Acquisition of land rights in Kiev: new rules

Material preparedSnezhana Vasilyeva, Lawyer of the Land Law Practice of ALARIUS Law and Darieu Chrobust, lawyer of the land law practice of ALARIUS, especially for the publishing house “Yuridicheskaya Praktika”

The Decision of the Kyiv City Council dated 09.10.2025 No. 98/10565 approved the Rules for the preparation and decision making by the bodies of the Kyiv City Council on the acquisition and termination of rights to communal property land in the city of Kyiv (Rules).

The new Rules regulate the authority of the Kyiv City Council to cancel its own decisions on the transfer of land out of court, provide additional grounds for refusing to renew lease agreements for communal land plots, stipulate mandatory verification of the proportionality of the land area and the real estate located on it and introduced a number of other innovations and changes to the procedure for the allocation of land plots in the capital.

Considering the importance of the availability of title documents to the land both for the unhindered and efficient conduct of economic activities, and for the realization of ownership of real estate for individual needs, residents of the city. Kyiv and developers need to know the new “subtleties” of registration of rights to communal land plots in the capital and understand what pitfalls exist on the “new path” of the transfer of communal land by the Kyiv City Council to private ownership or use.

Legal fate of the “old” Procedure for acquiring land rights from communal property lands in the city of Kiev

It should be noted that the new Rules do not cancel any provisions of the decision of the Kyiv City Council of 20.04.2017 № 241/2463, which approved the Procedure for acquiring land rights from communal property lands in the city of Kyiv (hereinafter — the Order), taking into account the different subject of regulation of these two decisions of a normative and legal nature teru.

Thus, the Rules establish the key principles of consideration by officials of the Kyiv City State Administration, permanent commissions of the Kyiv City Council, deputy/deputies of the Kyiv City Council of issues in the field of acquisition and termination of land rights. In turn, the Order regulates the procedure for the realization of land rights by individuals and legal entities from the land of communal property of the territorial community of the city of Kyiv. In other words: if the Rules regulate for the most part the relations that arise already during the processing by the Department of Land Resources, the Secretariat, the commissions and the deputy corps of the Kyiv City Council of the package of documents already submitted by the person and the prepared draft decision on a specific land issue, then the subject of regulation of the Procedure is the relationship issues that arise between a person and the land management body at the initial stage, namely during the preparation, submission by private individuals of applications and the necessary package of documents on the allocation of land plots to communal/ state ownership in the city. Kyiv.

At the same time, the conclusion about the conditionally “superior” legal force of the new Rules over the Procedure is prompted by the provisions of subparagraphs 1.4, 1.5 of the Rules, which, firstly, establish the mandatory consideration of the provisions of the new Rules when adopting any decisions of a normative and individual nature by the Kyiv City Council, and secondly, allow the application of the regulations of a legal nature adopted before the entry into force of these Rules, including the Procedure, only in the part that does not contradict these Rules.

In this regard, interested persons and lawyers must take into account the provisions of the new Rules when preparing documents for obtaining a land plot, determining the proper procedure for processing such documents by an administrative body and choosing an effective strategy to protect the interests of the person in land public legal disputes in Kyiv.

Principle of priority and equality in the elaboration of draft decisions of the Kyiv City Council on land issues

As one of the key principles of the Kyiv City Council's decisions on the acquisition and termination of land rights by the new Rules, the order of consideration according to the date and time of registration of the application is provided, which is based on the principle of equality before the law. In the case of similarity of the subject matter of applications, the priority can be determined by the substantive similarity of the issues.

Draft decisions on communal land are included in the agenda of the commission meeting in the order of receipt of applications and are published on the official website of the Kyiv City Council.

Projects that are not published two working days before the meeting or not brought to the attention of the members of the commission may not be considered, except for the following exceptions:

· issues regarding the transfer of land plots for the placement of state or municipal institutions, military units of institutions, military-educational institutions, enterprises and organizations of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, other military formations formed in accordance with the legislation of Ukraine;

· termination of lease agreements due to violation of obligations by the tenant;

· cancellation of decisions of the Kyiv City Council that do not comply with the legislation.

Special attention should be paid to the rule of the Rules, according to which if the draft does not receive a decision on the acquisition or termination of land rights by the required number of votes at the meeting of the permanent specialized commission, it is considered rejected and does not require a separate vote the question of its rejection at the meeting of the standing commission. In this case, at the plenary session of the Kyiv City Council, the question of refusing to transfer land or approving the inventory is first put to the vote.

Digitalization and transparency of the process of processing land allotment applications

The new Rules impose on the Department of Land Resources the obligation within a period of six months from the date of their entry into force to organize the creation of a public electronic register, which will allow tracking the status of consideration of land applications online by any persons indicating the structural unit of the Department of Land Resources, under consideration which is the relevant statement. Such digitalization will certainly optimize the procedure for processing applications for the acquisition and termination of land rights in the capital, will make such a procedure for citizens and business entities more understandable, transparent and accessible, as well as partially solve the problem of bureaucracy in the land sphere and endless correspondence with the Kyiv City Council regarding the status of consideration of applications.

Appreciating this innovation and the desire of the Kyiv City Council to implement in practice the principle of openness of administrative procedure in the land sphere, we should express reservations about the risk of violation of the confidentiality of personal information about persons interested in obtaining land plots, as well as obtaining unauthorized access restricted access to official information or information containing legally protected secrets (in particular, regarding the location of land plots of energy enterprises, defense lands, etc.) against the background of an increase in cyber threats; and intensification of phishing attacks in Ukraine under the conditions of martial law.

Since the Rules do not provide specific answers to questions about the body of the Kyiv City Council or the public institution responsible for the administration of such body, as well as the entire range of functional capacity of the future electronic registry and the mechanism for obtaining access to its information, we hope that in the near future we will see a separate provision that will clearly define the procedure the formation and maintenance of an electronic “land” register in Kiev.

Mandatory legal verification by the Department of Land Resources of the real estate as a means of combating self-development of the capital

In practice, there were rare cases when the Department of Land Resources prepared a positive draft decision for the owner of the real estate on the transfer of the land plot for its exploitation or even a corresponding decision was already made by the Kyiv City Council, and then there was a decision on opening proceedings on the claim of the prosecutor's office on the recognition as illegal and the cancellation of the relevant decision of the Kyiv City Council and the demolition of the object of self-construction, for which the site is allocated.

Such situations, firstly, have formed a negative trend of contradictory behavior of the State in property relations with private individuals and investors in the field of construction, which in some cases contained in the person signs of a significant violation of the right to property guaranteed by Article 1 of the Protocol of the First European Convention on Human Rights. Secondly, the practice of the return by the state of land previously reserved for the operation of a self-built real estate object can be considered as evidence of the absence at the stage of preparation of draft decisions on land issues of comprehensive and proper verification by the administrative body of all the circumstances of the case and the collected materials, which in general is a violation of the principle the reasonableness of the administrative procedure and the good faith and prudence of the administrative body. Thirdly, the absence of a normatively defined mandatory requirement for verification by the Department of Land Resources and the Special Commission of the Kyiv City Council of the legal “history” of the real estate was a corrupting factor.

According to the new Rules, the “checklist” within the framework of the relevant property inspection will include receiving information:

· on registration of documents giving the right to carry out preparatory and construction works and certifying the commissioning of objects located on land plots;

· on possible violation of the requirements of improvement on the relevant land plots by unauthorized placement of buildings (structures) on them, etc.;

· on the availability of decisions on the assignment of addresses to real estate objects located on the corresponding land plots;

· materials of satellite survey of land plots over the past years in order to confirm the fact of the presence or absence of real estate on the plots;

· information from the digital orthophoto plan;

· taking into account the results of surveys of land plots by state inspectors for control over the use and protection of land.

Therefore, before initiating the administrative procedure for registration of land rights, it is advisable for the property owner to contact a specialist for a full verification of the title documents for real estate, and if necessary, eliminate the relevant legal deficiencies so that they do not serve as a basis for the demolition of the relevant real estate and the loss of significant land capital investments.

(Not) proportionality of the areas of the land plot and the immovable property located on it according to the new Rules: a clear formula or an individual approach?

The new Rules established the duty of the Standing Commission of Kyiv City Council on Regulation, Deputy Ethics and Prevention of Corruption within three months from the date of adoption of this decision to take organizational measures to resolve the issue of determining the boundaries of the size of the land plot required for servicing real estate of the relevant area and the corresponding functional purpose. The emergence of the specified norm of the Rules is objectively due to the frequent cases of allocation in Kyiv of municipal and state land plots of much larger area than the area of real estate, which have already been called “toilet schemes” in society and the media.

The issue of (non) proportionality of areas of real estate objects and land often becomes the subject of court proceedings, in connection with which the Supreme Court has already formulated established law enforcement guidelines:

· The land management project plays a key role in the issue of rational (or non-rational) use of the land plot (Resolution of the Supreme Court of Justice of 20.07.2022 in case No. 910/5201/19);

· the size of the land plot required for the maintenance of a residential building, building or structure is determined by conducting an examination at the request of the parties (Resolution of the Supreme Court of February 09, 2018 in case No. 910/4528/15-g).

First, the Rules provide for justification of the size of the land plot by the capacity of the object and the main parameters according to DBN B.2. 2-12:2019 “Planning and development of territories”. It should be noted that the specified DBN mainly refers to the minimum required (in the sense of “not less”) size of the land plot when providing for construction or reconstruction of the object, and not about the “maximum” of the site for the operation/maintenance of the object. At the same time, there are no norms of DBN, which are the “upper threshold” of the area of the site.

Secondly, the Rules define the minimum size of the area of land plots, for example, at least 150 m^{! 2}for blocked buildings, and not less than 500 m^{! 2}— for individual housing development.

Thirdly, the Rules provide for the possibility of dividing a land plot in case of exceeding the maximum allowable size for servicing a property of private property. In this case, the relevant permanent commission of the Kyiv City Council prepares a reasoned refusal to make a decision on the allocation of the land plot and sends a package of documents to the Department of Land Resources for the division of the relevant land plot in order to transfer its part of the appropriate and sufficient size for servicing the relevant real estate object. In case of refusal of the applicant (property owner) to divide the land plot, the application and the draft decision on the acquisition and termination of rights to communal property land in the city of Kiev by legal entities and individuals are canceled and removed from the registration queue in accordance with the administrative procedure. In this case, we see several problematic aspects. First, the refusal of the specialized standing commission to decide on the transfer of the land plot and the return of materials to the Department of Land Resources for the purpose of further division of the land plot cannot be identified with the decision-refusal of the Kyiv City Council as the manager of communal property lands. In this context, the Supreme Court has repeatedly noted that the refusal by a state authority or a local self-government body authorized to dispose of lands of state or municipal property, any decision based on the results of consideration of land management documentation constitutes unlawful inaction (Decisions of 22.01.2010) 2020 in case No. 707/2230/18, from 22.03.2023 in case No. 400/491/21). Secondly, the fifteenth part of Article 123 of the Land Code of Ukraine determines the only grounds for refusing to approve documentation with land management its non-compliance with the requirements of laws and regulations adopted in accordance with them, and the current legislation of Ukraine does not establish a clear formula for calculating the maximum land area land necessary for the maintenance of a particular type of real estate. In this regard, the decision of the relevant permanent commission of the Kyiv City Council on refusal to transfer land due to incompatibility will raise reasonable doubts about their legality and compliance with the provisions of the Land Code of Ukraine.

In connection with the foregoing, today we consider the following measures as optimal ways to solve the problem of ensuring the principle of rational land use and proportionality of land and real estate areas:

· improvement of land legislation in this area, in particular, by supplementing the Law of Ukraine “On Land Management” with the provision on the inclusion in the materials of land management documentation of an expert opinion on the proportionality of the area of the land plot and the area of the real estate located on it, for the operation of which the specified plot is planned to be allocated;

· obtaining such an expert opinion by the customer or developer at the stage of development of land management documentation on its own initiative, since its inclusion in the land management documentation is not prohibited by law;

Renewal of land lease agreements according to the new Rules: no object — no renewal

No less important are new approaches to the renewal of land lease/ conclusion agreements for a new term. According to the Rules, the extension of the lease or the conclusion of a new contract is possible only after confirmation of the fact of proper use of the site, the absence of debt and compliance with the terms of the contract. The profile permanent commission of the Kyiv City Council has the right to reject the draft decision on the renewal of the land lease/conclusion agreement for a new term if there is no real estate object on the site for the maintenance of which it was transferred or in the absence of the object of real estate or the object of unfinished construction for which it was transferred came out.

For contracts concluded after July 16, 2020, a separate control mechanism has been introduced. Thus, the Department of Land Resources of the Executive Body of the Kyiv City Council (Kyiv City State Administration), three months before the end of the lease term, checks the tenant's compliance with the terms of the contract, draws up an act, and in case of detection of violations, prepares a submission for refusal of renewal, which should be considered by the Kyiv City Council no later than 40 days before the expiration of the contract. This creates a new culture of good faith in land use, where the extension is the result of the proper performance of obligations rather than a formality

It is impossible to cancel the decision of the Kyiv City Council: where to put who under the new Rules?

Sub-clause 1.7 of paragraph 1 of the Rules provides that the Kyiv City Council may decide to cancel, withdraw, and invalidate a previously adopted decision on the grounds of its non-compliance with the requirements of the current legislation of Ukraine, if the relevant legal relations in the field of land use did not arise on the basis of the decision, which is annulled in cases and in the procedure, defined by the Land Code of Ukraine and the Law of Ukraine “On Administrative Procedure”.

Such powers of the Kyiv City Council did not arise out of nowhere, since their legal basis is laid down in Chapter VII of the Law of Ukraine “On Administrative Procedure” and Part Three of Article 17^{! 2}Land Code of Ukraine. More globally,

The new Rules in conjunction with Article 86 of the Law of Ukraine “On Administrative Procedure” empower the Kyiv City Council both to recognize as invalid the illegal decision on the disposal of communal property lands and to withdraw its lawful decision in this area, but with the obligatory observance of the requirements of Article 88 of the Law of Ukraine “On administrative procedure.”

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