Notaries will vote for apartment owners

Amendments to the legislation on personal data introduced this year will deprive residential building management companies of access to data on apartment owners in the USRN from the spring of next year. This will make it difficult to hold general meetings, where questions about the maintenance of common property and tariffs for housing and communal services are resolved. To solve the problem, the Criminal Code suggested that Roskomnadzor involve notaries and registrars in organizing such meetings, who will still have information about the owners of real estate. This will lead to an increase in costs that will be borne by homeowners, experts warn.

From March 1, 2023, companies managing apartment buildings will no longer be able to maintain an up-to-date database of homeowners, since access to such data from extracts from the USRN will be closed to third parties. For the Criminal Code, this information is necessary for organizing general meetings of property owners. The reason for this is the amendments to the legislation adopted this year, which prohibited third parties from accessing data about property owners without their consent. These changes were argued by the authorities for the protection of personal data. Notaries, registrars and depositories have such access. But in order for them to notify apartment owners about holding general meetings, it is necessary to develop a separate mechanism. The Association of Real Estate Service Companies (AKON) asks Roskomnadzor in its letter (Kommersant has a copy) of October 7 about this.

In addition, the mechanism may suggest that notaries can represent the interests of homeowners at general meetings without disclosing information about them, says Nikita Chulochnikov, general director of ACON. Roskomnadzor confirmed the receipt of the letter to Kommersant.

In July of this year, ACON submitted similar proposals to the Ministry of Construction. But in a response letter, a copy of which is also available to Kommersant, the ministry advised to contact Roskomnadzor, which maintains an information system of consents to the processing of personal data.

Maintaining the register of owners is one of the statutory obligations of the UK and homeowners associations (HOA), explains the director of the Neoroom Service UK Kristina Golovkova. The management company needs an up-to-date register of owners for the correct calculation of fees for housing and communal services, accounting for the passport office, conducting judicial work and holding general meetings of owners, but residents do not always provide data on the change of ownership themselves, adds the Deputy General Director for Legal Affairs of Astrum-Moscow Management Company (GK “Granel”) Valentina Tugushev.

Igor Vdovichenko, General Director of A101 Comfort Management Company, believes that the measure proposed by ACON can greatly simplify the holding of general meetings, as it will eliminate the need to request information from a notary in advance and provide an opportunity to promptly resolve the issue of confirming the powers of the owners. Kristina Golovkova cites the example of the Krasnodar Territory, where due to the high demand for the purchase of housing for investment purposes, owners regularly change, which can lead to problems with the relevance of the data.

The most effective way to solve the problem would be to give the Criminal Code access to data on homeowners, by analogy with notaries and registrars, Valentina Tugusheva believes. True, she continues, this activity is not specialized for home management organizations, and they do not have the appropriate software. In the current realities, providing direct access to the personal data of the owners of the Criminal Code and the HOA can lead to abuse and become corrupt, given the limited range of access to the personal data of the owners, Igor Vdovichenko objects.

Involving a notary in the procedure for convening a general meeting can lead to both time and financial costs, warns Dmitry Galantsev, managing partner of the Propositum Law Office. But Igor Vdovichenko proposes to lay these costs on the owners, including them in the tariff for housing and communal services, since such costs are aimed at managing the premises of common house shared ownership.

Daria Andrianova