As a result of the full-scale invasion of the enemy troops of the Russian Federation on the territory of Ukraine, many unfinished buildings were damaged / destroyed. The question arises more and more often: who should collect evidence, the developer or the investor?

Based on the analysis of the Law “On compensation for damage and destruction of certain categories of immovable property as a result of hostilities, terrorist acts, sabotage caused by the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, and the State Register of property damaged and destroyed as a result of hostilities, terrorist acts, sabotage caused by the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine”:

• the holder of compensation must submit an application with relevant documents, in particular, evidence of ownership, or evidence of property rights to the destroyed object, as well as other documents established by law.

Therefore, the collection of evidence in accordance with the specified Law is entrusted to persons who invested / financed the construction of construction objects, in respect of which the right to perform construction works was obtained and the owner of a special property right to indivisible residential objects of unfinished construction, future objects of residential real estate or persons who have paid a partial price of such an object and in whose favor the encumbrance of property rights on such an object has been registered in accordance with the Law of Ukraine “On guaranteeing property rights to real estate objects to be built in the future”, in the case receiving compensation for damaged objects of immovable property, defined by subparagraph “c” of clause 6, part 1 of article 1 of this Law, i.e. components of construction objects (apartments, other residential premises in the building), which after being put into operation are by independent objects of immovable property, provided that at the time of damage, load-bearing and external enclosing structures were erected in the construction object (except for translucent structures and filling of doorways), in respect of which the right to perform construction works was obtained; or for destroyed objects of immovable property, defined by subparagraph “c” of paragraph 4 of the first part of Article 1 of this Law, which is identical.

At the same time, after submitting an application for compensation of persons who have invested / financed the construction of construction objects, in respect of which the right to perform construction works has been obtained and the owner of a special property right to indivisible residential objects under construction, future objects of residential real estate or by persons , who have paid a partial price of such an object and in whose favor the encumbrance of property rights on such an object has been registered, actually transfers the obligation to collect relevant evidence to the Commission for consideration of issues regarding the provision of compensation, which is provided for in Article 6 of the mentioned Law ̶  collection of documents and/or information necessary to make a decision on compensation by:

• access to relevant information and communication systems of state and communal forms of ownership and obtaining documents and/or information from them;
• claims from state bodies, local self-government bodies, enterprises, institutions, organizations regardless of the form of ownership of documents and/or information (including for the purpose of renewing lost documents necessary for making a decision on providing compensation for the destroyed object of immovable property) (for necessary);
• demanding from the recipient of compensation the originals of the documents specified in the seventh part of Article 4 of this Law, to certify the authenticity of the submitted copies, in the event that such documents (information from such documents) are not available in the persons specified in subparagraph “b” of this clause and in the information and communication systems state and communal forms of ownership.

The publication was prepared within the framework of the Project “Increasing awareness among self-governing municipalities and citizens on recording the destruction caused by war”, which is implemented by the Ukrainian Association of District and Regional Councils with the support of the “Phoenix” Project, which is implemented by the Eastern Europe Fund at the expense of the European Union.