Housing plan, evictions also in 15 days. 1% penalty for each day of delay arrives

Tight deadlines for vacating properties, a fast track on evictions and a crackdown on unlawful occupations. This is the perimeter of the draft law approved last Thursday by the Council of Ministers that accompanies the Housing Plan put together by the government: the text is consolidated but the technicians are still working on the final touches.

It is one of the hottest dossiers on the table of the executive, but also one of the most delicate because of the need to balance the rights of owners with those of tenants. Under indictment is the often chronic difficulty of returning property: long times, complicated procedures and a series of steps and deadlines that not infrequently make restitution an odyssey. This is where the Ddl tries to intervene with a system aimed at shortening the timeframe. The declared objective is 'to make the restitution of property faster and more effective', taking into account the fact that 'in a large number of cases, such property constitutes an essential tool for ensuring the owner's means of subsistence, all the more so in the not infrequent hypothesis in which the purchase of the property then leased was made through the taking out of financing,' the report explains.

The heart of the reform is in the rewriting of the Code of Civil Procedure. In general, the validation hearing in front of the judge is dispensed with in several situations, in order to gain time: the landlord will be able to apply directly for a release order. The lever is the new 'Injunction of release for finite tenancy', 'modelled on the monitorio procedure for an injunction to pay sums of money or deliver movable property,' the report explains. And in the same way as the ordinary injunction for payment, the decree arrives within fifteen days, in the case of a contract that has not yet expired, and orders the release of the property without further steps, from the date of expiry.

If the contract has already expired (and thus falls under eviction), the judge fixes release within a period of between 30 and 60 days, leaving a margin of flexibility for the needs of the parties. An economic lever is then triggered: at the landlord's request, a sum equal to 1% of the monthly rent may be awarded for each day of delay. The judge retains the power to suspend provisional enforcement at the request of the opposing party who raises well-founded objections. "This provision constitutes an important safety valve for the tenant," the report further explains. The new institution of the injunction does not, however, apply in the case of arrears: here the procedure remains that of validation before the judge, but a penalty of 1% of the rent for each day of delay in leaving the property is also set in this case.

On illegal occupations, the bill introduces a super-fast track for release: there will be no more going through the judge. In the presence of occupation without any title, the owner will be able to initiate enforcement even on the basis of notarial deeds attesting the right of ownership. In essence, this can be done without the need for further steps to obtain an enforcement title. The rule applies to cases of arbitrary occupation, with the exclusion of those in which there was a title that was later declared invalid. The protections for the weakest remain in the enforcement phase. The bailiff may defer the execution of the eviction only once, and up to 180 days, "if the enforced party is over seventy-five years of age or is a severely disabled person or is terminally ill".