DISY seeks the protection of the owners of rented premises from tenants who do not pay the due rents on time, for properties that do not fall under the law on the Rental House through legislation.
An amendment to the Law on Civil Procedure is requested with a bill submitted by MP George Georgiou on Thursday. The proposal provides that in case of registration of a lawsuit, by which the plaintiff demands the termination of the illegal intervention on his real estate and its delivery, due to the delay in the payment of the rent due, under a lease agreement, the registration of a defense report (p. p. by the tenant) will be allowed under the condition of repayment of the due rent, as provided in the law on Tenancy.
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In the meantime, the Ministry of Finance has revised the bills that extend the tax incentives granted to property owners who will voluntarily reduce the rent for their tenants, within the period January – June 2021. With both bills, reduce rent by 30-50%, for any month within that period, will be exempt from the special contribution for defense (3% to 75% of rent) and will be granted a tax credit equal to 50% of amount of rent reduction.
It is worth noting that the corresponding legislation was implemented after the first wave of the pandemic and ended at the end of December. The new proposed regulations, however, apply only to companies with full or partial suspension of operations due to pandemic measures and not to all businesses, as provided for in previous legislation.
The new bills amend the explicit reference to the months (January to March 2021) regarding the reduction of the rent and replace it with a word referring to a period that does not exceed 3 months and falls within the period from 1/1 to 30/6/21. However, the changes do not seem to satisfy the opposition MPs, who had asked for a direct subsidy of 1/3 of the rent from the state. The Ministry of Finance claims that this will have a major budgetary impact.
