Bank Report Highlights Albania's Property Chaos

“Despite several attempts at reform, immovable property rights in Albania are not adequately secure and represent an important governance challenge,” the report issued on Thursday said.

“Problems have resulted from incomplete first title registration, the lack of accurate cadastral records, and, in many cases, the absence of reliable evidence of ownership,” the World Bank adds.

The report notes that gaps in territorial planning legislation and administrative failures in the issue of construction permits have made it difficult to obtain an appropriate construction permit, even when occupiers have legal title to the land.

“Authorities have largely failed to prevent new illegal occupations of land and illegal construction, and it is estimated that up to one-third of all buildings in Albania are illegal,” the report underlines.

Reshit Vorpsi, from the Property with Justice Association, an organization that represents property owners expropriated by the former Communist regime, agrees, noting that the government attempts to regulate property problems have failed.

 “The process of returning property [to expropriated owners] and the process of legalizing informal settlements are both failed processes, because they have produced financial tabs that the government cannot afford,” Vorpsi told Balkan Insight.

According to Vorpsi, the Agency for the Return and Compensation of Property, AKKP, whose mandate ended in December, has over 8,000 oustanding claims that have not been reviewed.  

Meanwhile the process of legalizing informal settlements has also run into the sand, because since the law entered in forced in 2006, thousands of new buildings without permits have been built.

“The primary goal of the law was to prevent the construction of illegal buildings and since then, according to the World Bank 80,000 new dwellings have been built illegally and the number could be as high as 120,000,” Vorpsi said.  

“It is imperative that so-called strategy for the return and compensation of property and legalization be changed,” he added.