Table of Contents:
- Will There Be a New Definition of Structures?
- Will There Be Changes Regarding Permanent Attachment to Land?
From 2025, changes in property tax must come into effect. The actual obligation to introduce them stems from the Constitutional Tribunal’s ruling of July 4, 2023, SK 14/21, which declared the definition of a building and structure as unconstitutional. A description of the bill has been included in the legislative work schedule, revealing some details about the planned changes. Below, we present a summary of the most important information.
Will There Be a New Definition of Structures?
The Ministry of Finance has heeded the voices of legal doctrine and jurisprudence and decided to introduce legal definitions of “building” and “structure” into the Property Tax Act. Until now, the act referred directly to the definition contained in construction law, which was widely criticized. This change aims to resolve disputes regarding the tax classification of certain objects, such as silos. The proposed change involves creating an annex to the act containing a list of objects treated as structures. Importantly, according to the new definition, structures are considered objects listed in the annex, constituting a technical and functional whole along with installations and devices. A technical and functional whole is defined as a set of elements necessary to achieve a specific economic purpose, connected in such a way that none of them can achieve this purpose independently, and the absence of any of these elements prevents its realization. The draft also stipulates that structures and buildings must be made using construction products.
Will There Be Changes Regarding Permanent Attachment to Land?
A revolutionary change is the introduction of the definition of permanent attachment to land into the act, which may be disadvantageous for taxpayers. It involves recognizing any object that withstands external forces and cannot be destroyed or moved by them as permanently attached to the land. This means that container structures or technical devices, whose construction or weight prevents external factors such as wind from moving them to another location, can be considered permanently attached to the land and subject to taxation. This poses a risk of significantly expanding the scope of taxation on structures.
