An internally displaced woman will not pay tax on her property remaining in the occupied territory

Publication date: March 6, 2024

Another successful case of the NGO “Center for Support of Local Initiatives” was the appeal of Liudmyla, an internally displaced person from the Luhansk oblast. One of her apartments remained in the enemy-occupied territory of Sievierodonetsk.

The woman received a notice about paying the property tax for 2022. But she had a question: must she pay for a currently occupied apartment?

• “The issue of taxation of property remaining in the occupied territory is now relevant for many IDPs who were forced to leave their homes because of the war, in particular, because of the occupation,” said Oleksii Kormiletskyi, a lawyer with the organization that has pledged to help Liudmyla.

Under Article 266 of the Tax Code of Ukraine, certain owners of residential property or shares in residential property enjoy the following benefits when paying real estate tax:

• owners of an apartment(s), regardless of their number, do not pay tax – up to 60 m2;
• for a residential building(s) regardless of their number – up to 120 m2;
• for different types of residential property, including their shares (in case of simultaneous ownership of an apartment(s) and a residential building(s), including their shares) – up to 180 m2.

Similarly, no property tax is payable on residential property, including its shares, owned by natural persons located in the territories where military operations are (were) being conducted or in the territories temporarily occupied by the armed forces of the russian federation, as well as on residential property that has become uninhabitable as a result of the military aggression of the russian federation against Ukraine. This exemption is provided for the tax (reporting) years 2021-2023.

• “Therefore, if you disagree with the levy, you should submit a written request to the tax authority,” advises Oleksii Kormiletskyi.

Taxpayers have the right to submit a written request to the supervisory authority at their tax address to verify data on the following:

• residential and/or non-residential property, including their shares owned by the taxpayer;
• the size of the total area of residential and/or non-residential property owned by the taxpayer;
• the right to use the tax exemption;
• the tax rate;
• the amount of tax accrued.

If discrepancies are found between the data provided by the tax authority and the data confirmed by the taxpayer based on the original relevant documents, including ownership documents, the tax authority recalculates the tax amount and sends a new tax assessment to the taxpayer. In this case, the previous tax assessment is considered cancelled (revoked).

The state registration authorities for property rights are obliged to submit to the supervisory authorities quarterly, within 15 days after the end of the tax (reporting) quarter, the information necessary for the calculation and collection of tax from individuals and legal entities at the location of such property as of the first day of the respective quarter.

The lawyer helped Liudmyla submit a written request to the supervisory authority.  

Within a few weeks, the woman received a refund of the real estate tax, and she would not pay the tax for her apartment in Sievierodonetsk.  

The material was created with the support of the international charity platform GlobalGiving and the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation. The publication’s content is solely the responsibility of the Legal Development Network.

Illustrating photo for the article: Alexander Emochenko (Reuters)

If you have notices an error on the web-site, please, highlight the text and press ctrl-enter.