Water discharge on to a lower property.
A long-held tenet of our neighbour law is that the owner of a property is obliged to accept the water discharge from that of a property situated above it, provided that the water is not concentrated in that discharge. A recent case in the Supreme Court of Appeal, elaborated on this by saying that such concentration could be allowed, if legislation allows therefor. This often happens in that the local authority prescribes stormwater drainage channels and the like as part of a development.
Transfer duty.
Tranfer Duty cases are rare: Two purchasers bought a property, one taking the right to inhabit only (the habitatio) and the other what was left thereof, generally referred to as the bare dominium. Each filled in a separate transfer duty declaration whilst the seller filled in a single transfer duty declaration. If successful the purchasers would jointly be taxed at a substantially lower rate of transfer duty than they would be taxed on, if this were one transaction. The court sought to establish whether the two purchasers acquired in an integral transaction; it found that, inasmuch as the parties had jointly and severally undertaken to pay the purchase price and other technical reasons, that the price could not be split and a single transfer duty declaration/receipt would have to be issued. Interesting try, but hardly worth the costs of a High Court application?
