Question regarding the NPPR

PeteIRL

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I'm in the process of selling my apartment which I've lived in since 2008. One of the things the solicitor has required me to get is the Certificate of Discharge/Exemption for NPPR. I'm just working my way through it and trying to get my head around just what I'm looking at. To be honest, I find this whole sale process a bit intimidating! Anyway, the exemption reason 1 requires evidence the "Property was the owners PPR for one or more of the NPPR charge years 2009 through 2013..." and that evidence used would be utility bills or bank statements for that period. I don't have any of these. The furthest back I can get a utility bill or statement is 2012. What can I do here?

The other thing is "A sworn affidavit confirming they are the registered owner(s) of the property and have resided in the property as their principal private residence on the relevant NPPR liability dates." What exactly does this mean and can this be used instead of the bill/statements.

Sorry if this is a fairly rudimentary question. I've never sold a property before, and like i said, intimidated!
 
I am selling a house, also my first time.

The sol provided me with a declaration that I must sign, declaring to the Co. Co. that the house was never an NPPR.

I signed it, and submitted to sol.

That's all I have to do so far.
 
It's a daunting process, but this is what you pay a solicitor for. Ask them questions.

A sworn statement is common. When I sold my house, solicitor asked council for certificate of exemption. The council sent out a statutory declaration form, I completed it, and it got sworn and returned to council.
 
You can write to the ESB or whatever provider you used and request a bill for all of the NPPR years. They are used to getting these requests at this stage. When you get the copy of the bills you fill in a form (it's online) from your County Council and send it in to them. They then issue you with a clearance. I had to do this in my mother's probate case as she was unable to sign a sworn statement for some reason. Timeframe all in was only about 2 to 3 weeks to be honest.
 
Thank you for the replies RedOnion and elcato. I'm going to get onto the relevant utilities and see if I can get those bills from years back. That's great.
 
Going through this myself at the moment. My solicitor is dealing with the Co Council to obtain the exemption certificate, all I had to do was sign the affadavit. Not all local authorities require the detailed back-up information (utility bills, etc), according to my solictor, the affadavit is sufficient.
Louth and Dublin (not sure which authority in Dub) apparently don't need the back-up details, but Meath do.

PeteIRL, my solicitor mentioned P60s or other tax documents as acceptable evidence - if you have your old P60s and if they show your address, that might be enough?
 
Going through this myself at the moment. My solicitor is dealing with the Co Council to obtain the exemption certificate, all I had to do was sign the affadavit. Not all local authorities require the detailed back-up information (utility bills, etc), according to my solictor, the affadavit is sufficient.
Louth and Dublin (not sure which authority in Dub) apparently don't need the back-up details, but Meath do.

PeteIRL, my solicitor mentioned P60s or other tax documents as acceptable evidence - if you have your old P60s and if they show your address, that might be enough?

Actually, I do have my old P60s. They're the documents I do hold onto. I don't feel the need to hold onto household bills after 3 or 4 years. So I can dig those out. Thank you for letting me know!
 
This is an absolute curse of policy that must cost them more to administer than it ever collects.

I had the same issue when selling the house of a deceased relative.

I looked through my files and (for DCC anyway) it seems they will issue you a certificate if you make a sworn declaration. From memory they were much more pragmatic over the phone than it seemed when I looked at the website first.
 
I am facing a similar issue but for a property where the owner is deceased - and as executor I am now seeking to sell the property. The deceased died in 2017 and had lived in the property as their primary residence for nearly 25 years before that - so no NPPR is due (and all local property tax post 2013 has been paid).

I now need apparently to provide an NPPR certificate of exemption to the solicitor to progress the sale - but Limerick county council apparently require two proofs of residency (e.g. bank statement, P60, car insurance, utility bill) for each of five years from July 2009 to March 2013) - i.e. between six and ten years ago to issue the certificate.

Is this serious - how exactly are you expected to obtain personal data for a dead person from a decade ago?

Has anyone had any luck with Limerick. In Cork they only require evidence for 2009 and 2013 - not all five years - and other councils seem to have different policies as above.

Just seems crazy bureaucracy for what is only a 1,000 euro liability for the purchaser?

Any thoughts?
 
The NPPR was the most draconian and unfair tax EVER, the penalties for not paying were grossly punitive :( You need to contact the utility companies, electricity, (Laya health insurance which I used), Eircom etc to get past statements. Any payments from social welfare, examples of state pension paid will all suffice.
 
The NPPR was the most draconian and unfair tax EVER, the penalties for not paying were grossly punitive :( You need to contact the utility companies, electricity, (Laya health insurance which I used), Eircom etc to get past statements. Any payments from social welfare, examples of state pension paid will all suffice.


I have no particular issue with the tax at all - governments impose taxes.

But I do think there needs to be some flexibility as to this NPPR exemption certificate where the homeowner has died - I doubt most people keep records going back 3 years let alone 10 even if they are alive and tracing 10 year old bills/letters for a dead person who may have shredded them isn't easy!

I have managed to get the electricity records - only because they stayed with the same supplier but if they hadn't how would I know who they were with as the person who knows is dead. It must also create huge bureaucracy for the electricity and gas providers too.

Does any one in the Irish government not think this nonsense needs to be looked at in terms of progressing house sales - probate delays are bad enough but this is ridiculous. At least they could standardise the evidence rules between county councils - which will allow evidence providers to set up common systems or allow waivers across the board for probate cases.

Still I presume checking up to 5 years residence data for every home sold in the country keeps a lot of bureaucrats in a job! Waivers allowed in Dublin and Louth, 2 years data needed in Cork, 5 years worth needed in Limerick - that's just the three largest cities?
 
After 12 years has past there wont be any need to pay this tax but until then then the County Councils are heaping huge revenue from those who haven't paid, up to 7000 euro in some instances. Great revenue source there for them indeed.:cool:
 
After 12 years has past there wont be any need to pay this tax but until then then the County Councils are heaping huge revenue from those who haven't paid, up to 7000 euro in some instances. Great revenue source there for them indeed.:cool:

Agreed - but perhaps Ireland just needs to improve its property records and systems.

The person who died in my case

lived in the house he owned for 20 years+ - a house which was originally bought from the same county council!
worked on and off for the county council before he retired (living in same house rented from them)
had home helps provided by the HSE for the last few years of his life - presumably after they helped him dress for bed he secretly headed off to his multiple second homes?
had a state pension paid to him at that address for 20 years
was registered with his GP there etc etc

And yet we have to provide proof to another arm of Government (a council which will presumably have multiple records on him) it was its sole home he lived at - does no one in the Irish 'governmental' arms communicate? In the UK when it comes to welfare and other payments councils and central government share data all the time!

Data matching exercises would surely be better than this crazy system for most cases.
 
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Was involved in selling 2 houses needing proof of residence (one where owner had died). The ESB provided a meter reading print out for the relevant years. Write requesting this, give MPRN and account number. If resident has died they can still give it to executor. As well as the ESB document, the CC requested a copy of the property folio and then simply a short note from a local resident stating that X had lived in the house for how ever many years.
 
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