Buying off-plan in the high end: what the contract must say

At a launch, the client falls in love in the show apartment and signs at a table right next to it, in the heat of the emotion. I do the opposite: I read the contract before I look at the show apartment. Because the show apartment sells the dream, and it is the contract that carries the risk. In a high-end property bought off-plan, almost everything that can go wrong is written, or missing, in the paper signed on the first day.

The deadline, and what happens if it is not met

The first thing I look for is the delivery date, and what comes after it. A good contract states the deadline, the legal tolerance, and what the developer pays if it is late beyond that. Delays in high-end construction happen; what separates a fair contract from a trapped one is having, in black and white, the consequence of the delay for the seller, not only for the buyer.

What exactly you are buying

The second point is the descriptive memorandum. It is what states the materials, the brands, the finishes, what belongs to the apartment and what is optional. In the high end, the difference between what was promised at the stand and what is delivered at the keys lives here. A 280 Art Boulevardi or an Arbórea Ibirapuerai sell themselves on sophistication; the memorandum is where that sophistication becomes an obligation, or not. What is not in the memorandum is not a promise, it is hope.

The reajustment, the termination and the guarantees

Then come the numbers that grow with time. The index that adjusts the installments during construction must be clear, because it is what defines how much the property will really cost by delivery. The termination conditions, if you need to leave the deal, say how much of what you paid comes back. And the construction guarantees, what the developer answers for and for how long after delivery, protect you precisely when the shine of the launch has already passed.

Who is doing the promising

Finally, I look at who signs on the other side. The developer’s reputation is not a legal detail, it is the greatest guarantee there is. A Cyrelai, or another name with a record of delivery, is a line of safety no clause replaces. I check the registration of the development, whether there is a segregated estate separating that project from the company’s other accounts, whether the memorandum is registered at the notary. Things invisible in the show apartment, decisive in the contract.

The numbers that grow, and the area that shrinks

Two points escape even experienced buyers. The first is the total cost to the keys, not the table price: adding up the installments adjusted during construction, the keys installment and any financing, the real amount usually ends up well above the number that charmed at the stand. A good contract makes that total transparent; a bad one hides the growth in the fine print of the adjustment index. The second is the square footage. What is advertised as the apartment’s area is not always the private area, the one that is only yours; part of it can be shared common area. Confirming, in the memorandum and in the registered development, how many meters are in fact private avoids the most common surprise of delivery, that of receiving less apartment than you imagined you had bought.

Why this comes before the keys

None of this is to scare anyone. Buying off-plan is, often, the best possible decision. But it is a decision protected at the beginning, not at the end, because once signed the contract rules, and the emotion is already gone. My work, and the reason an advisor who is also a lawyer exists at your side, is to turn the complexity of that contract into security, so that your only surprise, on the day of the keys, is a good one. It is to read the contract with a cool head while the client dreams of the apartment, so that the dream arrives whole, with no clause charging, further ahead, the price of today’s emotion.