On 29 September 2021 a bench of 7 justices of the Supreme Administrative Court (“SAC”) adopted a resolution in case no. III FPS 1/21 relating to classification of built features for the purposes of real estate tax.
SAC held that, for the purposes of real estate tax, a built feature which is a structure (as per Article 3(3) of the Building Law Act of 7 July 1994 (Journal of Laws of 2010, no. 243, item 1623, as amended, “BLA”)) may be treated as a building within the meaning of Article 1a(1)(1) of the Local Taxes and Levies Act of 12 January 1991 (Journal of Laws of 2010, no. 63, item 6613, as amended, “LTLA”), if:
- it has all the characteristics required of a “building” under LTLA, which are as follows:
- it is permanently fixed to the ground;
- it is separated from ambient space by means of building enclosures;
- it has foundations;
- it has a roof; and
- it is characterised by the presence of usable space as defined in LTLA.
On a practical note, the SAC’s ruling should contribute to a more uniform approach to real estate taxation of buildings and structures such as silos, tanks and the like. The SAC held that if the above requirements are satisfied, built features of this kind should be taxed as if they were buildings (according to their usable space) rather than structures (according to their value).
A written statement of ratio decidendi for the ruling has not been published yet.
If this issue pertains to your business and you are interested in our assistance, please contact us.
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