Act immediately, before the district office decides on registration. Approval becomes final on the day it is issued, and the Act expressly excludes appeal, reopening and review outside appeal proceedings. While the proceedings remain pending, it is possible to secure their suspension and a notice in the register. After approval, the only remaining route is a court claim and litigation that can last years.
Cadastral departments encounter cases in which they receive a series of agreements by which an ‘owner’ transfers all their properties to non-existent companies or fictitious persons, while the true owner knows nothing about it and has signed nothing. Companies with larger property portfolios are particularly easy targets if they do not check their title deeds.
Why days matter
The Act allows no remedies against approved title registration:
A decision approving registration becomes final on the day it is issued. No appeal or application to reopen proceedings may be filed against a decision approving registration, nor may it be reviewed outside appeal proceedings.
— Section 31(5) of the Cadastral Act (unofficial English translation)
This is therefore not a deadline that can be missed and later remedied, but a complete exclusion of remedies. The moment the office approves registration, the administrative proceedings are closed. Someone else is entered as owner, and your ownership can then be pursued only through a court claim, with the burden of proof on you and the risk that the property will be ‘sold’ on in the meantime.
The office may send the approval decision to the parties up to 15 days after issuing it (Section 31(6)), and under the forged agreement you probably do not even appear among the parties. In practice, you may not learn about it at all until someone calls.
What the land register checks and what it will not detect
The scope of review is set by law. The district office checks whether the agreement contains its essential particulars, whether the act is in the required form, whether the transferor may dispose of the property, whether the expressions of intent are certain and comprehensible, whether freedom of contract or the right of disposal is restricted, and whether the agreement conflicts with or circumvents the law or is contrary to good morals (Section 31(1)). It also considers factual and legal circumstances that may affect approval.
Checking the authenticity of the signature is not among these checks. The office works with a document that appears regular: it bears a certified signature, the property description matches and the fee is paid. A reasonably well-made forgery can pass this filter because it is designed to catch formal defects, rather than fraud.
If the agreement was drawn up as a notarial deed or authorised by a lawyer, the office assesses only its consistency with the cadastral records and compliance with procedural requirements (Section 31(2)). The review is therefore even narrower.
While proceedings are pending
The opportunity to respond is narrow, but it exists. Title registration proceedings are suspended, among other circumstances, if:
- proceedings on a preliminary issue have begun (Section 31a(a)), typically court proceedings on ownership or the agreement’s validity;
- an urgent or interim measure orders a party not to dispose of a particular property (Section 31a(e));
- the right to dispose of the property is restricted under separate legislation (Section 31a(f)).
The most effective tool is therefore a prompt application for an urgent measure, seeking a court decision that directly requires the office to suspend the proceedings. A complaint to the office, letter or telephone call does not have the same effect.
A notice is entered in parallel. A notice records facts restricting the owner’s right to dispose of the property or provides information about the property or rights to it (Section 38). The office enters it on notification from a court or another state authority, or on an application by an entitled person or a party, and also records that the reliability of the cadastral information about the right to the property has been challenged (Section 39(1) and (2)). This alerts every subsequent prospective buyer and breaks the chain of further ‘transfers’ to third parties who might later assert good faith.
The Act also allows proceedings to be terminated on other grounds, for example if the application was not submitted by a party or defects in the application or attachments were not corrected within the set period (Section 31b(1)). Forged agreements often contain several defects. They need to be identified specifically to the office, in writing and on the file.
If registration has already been approved
The response is a claim, usually for a declaration of ownership, alongside an application for a notice to prevent the property being smoothly sold on. If it has already passed to another acquirer, a dispute over that person’s good faith is added. A criminal complaint is filed in parallel, but criminal proceedings do not themselves restore ownership: that is for the civil court to decide.
This scenario costs many times more time and money than a few days’ work at the outset.
Prevention
The land register also records circumstances relating to property rights, including a declaration of bankruptcy against the owner, commencement of proceedings to execute a judgment by selling the property, commencement of expropriation proceedings and commencement of enforcement by sale of the property (Section 6(1)(f)). A pending-entry marker also appears on the title deed very quickly; we explain it in what a pending-entry marker on a title deed means.
If a company owns several properties, regular checks of its title deeds are worthwhile. They take a few minutes a month and are the only way to learn of an unauthorised proceeding while the registration period is still running.
How we can help
If this is happening now, contact us today, rather than next week. While proceedings remain open, there are steps we can take. We prepare an application for an urgent measure and a submission to the cadastral file, arrange the notice and take over court representation, including a claim for a declaration of ownership. If proceedings have been suspended or registration refused and a deadline applies, see suspended and refused cadastral proceedings.
The first call, in which we establish the stage of the proceedings, is free.
This answer provides general information on the law as at 16 August 2026. It does not constitute legal services or replace an assessment of an individual case. The details of your situation may differ. Book a consultation to discuss them.
