On 30 December, Decree-Law 117/2024 was published, amending the Legal Framework for Land Management Instruments (Decree-Law 80/2015 of 14 May, aka the Land Planning Act).
These changes come about to comply with the programme of the XXIV Constitutional Government and the measures contained in the ‘Building Portugal’ package, which aim to respond to the difficulties that have been felt in the real estate sector by increasing the supply of housing throughout the country through the possibility of building and urbanising rustic buildings, while safeguarding the country’s natural resources.
Amongst the various changes introduced to the system for reclassifying rustic land as urban, we would highlight the following innovations in terms of reclassifying land for residential or complementary use:
The procedure is now carried out through a simplified amendment to the municipal masterplan provided that, cumulatively:
- The consolidation and coherence of the urbanisation to be developed with the existing urban area is ensured;
- At least 700/1000 of the total above-ground construction area is for public housing or housing of moderate value;
- An execution unit is delimited and developed;
- The general and local infrastructures exist or are guaranteed, as well as the necessary collective use equipment and green spaces to cover the needs arising from the new uses;
- It is compatible with the local housing strategy, municipal housing charter or housing stock exchange.
In these cases, reclassification to urban land may not cover:
- Areas integrated into the National System of Classified Areas, excluding areas not covered by a protection regime;
- Hazardous areas of establishments covered by the major accident prevention regime;
- Areas covered by special programmes for the coastline, public water reservoirs and estuaries;
- Areas at significant potential risk of flooding as provided for in Flood Risk Management Plans;
- Hydro-agricultural developments;
- Areas classified under the terms of the REN legal regime as maritime coastal protection strip, beaches, detrital barriers, tombs, marshes, islets and rocks emersed in the sea, coastal dunes and fossil dunes, cliffs and their respective protection strips, terrestrial coastal protection strip, transitional waters and their beds, banks and protection strips; watercourses and their beds and banks; lagoons and lakes and their beds, banks and buffer strips; reservoirs that contribute to the connectivity and ecological coherence of the REN, as well as their beds, banks and buffer strips, adjacent areas, areas threatened by the sea and areas threatened by floods;
- Land classified as class A1 or soils classified as class A and class B;
- In areas where reclassification to urban land is permitted, based on a technical opinion from the municipal services or another entity contracted with technical competence for this purpose, the necessary measures must be planned and implemented to safeguard the preservation of fundamental natural values and functions, as well as the necessary measures to prevent and mitigate risks to people and property.
- Failure to carry out the necessary urban development operations within the time limit set by the municipality or by law will result in the reclassification as urban land being cancelled.
It should also be noted that:
- The allocation to moderate value housing and the subjection to a limit on the sale price are obligatory facts subject to land registration, free of charge.
- Legal acts or transactions whose object is the transfer, encumbrance or promise of transfer or encumbrance of buildings intended for the construction of moderate housing, and subject to a limit on the sale price, cannot be authorised or carried out without mentioning these facts and their definitive entry in the land registry, under penalty of annulment.
- The municipality has pre-emption rights after the first transfer of properties built on reclassified land.
This decree comes into force on 29 January 2025, with the exception of the provisions relating to the regime applicable to acts and operations carried out in suspended urbanisable or planned urbanisation areas, which came into force on 31 December 2024.
It should be noted that the Decree-Law’s survival remains uncertain, as several requests for parliamentary scrutiny of the decree-law have been submitted to Parliament, as well as a PCP bill to amend the Legal Framework for Territorial Management Instruments (RJIGT).
