Five days after taking over from Tina Birbili at the Environment Ministry, former Finance Minister Giorgos Papaconstantinou has prepared plans to allow owners of illegal homes to pay a fine to protect their home from demolition, a scheme opposed by his predecessor. Homeowners who pay the fines, the size of which has yet to be set, would protect their properties from the threat of demolition for between 30 and 40 years.
The regulations will vary slightly depending on whether the home has been built without a permit or if it has failed to comply with town-planning rules, or both. The scheme is very similar to the one introduced by the government last year, which allowed homeowners to declare illegally altered parts of their properties, known in Greece as imiypaithrioi, to protect them from penalties for the next 40 years. It is likely that the time frame homeowners will be given to submit their paperwork will be six to eight months.
Source: Kathimerini
