How To Transfer A Part Of My Land In Jamaica
Your grandfather owns a large lot of land and had recently told you that he wants to give you a portion of it as a wedding gift. How can he fulfil this desire and provide you with this opportunity to start life with your new family?
To transfer part of land to a third party in Jamaica your attorney will use a Part of Land Transfer. Through use of this form a new title called a “Splinter Title” will be issued by the Titles Office, for the part of the land coming out of the larger parcel. Proprietorship of this title will then be in a different name from that of the original owner.
As with any other transfer of land transfer tax is payable in relation to the Part of Land Transfer. This is done using the same form of transfer used in relation to registered land except that it refers to “part of land”. To facilitate a smooth assessment of the transfer, the details of the land must be precisely described in accordance with the pre-checked survey diagram showing the exact size of the part of the land being transferred to you.
To proceed, the landowner (your grandfather) first has to obtain subdivision approval from the Municipality (formerly Parish Council) in which the land is located, along with the release from the Superintendent of Roads and Works. This release confirms that the conditions of approval issued as part of the subdivision approval have been complied with. Effectively, the Release is addressed to the Registrar of Titles and clears the way for the Registrar to issue a new title for the lot being transferred.
Once the release is issued, the Part of Land Transfer is filed at the Titles Office along with the approved subdivision plan and the pre-checked survey diagram for the lot being transferred. A new title will be issued in the name of the third party (you) for the part and the remainder, will remain in the original title which is then referred to as the “parent title”. The Registrar of Titles will then simply make the appropriate notation on that old title, indicating the part that was removed as well as the new title reference for that lot.
If the intention in due course is to cut up the remaining land into several lots, then a further subdivision application would have to be commenced and then the parent title would be surrendered to obtain the splinter titles for all the new lots in the subdivision. This process will yield titles in the name of the owner on the parent title and thereafter a transfer would then have to be effected to any third party with an interest in the land.
Whether the part of land transfer contemplates one lot or several lots to come from a bigger parcel, you must plan for a wait of several months to obtain subdivision approval and then to finalize the process to obtain the Certificate.
Where the land is located in a Land Administration Management Project (LAMP) Area the requirement for subdivision approval may be avoided. Where the part of land has established access to it, then an application may be made to the Minister (currently the Prime Minister as the Minister of Economic Growth and Job Creation) for a Section 5 waiver of subdivision approval under the Registration of Tiles (Cadastral Mapping and Tenure Clarification) Special Provisions Act.
The hope is that this article clarified how you would go about dealing in a part of your bigger parcel of land. Since there is no substitute for good legal advice when embarking on the process of disposing (selling, gifting ) a part of your bigger parcel of land kindly seek the services of an Attorney at law experienced in land matters to avoid pitfalls which can easily occur in these matters.
Prepared by Karene N. Stanley Jones (Attorney-at-Law and Managing Partner Karene N. Stanley & Co. )
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