Folia Geographica 10. sējums - Latvijas Universitāte

DEVELOPMENT OF PLACES AND REGIONSTable 2Various Forms of the Treatment of Property Rights Concerning Real Estatein Latvia during the 1990sĪpašuma tiesību formas Latvijā 20. gs. 90. gadosForms of the Treatment of Property RightsRestitution offormerly stateownedlands andtheir legal basisBeneficiaries of therestitution of propertyrightsTenant protection forprivate citizens and/orcommercial users (forexample, retailers) inrestored buildingsHousingprivatisation andtheir legal basesRelative portion oflocal property whichcan be rented and/orleased as businessspace(At the end ofthe1990sYes,comprehen-sivereturn inaccordance withthe law ofdenationalisationofprivate propertyof 30 October1991Entitled not onlycitizens but alsoemigrants (foreignersand theirbeneficiaries) so far asthe deadline (17 June1940) of habitation inLatvia was met, butlegal problems withBaltic Germans (resettlers)because ofthe Germandistribution ofburdensFor commercial tenantsand administrativemechanisms: noprotection againstevictionFor tenants of dwellings:7 years starting from thetime of the restitutionYes,but due to lengthypolitical discussionsdischarged onlycomparatively late;Conversion startingfrom March 1996Use of shares(Certificates)Law concerningprivatisation ofnational dwellingsand the autonomy ofsuch in 21 May 1995Small,(within the OldTown, somewhathigher)Sources: Frydman et. al. (1993); Jaffe, Turner & Victorin (1995); Roggemann, H. (Ed.) (1996); Venesaar & Hachey(Ed.) (1995); Wollmann (1994); as well as the authors’ findingsOwing to the very much liberalised legal regulations, the owners had been put into anextremely favourable position, in which they could quit contracts with commercial tenants.Even public administrations could be more or less evicted without notice from their buildings.Thus the owners received immediate and almost unrestricted control over returned real estate onsuch premises. The amount of the rent and the running time of the new lease could therefore benegotiated under purely free market criteria and without national regulation. The fact that thenew owners exhausted as far as possible the legal framework available concerningcommercially used areas in their buildings, which were again profitable, is quite understandable,particularly because a legally assured lodging right had been granted to the tenants for theduration of seven years. Those who could not follow the demands for renting the outlets wereforced to close and leave. Thus it was very often the case that many stores and service facilities,despite partially effected privatisation, disappeared immediately from the market after therestitution of the real estate property. The old state-run commercial structures were thusliquidated in Riga quickly and comprehensively. Especially in the years 1993 and 1994 thesituation in the central part of Riga, which included parts of the Old Town (Vecrīga), wascharacterised by a very fast change in retail trade. Many outlets in denationalised buildings wereunder reconstruction, waiting for their new purposes. One of the most impressive, though notvery successful examples, concerning the location of retail trade, is the reconstruction of thefamous shopping centre Berga Bazārs, originally built at the beginning of the 20 th century.Those buildings which had been built by the state or by cooperatives after the Sovietoccupation were denationalised during the so-called Mass Privatisation. The same applied tothe few buildings which were put under state control between 1940 and 1990, but no requestswere made for restitution, nor was it granted in those cases in which the desired return could notbe sufficiently justified by the applicant. In the course of this privatisation the tenants wereshifted into a legal situation, under which a portion was paid through public funds (Privatisation81