May 2025

Decision of the Single-Member Court of First Instance of Arta on the Annulment of the Seizure Report Concerning Thirteen (13) Horizontal Properties

The decision no. 97/2025 of the Single-Member Court of First Instance of Arta was recently published, which annulled the enforced execution proceedings initiated against our clients – natural persons. Specifically, both the payment order and the consequent seizure report aimed at auctioning thirteen (13) horizontal properties owned by the aforementioned individuals were annulled. These proceedings were based on alleged debts arising from their guarantor liability in favor of a construction corporation. According to the findings of the decision, the execution proceedings initiated by the alleged creditor – a loan and credit receivables management company – were flawed, as the company failed to serve all the required documents to substantiate its legal standing (active legitimacy) and, thus, its right to claim the debt following the acquisition of the receivables from a former banking institution, in accordance with Article 925 of the Greek Code of Civil Procedure (CPC). As stipulated in the provision: “{…} the special successor of the creditor may not initiate or continue enforcement proceedings before serving the debtor against whom the execution is directed with the payment order and the documents substantiating the successor’s legal standing”. Key excerpts from the decision are as follows: “However, upon reviewing the contested payment order and the documents cited therein, which were served to the appellants under Article 925(1) CPC to prove the claimant’s active legitimacy in the enforced execution it initiates, it is proven that the document with protocol number {…} – a publication by the Athens Pledge Registry summarizing the amendment of the 12.9.2019 agreement for the sale and transfer of business receivables – was not served, but merely referenced. Moreover, the annex of the transfer agreement, to which the supplementary management agreement refers, is not derived from the supplementary management contract itself, as the interim amendments and modifications of the sale and transfer agreement with regard to its annexes, and the corresponding publications in the pledge registry books cited in the supplementary agreement, are neither submitted nor invoked {…} Therefore, not all legitimizing documents proving that the defendant acquired the authority to manage the contested claim and thereby holds legal standing to enforce execution proceedings against the appellants were served along with the contested payment order.”