Twenty-seven times

A rumour about a new tax is not a law. The tax you actually pay is in the letter you received from the city hall in January.

“I signed on October 29. The minister spoke on November 6.”

Gilad sent me those two dates in a single message, on Friday at noon. Below them he attached a link to an article on Digi24. The Romanian finance minister, Alexandru Nazare, had told a professional conference that the tax on apartments based on market value would not come into force in 2027, and that the rumour that the tax would jump 27 times was “not true.” Eight days earlier, Gilad had signed a preliminary agreement (antecontract) to sell his apartment in the Titan neighbourhood of București, 6% below the price he had asked for in the spring.

He had read the “27 times” in mid-October, in a WhatsApp group of Israeli investors in Romania. Someone forwarded a screenshot of an article in Romanian to the group, with a partial translation below it: from 2027 the tax on apartments would be calculated on market value, and the bill could jump twenty-seven times. That same week three more messages like it reached the group.

Gilad is the CFO of a software company, and not a man who scares easily. He bought both of his apartments in București after doing his homework: one in the Tineretului neighbourhood in 2018, and a two-room apartment in Titan in January 2024, for 96,500 euros. Both have tenants, and each has an Excel sheet with its net yield. Faced with the rumour, he did what a finance manager does when facing a risk: he ran the numbers. The Titan apartment rents for 520 euros a month. If the tax jumped 27 times, it would eat about a third of the rent. He went to an agent, got an offer from a young couple with mortgage pre-approval, negotiated for one week and signed: 110,900 euros, a deposit of 11,090 euros, and signing before the notary on December 15.

There was one document he did not open.

I asked him to photograph the tax assessment (decizie de impunere) that the city hall had sent him in January for the Titan apartment. He found it in his inbox. The tax for 2026 was 387 lei, about 76 euros a year. Even multiplied by twenty-seven that is a meaningful sum, about 2,050 euros a year. But it was a calculation that rested on a rumour, not on the law.

In Romania, the building tax on a private individual's residential apartment is set in article 457 of the Tax Code (Codul fiscal). It is calculated on a taxable value per square metre fixed by law according to the type of construction, the zone and the age of the building, multiplied by a rate that the local council chooses between 0.08% and 0.2%. The market price of the apartment does not enter into the calculation. In 2026 the taxable value per square metre rose by about 80%, under Law 239/2025. The same law added a paragraph to article 457 that prohibits the city hall from charging a rate lower than its 2025 rate. In other words, Gilad's bill really did go up this year: the 2025 assessment said 214 lei.

And what about market value? There is currently no market-value tax in the law. There is a commitment in the government programme and in the EU recovery plan, tied to a new computerised property registration system. The minister said the transition would be gradual, towards the end of the fiscal consolidation period, when the deficit approaches 3% of GDP, and that what applies in 2027 will be decided with the budget. His statement is not a law either. It only explains why the rumour was not a law.

Gilad asked whether he could get out of the agreement. I went through two articles of the Romanian Civil Code with him. Under article 1669, if a party to a preliminary agreement refuses without justification to sign the final contract, the other party can ask the court for a judgment that takes the place of the contract, within six months of the date on which it should have been signed. And under article 1544, a party who received a deposit and did not perform the agreement may have to return it twice over. But the choice between the two routes belongs to the buyers, not to him. The buyers had already told their landlord in Drumul Taberei that they were leaving, and their bank had already sent a valuer. Gilad offered them three thousand euros to cancel, and they refused.

So we moved on to the second question: how much does the sale itself cost. Under article 111 of the Tax Code, a person who sells an apartment pays a percentage of the price, and the notary collects it at the signing. Someone who has held the apartment for up to three years pays 3%, and someone who has held it for more than three years pays 1%. Gilad bought the apartment on January 22, 2024, and the deed was set for December 15, 2026. In other words, he was five weeks away from the difference between 3,327 euros and 1,109.

The buyers agreed to postpone the deed to January 27, 2027, in exchange for a further discount of 1,100 euros, and their bank agreed to extend the approval. Gilad was left with a net saving of about 1,100 euros. He is not selling the Tineretului apartment. “I paid eight thousand two hundred euros for a WhatsApp message,” he said, “and I received the letter that would have answered it ten months ago.”

I have been in București since 2006, and I have seen this film several times: a message, panic, a postponement. What struck me about Gilad's story is that he did exactly what a careful investor does, he calculated the worst-case scenario, but he did not check where the scenario came from. Israeli investors read about tax in Romania in headlines and in groups, and pay it according to a letter from the city hall. A rumour arrives on WhatsApp. A tax arrives by registered mail.

The question I would ask in your place

• Where is the change I am reacting to actually written: in a law published in Romania's official gazette (Monitorul Oficial), in a bill, or in a minister's statement?
• How much tax did I pay this year according to the city hall's tax assessment, and what percentage of the rent would it be if the rumour were true?
• If I sell now, will the notary withhold 3% or 1%, and how many days am I short of three years from the date of purchase?

Stories are based on real situations, with identifying details changed. Not legal advice.

Translated from the Hebrew original. עברית

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