Melkia or land title: understanding ownership in the medina
Two regimes coexist in Morocco. One is definitive and enforceable against all, the other rests on testimony. What that changes for a buyer.
Morocco has two property regimes living side by side. Working out which one applies to a building is the first thing to do, before any talk of price.
The land title: definitive registration
Land registration gives the property a unique title held by the land registry. Once established, the title is definitive and enforceable against all: registered rights can no longer be challenged by an earlier claim. It is the safest regime, and the one banks and foreign buyers look for.
The melkia: the traditional deed
A melkia is a deed of ownership drawn up by adouls, who record the testimony of witnesses attesting that the property does belong to the seller. It remains very common in the medinas, where many houses have never been registered. A melkia is a valid deed of ownership, but it does not carry the definitive character of a land title: a challenge remains possible.
Moving from one to the other
A melkia property can be registered. The procedure runs through a filed application, a boundary survey on site, a legal publication opening a period for objections, and then the issuing of the title. How long it takes depends mostly on the number of rightful owners, any objections, and how clear the chain of ownership is.
- Clear melkia, single seller: registration is relatively quick
- Undivided estate: every heir must be gathered, or the estate divided
- A neighbour disputing a boundary: the survey becomes the critical stage
- Occupied property: the occupant's situation must be settled in parallel
What it changes about the price
At equal surface and location, a registered property costs more than one held under melkia — the gap is the risk and the delay the buyer takes on. That is why each of our listings states the nature of the title, its quality and the estimated time to register it: three lines that explain much of the price gap between two neighbouring riads.
A low price in the medina is almost never a bargain: more often it is the price of a legal problem somebody will have to solve.
A general presentation of the principles of Moroccan land law. Every file must be checked by a notary or a lawyer.