Subdivision as a tool for regulating and approving legal status of real estate

Abstract

Subdivision surveying of land property, in its basic form, is a technical and administrative procedure which can be called one of the most important elements of the real estate management. Its purpose is to separate at least two new cadastral parcels, without changing their current owner. The preparation of a proper real estate subdivision plan should serve the purpose of appropriate use of investment opportunities which are associated with it. However, under the Polish law, there are numerous premises to perform subdivisions, whose sole purpose will be to form a new structure of land ownership or to approve the existing legal status. The paper is aimed at systematizing the most important, according to the Authors, surveying and legal procedures creating new boundaries, separating the existing real estate or the one which is to be created by virtue of law. Subdivisions approving the existing legal status of real estate are performed when it is necessary to transfer ownership rights to only part of a real property. Normally, it happens when a fragment of a plot is used by the so-called autonomous possessor, as if it was their own. Such a person can apply before a common court to be conferred ownership rights to the land, which they use. That land must, however, be subdivided as a separate cadastral parcel. A similar situation occurs when a parcel adjacent to land under flowing surface water will be permanently taken away by this water. Automatically, if the water exceeds the cadastral boundaries, part of the parcel flooded by the river becomes the property of the owner of the water. In Poland, it is the State Treasury. Subdividing this part of land covered by water is conducted in the process of determining the course of a boundary line. A similar situation occurs when a public road was built on a private property. By virtue of law, the owner of the road is entitled to the ownership rights to part of the real estate seized for that road. The subdivisions in order to parcel out land for a road are subject to separate regulations. The subdivisions can also regulate the legal status of real estate. It is possible in such cases where on part of the real estate, which is private property, public investments are planned, i.e. actions of strategic importance for the functioning of a society. Depending on the nature of such investment, subdivision procedure will be conducted differently, and the result will always be the transfer of ownership rights to a separate cadastral parcel. Deprivation of ownership rights to the separated part of the real estate is held under an administrative decision in the course of expropriation proceedings. The most distinctive, however, are the subdivisions performed under the Special Roads Acts, most frequently in order to separate a lane of local and supralocal significance. The subdivisions for railroads, airports, pipelines, flood protection structures or nuclear power facilities are conducted in a similar manner.