The Maceda Law
The Maceda Law
The Maceda Law
Buyer Act or Republic Act 6552 is the law that lays out a
defaulting buyer’s rights in the Philippines with regards to his
purchase of a real estate property, whether it’s a
condominium unit or a house-and-lot unit in a subdivision
development. This was initiated by lawmaker Ernesto
Maceda and has taken into effect on August 26, 1972.
WHO IT APPLIES TO
If you come into this situation, the Maceda Law was passed
to help protect you. It established the rights of a qualified
buyer who can’t continue with his payments anymore.
RIGHTS OF A BUYER
Section 3
…where the buyer has paid at least two years of installments, the
buyer is entitled to the following rights in case he defaults in the
payment of succeeding installments:
Section 4
In case where less than two years of installments were paid, the seller
shall give the buyer a grace period of not less than sixty days from the
date the installment became due.
If the buyer fails to pay the installments due at the expiration of the
grace period, the seller may cancel the contract after 30 days from the
receipt by the buyer of the notice of cancellation or the demand for
rescission of the contract by a notarial act.
o Banks
When you start paying to the bank, that means you’ve already
taken out your housing loan from them. When you took a loan
from your bank, you basically borrowed money and then you
used that money to pay the developer in full. But this all
happened in the background and the money did not go through
your hands anymore. The bank gave it straight to the developer.
And this is what commonly confuses people.
The Maceda Law only assures 50% refund on all the payments
you’ve made (or a little more as appropriate). If your developer is
at fault, you should not ask for only 50% refund but for the entire
amount you’ve already paid. You can even demand for damages
as you deem fit.