What to check before you pay a deposit

In Cyprus the money stops being recoverable when the contract is signed, and your protection begins only when it is deposited, within six months. In Greece the deed is a notarial act and the pre-contract payment is a matter of private agreement rather than of statute.

The short version

The two countries do not work the same way and the difference is structural, not a matter of degree. Cyprus puts a statutory clock and a register entry around the contract. Greece puts a public officer around the deed.
The Cypriot clock runs from SIGNATURE. Section 3(1)(c) of Law 81(I)/2011 gives six months from the date the contract was signed to deposit it at the district lands office where the property is, and it costs 50 euros.
A clause forbidding you to deposit the contract is void from the outset under section 3(2). It is not a term to negotiate. It is a term that does not exist.
Depositing does not put you at the front of the queue. Section 5(1) gives the resulting charge the priority it acquires on deposit, so a mortgage registered earlier stays ahead of you.
Since Law 132(I)/2023 the Cypriot seller must attach a search certificate dated within five working days of signature. If nobody has shown you one, that is the question to ask before the money moves.
This page states no Greek tax or fee figure. On 26 August 2026 no Greek government source publishing one could be reached, and an invented number on this page would be the worst possible place for one.

Where the money stops being recoverable, by country

| Country | The instrument | What protects the buyer | When the money stops being recoverable | Citation | |---|---|---|---|---| | Cyprus | The contract of sale, a private written agreement | Depositing it at the district lands office creates a charge on the property in the buyer's favour | On signature, in practice. The contract binds from then; the deposit is what makes it enforceable against the land, and its clock is already running | Law 81(I)/2011 ss. 3(1)(c), 5(1) | | Cyprus | The deposit itself, at €50 to the Department of Lands and Surveys | Priority in the register from the date of deposit, and nothing earlier | Six months after signature, when the right to deposit lapses unless a court allows it late | Law 81(I)/2011 ss. 3(1)(c), 12 | | Greece | The notarial deed of transfer | The notary is a public officer and the deed is the transfer | At the deed. What happens before it is private agreement, and this site has read no Greek instrument governing it | Not established as at 26 August 2026 | | Greece | The encumbrance certificate from the mortgage registry or the cadastral office | It shows what is charged against the property at the moment it is issued | Not applicable. It is evidence, not protection | Greek Ministry of Migration and Asylum document list |

That table is the whole page in one object, and the fourth column is the one to read twice. In Cyprus the dangerous moment is earlier than a British buyer expects and the protection is later. In Greece the site cannot tell you where the line is, and says so rather than guessing.

Cyprus

Work it on a real sequence rather than an abstraction.

You sign a contract of sale on 4 April. Under section 3(1)(b) of the Sale of Immovable Property (Specific Performance) Law 81(I)/2011 it has to be written, to identify the parties and the property adequately, to state the price, and to be signed by everybody. From that moment you are bound. Nothing about the register has happened yet.

You deposit it at the district lands office of the district where the property is, and it costs €50 to the Department of Lands and Surveys. Section 3(1)(c) gives you six months from 4 April, so the last day is in early October. Under section 5(1) the deposit creates a charge on the property, and:

the charge created by the deposit of the contract takes the order of priority which it acquires on its deposit

Which means the developer's mortgage from 2018 is ahead of you and stays ahead of you. There is a route through it, and Law 132(I)/2023 built it: where the contract is accompanied by the written declaration the statute calls Form A, the buyer pays the sum named in it into the seller's designated account, the mortgagee must accept it, must issue the Form B receipt, and must release the property from that mortgage.

Miss the six months and section 12 lets a court permit a late deposit where it thinks it just and reasonable to protect the buyer. That is an application, with a lawyer, an outcome and a bill.

Two things to check before the money moves, both statutory and both recent.

Ask for the search certificate that should already be attached. Section 4(1A), inserted by Law 132(I)/2023, obliges the seller to include one as an integral part of the contract, dated no more than five working days from signature. Section 4(1B) allows an administrative fine of up to 10,000 euros for failing to, and section 4(2) makes it an offence carrying up to two years' imprisonment, a fine of up to 5,000 euros, or both. If nobody has shown you one, the contract in front of you may not comply.

Read the contract for a clause forbidding you to deposit it. Section 3(2) makes any such clause void from the outset. It is not a bargaining chip and it is not something to accept in exchange for anything.

Greece

Greece is the shorter section on this page and the reason is not that less happens.

A transfer of Greek immovable property is executed before a notary. The Greek state's own document list for its investor residence permit requires a certificate from the notary who drew up the transfer deeds, certifying the parties, the property, how the agreed price was paid and the specific details of that payment. That is the state proceeding on the basis that the deed is a notarial act, and it is why the sequence in Greece is built around an appointment rather than around a filing deadline.

What happens before the deed is where the money is at risk, and this site has not read a Greek instrument governing it. No Greek government source publishing a transfer tax rate, a notary fee scale or the cadastre's own charges could be reached on 26 August 2026: aade.gr, gsis.gr, gov.gr, ktimatologio.gr and et.gr all refused or were unreachable. So the honest position is this. Not established as at 26 August 2026: whether and when a Greek pre-contract payment becomes non-refundable, and on what terms.

What can be said, from the Greek contact point's contribution to the European Land Registry Network, is what the checking looks like. Anyone invoking a legitimate interest can apply for information held in the land registry, and no special evidence of that interest is required. In offices covering cadastral areas, registration or rejection of an act must happen within five days of submission. And Greek law does not permit electronic signature of these certificates, so nothing arrives by email: somebody has to collect it, in Greece.

Plan the checking around that, not around a British timetable.

What to check before you sign

Six things, in order, and none of them is a matter of opinion.

Which register holds this property. In Cyprus, the district lands office for its district. In Greece, either the cadastre or the older mortgage registry, depending on whether the survey is complete there, and that decides whether a search can be run on the plot at all.
What is registered against it. In Cyprus that is a search certificate at €15 per selected property from the Department of Lands and Surveys. In Greece it is the encumbrance certificate the state itself asks for.
Whether a separate title exists at all. On a Cypriot development the unit may still sit inside the developer's larger registration, in which case there is no deed to transfer to you and the deposited contract is the whole of your protection.
Who ranks ahead of you. A mortgage, a court judgment registered as a memo, or an easement, each with the date it was registered. The dates are the point.
What the contract says about depositing it, and whether the seller has attached a current search certificate to it.
Who is acting for you, and only for you. gov.uk's own guidance on buying property abroad is that you should choose an independent lawyer who works on your behalf only, and it is right.

The mechanics of point 2 in Cyprus, route by route with what each one publishes, are on what a Cyprus land registry search costs. The mechanics of points 1 and 3 are on how a Cypriot purchase works and how a Greek purchase works. What each document proves and does not prove is in the glossary.

Email me the updates

We keep this page current against the statutes it cites and re-read them every 90 days. Leave your address and we will email you when a rule or a figure on it changes. At most one email a month, and there is nothing to buy.

Common mistakes

Treating the Cypriot deposit as an English exchange of contracts. It is not an exchange, there is no second party doing the same thing at the same moment, and the clock in section 3(1)(c) is already running from the day you signed.

Assuming the deposited contract automatically beats an earlier mortgage. It does not. Section 5(1) gives the charge the priority it acquires on deposit. gov.uk's Cyprus page, last updated on 27 November 2019, says the 2011 law gave a contract of sale "precedence over any pre-existing mortgage", which described section 5(2), a precedence the buyer had to pay for, and which section 5(10) has since confined to contracts deposited before the 2023 amendment.

Believing a Cypriot search needs the seller's permission. Section 51A(2) of Cap. 224 counts a person who satisfies the Director that they are a prospective purchaser as an interested person in their own right.

Reading a Greek cadastral record as proof of ownership. It describes a plot and the rights registered against it. It is not the notarial act by which ownership moved.

Expecting a Greek certificate by email. Greek law does not allow electronic signature of them. Somebody collects it or it is posted.

Paying against a photograph of a document. In both countries the thing that matters is the register entry on the day the money moves, which is exactly why the Cypriot statute now limits the age of the attached search certificate to five working days.

Can I get my deposit back if the seller pulls out? In Cyprus that is a question about specific performance under Law 81(I)/2011 and about what your contract says, and it is a question for your own lawyer rather than for a website. In Greece this site has read no instrument on it and states nothing.

Is there a deposit calculator anywhere on this site? No, and there will not be. A deposit is a negotiated figure. There is nothing to calculate, and a calculator would imply a rule that does not exist.

How much is the Cypriot deposit itself? That is between you and the seller. What has a published price is the act of depositing the contract at the register, which is €50 to the Department of Lands and Surveys.

Does this apply outside the Republic of Cyprus? No. Property in the areas outside the effective control of the Republic sits under a separate regime that this site does not cover.

What this page does not cover

It does not tell you whether to pay. It does not draft, review or comment on your contract, it does not act for you and it does not introduce you to anybody who would. We are not lawyers and this is not legal advice. Before you commit money, instruct an independent lawyer who acts only for you in the country where the property is.

It covers Cyprus and Greece. Anything you have read about deposits in Spain, Portugal, Italy or France is about a different instrument in a different legal system, and this page does not extend to it.