What is the roof?

What is the roof and what are its rights

The roof (terrace) is a common thing and this results from the nature of its purpose to serve the co-owners with their common use and is related to the functionality of the separated horizontal properties. If the deed of incorporation does not define the attic as an object of exclusive ownership (i.e. as a floor or an apartment or as a divided independent ancillary space belonging to floors or apartments), then it is not an independent property, but is automatically the object of forced co-ownership of the co-owners.

Among the common property which the owner of a floor or apartment is entitled to use is the attic and any addition made by one of the co-owners by erecting a room or apartment, as well as the external staircase built on the common ground and leading to the attic, if it is intended to serve the common attic, thus serving for the common use of all the co-owners, including the owner of the ground floor, and it is irrelevant when and from when the attic was built.

The law contains a specific provision for a roof or terrace or solar roof or in the absence of an agreement to the contrary, a common roof and for short "room terrace". Consequently, the terms terrace and roof are identical.

On a horizontal property, a separate (divided) ownership of a floor of a building or a floor apartment is established, but also an indivisible forced co-ownership of all the owners of the separate properties, which is acquired automatically, in proportionate shares, in the parts of the entire property, which are used for the common use of all the floor owners. The criterion for the classification of a thing as common and common property shall be that it is intended in its nature to serve the joint owners in their common use. The common and common property of a building on which horizontal ownership has been established is not subject to usufruct, since it is in the nature of the components of the whole building, on which the establishment of separate rights in rem is prohibited. Moreover, Article 1001 of the CC provides that ownership of immovable property extends, unless otherwise provided by law, to the space above and below the ground. The common property of the building undoubtedly includes the roof of the building and the staircase.

It has also been held that in the absence of a specific provision of the owners, the common parts of their building are deemed to be, inter alia, the ground, the plot, the roof and everything else that is intended by its nature to serve the common property. Buildings on the common roof of a block of flats cannot be the subject of horizontal ownership, but shall be included in the common and common parts of the building.