BERMUDA Law and Practice Contributed by: E Scott Swainson, Katrina Dickson and Erik Gotfredsen, Wakefield Quin Limited
1.3 Proposals for Reform Bermuda’s planning and immigration regula - tions are constantly developing. The Premier and Immigration Minster wish to welcome many thousands of new residents in order to counter - act an aging population and low birth rate, and are actively fostering schemes that encourage international investment. Due to Bermuda’s limited size and scope to expand by land reclamation, city living in higher residential apartment blocks will be promoted. 2. Sale and Purchase 2.1 Categories of Property Rights Classes of Title Title to real property can be held freehold (fee simple) or leasehold. Fee simple fractional ownership exists in some of the high-end resort properties favoured by second homeowners. Timeshares are techni - cally available but are no longer relevant. Condominium Living Apartments and town homes are generally sold on 999-year leases and include shares in the condominium corporation that owns the free - hold reversion. Whilst freehold condominiums can be created, they are rare outside of gov - ernment-sponsored schemes only available to Bermudians. 2.2 Laws Applicable to Transfer of Title Operative Law The transfer of unregistered land is governed by the Conveyancing Act 1983, while the transfer of registered land is governed by the Land Title Registration Act 2011.
The Economic Development Act 1968 was recently amended to encourage residential and other development activity in the City of Hamil - ton (as a whole). This was achieved by relaxing Immigration Act-related restrictions that previ - ously made it difficult for restricted persons to acquire property in the City and generally extending the potential availability of economic concessions to persons developing land in the City (as a whole). Impact of Rising Inflation and Interest Rates Rising inflation, supply chain issues and higher interest rates have caused development costs to increase materially. This has impacted specula - tive development adversely; in particular, there are very few new condominiums. Blockchain, etc Whilst the Bermuda government is keen to keep up with technological advances such as digitali - sation and fintech, their emergence is not antici - pated to have a significant effect over the next 12 months. The 2024 budget speech highlighted future AI-powered services, with the Department of Immigration being the first targeted depart - ment to benefit from this developing technology. Property transactions are generally conducted in an old school manner, involving wet ink sig - natures and overseas notaries. The level of AML monitoring for real estate is very high. Bermuda’s electronic Land Title Registry Office (LTRO) became operational in August 2018 but does not yet capture all real estate, as only cer - tain transactions trigger compulsory first regis - tration. Other transactions may be registered in the Office of the Registrar-General, which is also now maintained by the LTRO, but are recorded by reference to the parties’ names (akin to a land charges register in England and Wales).
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