One Community
Draft Proposal
Draft Proposal
For New Statutes & Regulations
A Federal Republic
Costa Natura is legally structured as four separate and distinct sets of horizontal property according to Spain’s Law of Horizontal Property. This reflects the sequence in which the buildings were originally constructed, the subdivision of residential units & storage rooms, and the dates that each set was registered with the civil registry office. It is written that the intention of the original property-developer was for all phases to ultimately be combined into one, with obligations to contribute to communal expenses being ‘automatically adjusted’ as new phases were built (and for all owners to be bound by the same Community Statutes).
Unfortunately the Law of Spain does not permit master deeds to be ‘automatically combined’ or quota percentages to be ‘automatically adjusted’ (one of several legal errors in the Community Statutes). Costa Natura owners have obviously suffered from recurrent autocratic rulers, many of whom appear to have exploited ambiguities and restricted access to information for private interest purposes. A deed from 1985 has been claimed to have defined new participation quotas, but that deed fails to have effect on several legal grounds (the only party to the deed was a representative of the developing company; it fails to reference any finca numbers; it did not account for several requirements in the Law of Horizontal Property; it did not account for structural modifications or changes in use; or even for the non-existence of 24 property units in Phase 1; for example).
Knowing and understanding the actual legal structure of Costa Natura, comprised of 4 distinct sets of horizontal property, provides a surprising possibility for reforming its governance in the model of a federal republic. The Spanish Constitution delegates autonomous powers to its regions, in like manner to divisions of power in the US Constitution (eloquently described in Federalist Paper No. 51 by James Madison). It is clear that each of the 4 sets of horizontal property is integral to - and inseparable from - Costa Natura as a place. All 4 master deeds refer to the same (flawed) document of Community Statutes. The garden grounds and common facilities of each set of horizontal property are defined to be equally available to members of the other sets of horizontal property. However, for matters exclusive to one set of horizontal property (such as building maintenance or permission for architectural modifications), the rules of horizontal division require that each set of horizontal property must have a separate Board of Owners and select its own representatives. It might be possible to combine phases 2 and 3, since unanimous agreement amongst a smaller number of owners is vaguely conceivable. It is also imperative to apply Articles 24.2b and 24.3 of the Law of Horizontal Property for the purpose of working together for matters that affect them all.
For the purpose of federating as a “Group of Communities of Owners”, it can be observed that the law requires only simple majority agreement from owners in each of them. A constitutive title and statutes for such group can be created or modified by simple majority.
Existing Master Deeds
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Set 1
1st Constructed Phase (January 1981)
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Set 2
2nd Constructed Phase (December 1983)
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Set 3
3rd Constructed Phase (June 1984)
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Set 4
4th Constructed Phase (July 1985)
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Public Access Lane
A poorly defined plot of land, originally owned by Naturaleza, comprising of a public access lane to the beach.
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Reception Building Plot
Plot of land including the Reception Building, which owners have always had rights to use and enjoy.
Notes about Existing Deeds
The title deeds for Costa Natura contain descriptions for 217 private residential property units, unequally distributed between 4 master deeds (144 in Set 1; 7 in Set 2; 24 in Set 3; 42 in Set 4). However, 24 units in Set 1 were not constructed; hence, 193 units exist.
A map distributed by ‘Naturist Association of Costa Natura’ contains the following misinformation: All 3-digit property units beginning with 4xy, 5xy, 6xy, 7xy and 8xy should have the 3rd digit separated by a slash, e.g. 6x/y etc. The third digit (after a slash) means that the same property number corresponds to two subdivisions, i.e. ‘6x/1’ and ‘6x/2’. Even after correcting for this misinformation, 6 units marked on the plan do not exist on any master deed (45/1, 45/2, 47/1, 47/2, 87/1 and 87/2). Rather, those 6 units correspond to just 3 units (45, 47 and 87).
The original plan was substantially modified between 1981 and 1985, resulting in 4 Sets of Horizontal Property of different sizes (whether by accident or design). Any intent to construct the 24 unbuilt units appears to have been definitively cancelled during that redesign (but the master deeds were not updated).
The numbering of property units on the plan is from 1 to 199. Of those numbered units: 24 were never built; 19 are subdivided into two units; and one (151) neither exists on legal titles nor was built. Hence, the total number of existing residential units is 199 - 24 + 19 - 1 = 193.
All units with construction numbers (not numbers on the plan) of 1-53 and 115-119 were originally sold as 2/52-weeks-per-year shares (4 of which - a total of 8/52-weeks-per-year for each unit - were allocated to common-ownership for the purpose of maintenance and renovation). Those construction numbers correspond to all units in Complexes 1-7 and 12 (numbers on the plan 1-49 and 96-100).
Each property unit in Costa Natura can be described by at least 6 different numbering systems (evidently, a source of much confusion): by sequence on the relevant master deed (any one, out of four); by construction number; by number on plan; by Codigo Registral Unico (CRU); by Finca de Estepona number; by Cadastral Reference number.
The method of numbering property units is logical when it is understood that the ‘simple notes’ use three simultaneous numeric sequences (construction number; number on the plan; number on the master deed).
38 storage rooms (26 in Complex 18; 12 in Complex 23) are included in the master deeds as independent property units. They should all, therefore, have unique owners and those owners must contribute (in a proportional manner) toward common expenses. It must be noted that the storage room numbered “21” on the construction plan has been entered in duplicate on the master deed for Set 3.
The third floor of Block 18 is described in the master deed for Set 3 as “One B-E unit, resulting from the union of a type B and a type E, with an area of 84.45 m² built and 31.55 m² of terraces”; whereas, it has a greater area (and has a higher participation quota by m²) than other type ‘B’ and ‘E’ apartments combined.
The true purpose of [enormously] expensive legal actions to claim an apparent debt [from a limited-liability company] in respect of ‘unpaid fees’ corresponding to 24 unbuilt properties is difficult to understand; especially as the only possible result of such legal actions was to take possession of land which was already in perpetual use and enjoyment of all owners of Costa Natura (for all intents and purposes).
Successive administrations have not complied with correct legal procedures for decision-making, which may have resulted in faulty legal precedents for architectural modifications. In particular, at least 20 property units within Costa Natura appear to have had structural modifications (some affecting the external façade and/or commonly-owned areas) for which Junius has found no evidence of any correct legal authorisation; for example:
For Context: Spanish Coastal Law of 1988
Article 132.2 of the Spanish Constitution defines all beaches as public property. The Spanish Coastal Law (1988) in Article 27 further defines a zone of 6-metres width (measured inland from the high-tide level) to be permanently open for public pedestrian passage, except in specially protected areas. This zone may exceptionally be waived (at the discretion of the state administration) or occupied for the construction of promenades.
Article 28.2 requires a public, pedestrian access route to the beach between Costa Natura and The Edge (because it requires such accesses at a maximum of 200 metre intervals).