Buying a Property in Portugal

Once you have found your dream Portugal property for sale and agreed a price with the seller the first step is to make a reservation and show your intent to purchase the property. This does 2 things in general, it stops any other party from coming and making a higher offer as the property is taken from the market, and secondly, it allows your lawyer time to check the property licenses and make sure everything is in order. Usually, a reservation fee of between 6,000 to 20,000 is acceptable and the time allowed for your lawyer to complete their works is between 15 and 30 days. Again both are negotiable at the point of sale, nothing is set in stone at this point. Once you’re ready to do a reservation there is a simple two-page document to sign with your lawyer along with the reservation fee to pay.

Once your lawyer has completed all their checks on real estate documents, they will give you a report on the property. They will also request a promissory contract from the seller which will include all the important points of the sale and a complete rundown of the property; they will send you this along with their thoughts and advise you about eventual alterations to the contract.

Once both you and the property seller agree on the promissory contract, you will pay a second amount that is usually a percentage of the sale price that varies from 10% to 60% of the final sale price. At this point, the contract is legally registered and it is very difficult for the seller to pull out of the sale. In fact, Portuguese law states that if a seller pulls out of a promissory contract then they have to pay double to the amount already paid back to the buyer, this gives assurances to the buyer as the penalties to pull out are very severe and virtually stops anybody from doing it.

This is a fairly straight forward process as a large amount of the work in done on the first step: Promissory. If the property in Portugal that you purchased was off-plan then the lawyer at this point will check that all of the licenses are in place and that the property is free from debt. Once this is all certified you will then complete your purchase along with payment of the balance, your lawyer will then register the property under your name and you will own the freehold of a property in Portugal.

If the Portugal property you are looking to purchase is ready and you have the funds in place it is possible to skip step 2 and go straight to step 3, Deeds. However, not many people have the full amount available in 15-30 days which is why there is a Promissory contract signed in around 90% of property purchases.

Buying property in Portugal is a transparent process and you, as a buyer, are completely protected during the whole process. Portugal Homes is here to make this whole process even easier for you, supporting you on each step of your journey of buying property in Portugal.