Compulsory mortgage of PLN 27 million deleted
The Supreme Court has upheld an extraordinary appeal against entries of a compulsory mortgage on premises after a bankrupt cooperative.
This was informed by the National Prosecution Office. The case concerns the bankruptcy of a housing cooperative in Kołobrzeg.
The trustee in bankruptcy sold the cooperative in April 2012, together with its share in the real estate. It was encumbered with cooperative ownership rights to several dozen premises. The sale took place together with its share in the real estate, which was encumbered with cooperative ownership rights to several dozen premises. The parent real estate and the premises that were then separated from it were subject to a compulsory capped mortgage in favour of a Liechtenstein company.
Pursuant to the Act on Housing Cooperatives, the cooperative ownership right to premises, to which the previous owners of the premises were entitled, was automatically transformed into the ownership right to these premises. At the request of the owners, in December 2013 the District Court in Kołobrzeg removed the residential premises belonging to them from the real estate register of the parent property and established a new real estate register for them.
However, the Liechtenstein company requested that a joint compulsory capped mortgage for the amount of over PLN 27 million be entered on the detached property. In its opinion, due to the transformation by operation of law, its mortgage also encumbered the separated premises for which a new land and mortgage register had been established. Her claim was met, and the owners of the premises took legal action to demand the removal of the mortgage. However, in subsequent cases, the courts ruled against the owners of the premises, justifying the judgments by established case law of the Supreme Court. After the judgments became final, the Lichenstein company brought actions against the owners of the premises for payment on account of the mortgage.
In an extraordinary appeal, the Attorney General pointed out that the members of the cooperative were not liable for the debts of the cooperative. On the other hand, the owners themselves did not contribute to their creation and had no influence on who would be the purchaser of the enterprise.
The Supreme Court reversed the decision of the District Court in Kołobrzeg. It also decided to cancel the entry of the compulsory mortgage entered in favour of the entity with its registered office in Lichenstein. It transferred the case to the District Court in order to make such an entry – not only in the land and mortgage register which was the subject of the complaint, but also in the co-encumbered ones.
