Measures to speed up real estate transactions coming

Declaring the current wait to close mortgage and land transactions unacceptable, Prime Minister Mia Mottley announced Monday that the government will be reviewing all the systems and processes related to those transactions.

And recommendations to speed up the process are to be implemented in the “immediate future”.

Mottley identified one of the major challenges to unlocking real estate investments in Barbados as the length of time it takes to complete mortgages and sales of real estate.

“Everybody is complaining, everybody. The banking and credit union sectors have reported to the Ministry of Finance that they have an unprecedented $2 billion-plus of investments in the pipeline, but for some reason, much of it is hampered by the pace at which transactions are being completed,” she reported in her Budget speech. “Sir, this cannot be allowed to continue.”

“We must do what we can to remove the impediments to speedy and effective investments in our country. Our economic growth depends on this.”

Mottley further questioned why it was significantly easier to get a loan to purchase a vehicle than to purchase a piece of the rock.

“Sir, this is madness. And this is in a country where mortgage defaults are in single digits. Bajans pay their mortgages. We know that.”

The prime minister, though saying that it was not a blame game, accused the banking sector of being too rigid and said it was rightfully criticised for demanding far more than is reasonably required to protect its interests.

Lawyers did not go without blame either, with the prime minister, a trained attorney-at-law, saying they were contributing to the hold-up in closing real estate deals.

“How can the legal profession maintain the right to regulate its own fees, charge a minimum fee on each transaction, while at the same time, we are told that the reason for the delay on closing mortgages and sales lies on the shoulders of the lawyers.

“Mr Speaker, the timelines are unacceptable and it is one of the biggest drags on economic development in this country,” she said.

“Sir, the land registry, there are also complaints about that, that that can be a cause of delay. Sir, I am simply saying to us today, we have to modernise how we do land transactions…. I have asked the Minister of Housing and the Attorney General to jointly convene a colloquium amongst all of the stakeholders to review all of the systems and processes related to transactions involving real estate and to recommend and oversee in the immediate future the implementation of these recommendations.”

Until those recommendations are implemented, however, Mottley said the government will get the ball rolling.

“One of the main delays in any land transaction is the investigation of title. This is required because except for lands and registered areas, title to land is not guaranteed…. To bring greater certainty to title and to relieve attorneys of long and complex title searches of state lands, we will shortly be amending the Crown Lands Vesting and Disposal Act to provide that all lands transferred from the state shall have an indefeasible title. In other words, sir, a state guarantee of title,” Mottley said.

“This small measure, Sir, in advance of the colloquium, will go a long way in cutting down the transaction time where the transaction involves state-owned lands. I concede too, Sir, that there are also other inputs into the transaction which are in the hands of the state, and they too must deconstruct and reconstruct and be at the colloquium – the Barbados Revenue Authority Tax Clearance Certificates, the National Insurance Clearance Certificates, the Certificates of Good Standing from the Corporate Registry, and others. We are not leaving any stone unturned in deconstructing this matter with land transactions.

“Where these matters require simply the checking of records, as for the most part they will, we will put systems in place so that they can be accessed within three working days, and eventually, in real time.”
(BT)