Sie sind Miteigentümer einer armenischen Wohnung, die jedoch von einem Verwandten verwaltet wird? Ihre Rechte und Optionen aus dem Ausland

If you co-own an apartment in Armenia and a relative occupies it, lets it or keeps the documents, Armenian law gives you four levers: a veto over how the flat is used, a claim to your proportional share of any rent actually collected, a one-month priority right to buy if another co-owner sells, and the right to ask a court to separate your share. You can use every one of them from abroad through a notarised power of attorney.

Step 1: Check what the register actually says

Start with a Cadastre extract for the apartment. A representative in Armenia can order it for you. It shows who is registered as owner, the size of each share, any mortgage, arrest or other encumbrance, and the registered transactions. Our guide to checking liens and encumbrances on an Armenian apartment explains how to read one.

Look first at how the ownership is recorded. Armenian law has two forms of common ownership:

• Geteilter Besitz: each owner’s share is fixed, for example one half or one third. This is the default form where the law or an agreement does not say otherwise.
• Miteigentum: the shares are not determined. Before the apartment can be divided, the shares must first be determined.

The difference has practical effects. The pre-emption right described in Step 3 applies to shared ownership only. The Court of Cassation held in 2009 that it does not apply to a sale of jointly owned property.

The extract does not show everything. A Cadastre certificate is valid for 15 business days, and it may not reveal heirs’ claims, unauthorised alterations, or whether a co-owner who sold a share served pre-emption notice. An heir who has accepted an inheritance owns the inherited share from the day the inheritance opened, even if the right was never registered. So if the register shows only your relative, your own right may still exist; see our guide to the six-month deadline to accept an inheritance and register your rights.

Registered rights carry legal force against everyone, and everyone is treated as knowing what the register shows. Register entries are presumed correct until a court or the registrar displaces them, which is why a wrong entry should be challenged early.

Step 2: When a relative holds the keys, the rent or the documents

Use of the apartment needs everyone’s agreement

Under the Civil Code, property in shared ownership is possessed and used by agreement of all co-owners. A majority share gives no right to decide alone. Where the co-owners cannot agree, a court determines how the apartment is used.

Each co-owner may demand a part of the property proportional to their share for their own use. Where that is impossible, the co-owner may claim compensation from the co-owners who are using the property. To obtain it you must show what you lost; no fixed formula such as your percentage of market rent applies. If you claim lost rental income, you must prove the apartment would have been let and at what rent.

An owner may also demand the removal of any interference with their rights, even where they have not been dispossessed.

Your share of the rent

Income from co-owned property, including rent, forms part of the common property and is distributed in proportion to the shares unless the co-owners agreed otherwise. If your relative collects rent for the whole flat, a half-owner is entitled to half of that income. How expenses such as repairs and utilities are set off against the rent is not settled by the sources we checked.

If a tenant or a company connected with your relative occupies the flat without your agreement, an individual co-owner can sue to recover it from unlawful possession. In a 2015 case the Court of Cassation restored an order evicting such a company. Whether a particular lease is invalid depends on its terms and how it was concluded.

Zeitbegrenzungen

The general limitation period is three years, running from when you knew or should have known your right was breached. A court applies it only if the other side raises it. A claim to stop interference where you have not been dispossessed is exempt from limitation. Claims for money, for recovery of possession or against a registration are not exempt. How the period applies to each month of unpaid rent has not been settled in the case law we found, so older rent is at greater risk with each month you wait.

What to gather before you act

• The Cadastre extract and your title document (ownership certificate, inheritance certificate, gift or sale contract).
• Any lease of the apartment, advertisements for it, and evidence of rent paid by tenants.
• Messages in which you asked for keys, access, documents or your share of rent, and the replies.
• Utility and maintenance bills, and who paid them.

A written demand, sent through your representative, sets out your share, what you want (access, an accounting of rent, an agreed use arrangement or a buy-out) and a date for a reply. It fixes the date from which your relative knew of the claim.

Step 3: Buying out, or selling your share

The quickest exit is usually a negotiated buy-out: your relative buys your share, or you buy theirs, at a price you agree. Disposing of the whole apartment needs the agreement of all co-owners, but each co-owner may sell their own share.

The pre-emption right

When a co-owner sells a share to an outsider, the other co-owners have priority to buy it at the same price and on the same terms. Sales at public auction are excepted. The seller must notify every other co-owner in writing of the intention to sell, stating the price and the other terms.

For an apartment the period is one month from the day the notice is received. If the other co-owners refuse, or do not acquire the share within that month, the seller may sell to anyone. The month is for buying the share; a reply alone may not keep the right alive, so be ready to complete the purchase. The required delivery method for the notice, and whether it must be notarised, could not be confirmed from official sources.

If your relative sold a share without notifying you, the sale is not automatically void. You can ask a court to transfer the buyer’s rights and obligations to you, which means you also take on the obligation to pay the price. The claim must be brought within three months. The law does not state when those three months start, so treat the period as running from the earliest date you could have learned of the sale.

Registration of a sale does not show that notice was given, and it does not cure a missing notice. Whether the Cadastre checks for pre-emption notice before registering a share sale could not be established.

Step 4: Partition and court options

Co-owners may divide the property by agreement, and any co-owner may demand that their share be separated. A minority owner needs no one’s permission to sue. If there is no agreement, the court can separate the share in kind.

The court’s test is whether the resulting parts can be used independently. In a 2016 decision the Court of Cassation held that leaving some areas in common use does not by itself prevent separation, and that a part need not match the share exactly: the difference can be paid in money. Feasibility is a technical question, so expect a specialist’s conclusion on the layout.

When the apartment cannot be divided

• Being paid for your share. Where separation is prohibited by law or impossible without disproportionate damage, a co-owner may claim the value of the share. Since 2011 the Court of Cassation has required the paying co-owners’ consent: the fact that the flat cannot be divided does not let a court force your relative to buy you out.
• Being bought out against your will. The other co-owners can be authorised to pay you off without your consent only if your share is insignificant, cannot be separated in kind, and you have no substantial interest in using the property. All three conditions must be met. In 2022 the Court of Cassation refused to treat a quarter share as insignificant merely because the other three owners combined against it.
• When your ownership ends. A co-owner’s share passes only when the compensation is received.
• Sale of the whole apartment. Where division or separation is manifestly inappropriate, the court may order the apartment sold at public auction or tender and the proceeds split by share. This is a discretionary remedy.

A judgment binds only the people who took part in the case, so every co-owner whose position the claim affects should be joined. A judgment is itself a title document on which the Cadastre registers the change.

Acting from abroad: the power of attorney

You do not need to travel. A representative in Armenia can order the extract, send the demand, negotiate, sign a sale and bring a claim, provided the power of attorney covers each of those acts. For property matters the power of attorney must be notarised. You can sign it in one of two ways:

1. At an Armenian embassy or consulate, which certifies powers of attorney for use in Armenia.
2. Before a notary in your country of residence. If that country is a party to the Hague Apostille Convention (in force for Armenia since 14 August 1994), the document then needs an apostille; otherwise it needs consular legalisation.

A document signed abroad must be translated into Armenian, with the translation certified by a notary. The powers must be stated clearly and specifically, so name the apartment by address and list each act the representative may perform. The formalities on your side depend on the country where you sign. Our guide to Nutzung einer Vollmacht zum Kauf oder Verkauf von Immobilien in Armenien aus dem Ausland covers the steps in detail.

If you later decide to buy your relative’s share or another flat, see our guide for non-residents buying property in Yerevan und unseren Immobilienwesen.

Häufig gestellte Fragen

Letzte Aktualisierung: 11. Oktober 2026