeted at ownership, such as additional taxes for non-nationals or even outright bans on foreign ownership, as well as limits on who can use the property such as rights to rent or prohibition on vacation rentals. The article argues that these restrictions can tell us something about property law more broadly. In particular, these restrictions invoke a communal claim to otherwise private property. The article argues that the restrictions can be divided into those which target who can be owners and those which target the use of the property. The article concludes that the latter are to be preferred as the former are often discriminatory while doing do little to guarantee that residential property be used as residential property.