Properties in Portugal to have a unique ID number

Launching in the second half of this year, the Portuguese tax office will allocate a Property Identification Number (NIP) for each property in Portugal, a similar idea to the Portguese citizen’s card in that a property database will hold all information regarding the property under a unique ID number.

Secretary of State for Justice, Anabela Pedroso explained that initially, “this project should start only for rural lands, and then will be extended later to urban properties. These are the first steps towards creating real-time, up-to-date databases relating to all available information on rural and urban properties.”

“This could be a crucial moment for real estate reform in Portugal. Today, each owner has multiple property papers, documentation, and registration numbers. Being able to do with the properties what was done with the citizen’s card is perhaps the most important part of the work of identifying the owner and the location of each property”, she said.

The launch of the NIP will be done step-by-step, along with the identification and registration of land and properties. The NIP is part of the Balcão Único do Prédio (BUPi), which allows rural land owners, without organised documentation or properties that aren’t properly identified, to update their registration.

According to Portuguese newspapers, the NIP will start as a pilot project in areas that are more vulnerable to the risk of fire, focussed initially in the central region of Portugal, expanding throughout 2023.

There is currently no deadline for all properties to have an NIP, but it is estimated the project will be complete by the end of 2025.