Foreign real estate investment is growing since the new Civil Code

From January 1st, 2014, foreign citizens and legal entities are allowed to acquire land in Romania under the same terms and conditions as Romanian citizens and legal entities. As for the agricultural land, the conditions of a pre-emption right require compliance. Additionally, foreign citizens and legal entities may own buildings under the same conditions as Romanian citizens and legal entities.

According to the new Civil Code, the authentic form of the sale-purchase agreement is not sufficient to ensure ownership right over real estate. Thus, registration with the relevant land book of the ownership transfer is mandatory. So, regardless of the moment the parties conclude the agreement, the ownership right will be transferred at the time of the inscription in the Real Estate Register. Nevertheless, until finalization of the cadastral works for each territorial unit, registrations shall be performed for third parties’ acknowledgement purposes only.

Public Procurement Regulations

To expeditiously resolve the numerous contestations, the Government Emergency Ordinance no. 34/2006 regarding public procurement procedures, as amended (OUG 34/2006) provides short terms in which National Council for Resolving of Contestations (NCRC) has to resolve the contestations (i.e., 10 days for deciding on reasons that would impede the analysis of the contestation on the merits, 20 days for regular contestations, with the possibility of prolongation, with a maximum of 10 days).

Through the Order of the European Funds Ministry no. 1120/2013 regarding the approval of the simplified procedure applicable to private beneficiaries of structural funds, the applicants for structural funds benefit from a simplified procedure (by way of request of offers) for the acquisition of assets or services for the contracts that exceed the thresholds provided by OUG 34/2006 within which the assets or services can be directly acquired.