The Russian Government sent bill No. 722059-8 to the State Duma on amendments to Art. 62 of the Law on State Registration of Real Estate to provide the Rosfinmonitoring (the Federal Financial Monitoring Service of Russia) with the ability to confidentially receive information about real estate properties to combat money laundering and terrorist financing.

Currently, an owner can obtain information about the persons who claimed details about their real estate upon request. This rule does not apply only if criminal intelligence agencies receive information from the Unified State Register of Real Property. The new bill proposes to extend this exception to Rosfinmonitoring as well.

Ekaterina Schmitt, TV&P lawyer, noted in her commentary to the “Advokatskaya Gazeta” (Russian Advocacy Newspaper) that the proposed changes would potentially help Rosfinmonitoring ensure the timely disclosure and compensation of damage from corruption and financial crimes. This is to be achieved because unfaithful persons who cannot confirm that they purchased the property with legally earned money will not be able to track everyone who was ever interested in their real estate and thus will not receive any "room to manoeuvre." That is, they will not be able to promptly resell the property to a bona fide purchaser or use other schemes for its alienation.

Nevertheless, even without the draft legislation, the state still has other ways to obtain information about real estate transactions and assess their legality (for example, using mandatory reports from realtors).

“Advokatskaya Gazeta” (Russian Advocacy Newspaper) is the official body of the Russian Federal Bar Association (published since 2007). The Newspaper’s publications are devoted to the most important legal topics, case law, as well as legal practice and issues of advocacy.

No copying of this information without quoting the source of publication is allowed. If you need to contact the TV&P lawyers you may use the application form in “Contacts”.