Instead of enjoying a peaceful end to his term, Panama City’s Municipal Engineer Jaime Salas is facing a torrent of complaints from real estate buyers who claim they were deceived by developers.
Irma Díaz Linares is one of the many disgruntled owners seeking Salas’ attention. When developers of the apartment building Ocean One, in Costa del Este, told her she could move in September 2008, she found that the social areas were still incomplete. After doing some research, she discovered that the city had issued the occupancy permit in July of that year.
Salas said, however, that it is impossible to expect for the building to be finished at the time the occupancy permit is issued, explaining that utilities and safety systems at the building must be checked one residence at a time. And waiting for that process would create significant delays.
In this case, regulations established by the Authority of Public Services seem to back up Salas’ arguments.
Permits are generally granted once the building is 90 percent complete, added Salas, and that rule is true for social areas, too.
Confusion creeps into the rules, however, in Article 60, which states that the occupancy permit can be issued while the building is still unfinished provided that the developer obtains the written consent of the prospective buyer. That rule is limited to non-horizontal properties, such as the luxury bay-front skyrises like Ocean One.
Linares says Salas’ willingness to overlook that rule is a testament to the fact that the code is enforced in an “arbitrary” manner.
But for the director of the National Department of Consumer Protection, Elías Elías, the solution to this issue is clear-cut.
“There is a provision requiring the consumer to accept a property under conditions other than those agreed upon,” he explained. “Therefore, if this happens, you should not accept it and instead pursue legal action.”
