Land, Housing & Property Laws & Implementing Rules

LAND REGISTRATION, OWNERSHIP & TITLING

  • Land Ownership by Americans (Presidential Decree 713) ~ Conferred upon qualified Americans the right to retain their landholdings, subject to certain limitations.
  • Land Ownership By Non-Citizens (Batas Pambansa 185) ~ Allows natural born citizens of the Philippines who lost their citizenship to be a transferee of land subject to certain limitations.
  • Property Registration Decree (Presidential Decree 1529) ~ Codifies and amends the various laws on land registration and titling under the Torrens System.
  • Title Reconstitution Law (Republic Act 8732) ~ Amends PD 1529 by providing for administrative reconstitution of original copies of certificates of title lost or destroyed due to fire, flood or other force majeure.

LAND AND HOUSING DEVELOPMENT

  • Ecozone Law (Republic Act 7916) ~ Designating geographic areas for development into Ecozones; prescribing the guidelines and criteria for approval of Ecozone development projects (industrial, commercial, residential, etc); granting incentives.
  • Social Housing Law (Batas Pambansa 220) ~ Liberalizing land development and construction standards to enable production of low-cost housing.
  • Striplands Law (Presidential Decree 399) ~ Reserving strips of land along national and provincial roads for urban development and human settlements purposes.
  • Urban Development and Housing Act (UDHA, Republic Act 7279) ~ Providing impetus to social housing development through (a) incentives; (b) funding allocations; (c) land identification mechanisms; and (d) imposition of social housing quota on land developers. Also decriminalized squatting.
  • Housing Agencies’ Charters:

LAND & PROPERTY REGULATION

  • Building Code (Presidential Decree 1096) ~ Codifies all the laws, rules and standards for building construction.
  • Clean Water Act ~ Provides, among others, for (a) the interconnection of sewage lines of residential, industrial and commercial projects; (2) the manner of regulating effluent of industrial establishments; and (3) incentives for establishments investing in wastewater treatment or pollution control facilities.
  • Condominium Law (Republic Act 4726) ~ Serves as the enabling law for the establishment of condominium corporations, and provides the comprehensive rules on condominium ownership, registration of titles and condominium administration.
  • Executive Order 648 ~ Designates the HLURB (formerly HSRC) as the implementing agency for PD 957 and BP 220, and confers regulatory and quasi-judicial powers for this purpose. Empowers the HLURB, among others, to: (a) prescribe the standards for land and housing development, (b) regulate land and housing development projects, and (c) prescribe the guidelines and standards for the preparation by LGUs of comprehensive land use plans.
  • Local Government Code of 1991 (Republic Act 7160) ~ The comprehensive law on local governance, it incorporates and amends the provisions of the Real Property Tax Code and prescribes, among others, the powers of LGUs to (a) enact zoning ordinances, and (b) reclassify agricultural lands into non-agricultural.
  • Maceda Law ~ Rights of Buyers of Property on Installment (Republic Act 6552) ~ Confers certain rights to installment buyers particularly in cases of default and cancellation of the sales contract.
  • National Integrated Protected Area System Law (RA 7586) ~ Identifies the categories of protected areas, and requires submission of an Environmental Impact Assessment prior to issuance of an environmental clearance certificate (ECC) to certain development projects.
  • Open Space Requirement (PD 1216) ~ Amends PD 957 by prescribing the open space requirements for subdivision projects and the uses to which such space may be devoted.
  • Public Land Act (CA 141) ~ Governs the reclassification of lands of the public domain into alienable lands and provides, among others, the manner of disposition of alienable public lands through homestead, patent and other modes.
  • Rental Regulation Law (Republic Act 9161) ~ The latest law imposing rental ceilings for residential units.
  • Subdivision & Condominium Buyers Protective Decree (Presidential Decree 957) ~ Prescribes the comprehensive rules and standards to govern the development, sale and regulation of subdivision and condominium projects.
  • Rules on Conversion & Reclassification of Agricultural Lands:
    • DAR AO No. 01 (2002) ~ Comprehensive Rules on land conversion
    • DAR AO No. 02 (2002) ~ Guidelines for the processing of conversion applications
    • DAR AO No. 06 (1994) ~ Guidelines for issuing CARP exemption clearance
    • DAR AO No. 06 (1992) ~ Rules and regulations on the valuation of lands
    • Malacanang Memo Circular No. 54 ~ Guidelines on the implementation of Section 20 of the Local Government Code (RA 7160) on the power of local governments to reclassify agricultural lands
  • PD 957 & BP 220 Implementing Rules

LAND & HOUSING FINANCE

  • Comprehensive & Integrated Shelter Finance Act (CISFA, Republic Act 7835) ~ Prescribes funding sources and additional budgetary appropriations for home lending programs and the housing development programs of the housing agencies.
  • Creation of the Pag-IBIG Fund (Presidential Decree 1530) ~ Provides for a system of government and private employee contributions, with employer counterpart, to be pooled into a mutual fund 70% of which is mandated to be allocated to home loans of Fund members. Initially placed under the SSS and GSIS, administration of the Fund was later transferred to the National Home Mortgage Finance Corporation (NHMFC) under Executive Order 538 to facilitate development of the Secondary Mortgage Market for housing. Subsequently, the Home Development Mutual Fund Corporation was created to administer the Fund.
  • Charters:

LANDS LEGISLATED FOR TOURISM DEVELOPMENT

  • RA 7668 ~ Mt. Samat in Bataan
  • RA 7357 ~ Callao Cave in Cavite