By making a small change to five articles in the Law of Civil Procedure, a giant step forward may have been taken to solve a leading social problem which has lasted many years for a substantial number of house owners who were inefficiently safeguarded against disruption to their legitimate rights of possession.
This step forward has taken by passing Law 5/2018, of June 11, which changes the Law of Civil Procedure Procedure Law 1/2000 regarding illegal occupation of houses.
As the same Law indicates, this new legislation has been passed to ensure streamlined and efficient answers for house owners in the Civil law ambit. Below we indicate the essential aspects:
1 – What type of protection can be requested?
The summary protection of the possession of a thing or the rights which the individual has been stripped of or the enjoyment of which has been disturbed.
2.- What can be claimed?
The immediate recovery of possession of a house or part of it.
3.- Who can request this protection?
Whoever that has been deprived of the possession of a house or part of it without his or her consent.
However, not any type of person can make this request, only natural persons who are house owners or legitimate possessors though a different entitlement, non-profit entities with the right to possess and public entities that own or legitimately possess social housing.
In short, all legal persons that do not take the form indicated in the previous category are excluded from requesting this protection.
On the other hand, it appears that the legislator wanted to protect only the legitimate possession of real estate that is in the form of house.
4.- What is the procedure to follow to obtain the previously mentioned protection?
a) The filing of a lawsuit requesting the recovery of possession of a house or part of it, including all the elements of fact and law that we have been described above. The deeds to the house on which the actor bases his or her rights must also be included in this lawsuit.
This initial lawsuit may be sent to the unknown occupants at the house. And the notification of lawsuit can be delivered to the person who is found at house at that time.
b) Notification will be made to whoever is found to be living in the house. This can be done to the overlooked occupants and whoever performs this act of communication may be accompanied by a legal official so that the recipient, that is to say the illegal occupant may be identified as having received the lawsuit.
If the illegal occupant is identified, this information will be sent to the appropriate government body (specialized in social affairs) to which the illegal occupants have given their consent.
c) If the plaintiff had requested the immediate delivery of the possession of his/her house, in the decree of admission of the lawsuit, the illegal occupants will be required to provide, within five days of the notification thereof, a deed or title that justifies their possession of the house.
d) If the deed or sufficient justification is not provided, the court will order the immediate possession of the house be given to the plaintiff, provided that the deed that accompanied the lawsuit demonstrates the plaintiff’s right to possess. No appeal will be made against the Court decision and this will be carried out against any of the occupants who are currently in the house.
e) In any case, in the same resolution in which the delivery of the possession of the dwelling to the plaintiff and the eviction of the occupants is agreed, it will be ordered to communicate this circumstance, provided that the consent has been granted by the interested parties, to the competent public services in matters of social policy, so that, within seven days, they can adopt the protection measures that may be appropriate.
f) If the defendant does not respond to the lawsuit within the legally stipulated period, a judgment will be issued immediately by the court.
g) The answer of the lawsuit by the defendant may be based exclusively on the existence of a deed or other documentation to show that the defendant possesses the house or on the absence of a deed owned by the plaintiff.
h) The positive judgment will trigger its execution, upon request of the plaintiff, without the need for the expiration of the period of twenty days provided for in the Law of Civil Procedure.
Therefore, the procedure is quite simple and with short deadlines to bring about a very quick evictions. But remember that these procedural peculiarities are not applicable to all cases in which it is intended to recover the possession of a real estate and that not all subjects are legitimized to do so (would exclude all commercial legal entities, that is, limited companies, banks, etc.)
To finish we could say that the law has tried to respond to a sector in our society but without disregarding another, since it seems that the law is born with the intention of not leaving defenceless those people who are in need because if these people give their consent, the government bodies who are authorised in this social ambit may act. Another and very different issue is if they really have enough resources to deal with these contingencies.
