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This article is transferred from [Shandong High Court];

Buying a car is easy, parking is hard

The owner's car couldn't even enter his own neighborhood.

On one side is an unused underground parking space.

On one side is a car that can't drive home,

What is going on?

Case Brief

In October 2019, Xiaomei signed a "Commercial Housing Sales Contract" (pre-sale) with A Real Estate Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as: A Company), which stipulated that Xiaomei purchased a house developed by A Company in a community in Yanta District, Xi'an City. Article 22, paragraph 3 of the contract stipulates that "the planned parking spaces and garages belong to the seller, and the seller has the right to rent or sell them separately." Article 13 of Appendix 12 stipulates that "the property rights of the underground and ground parking spaces of this project belong to the seller, and the seller has the right to choose to dispose of them by sale, gift or lease. The buyer has no objection to this." At the end of June 2022, Xiaomei obtained the real estate certificate for the house involved in the case.

After the underground parking lot of the community was completed and put into operation, the third party W Property Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as: W Company) issued a notice to the owners of the community in May 2022, stating that according to the requirements of Company A, vehicles that have not purchased parking spaces in the community underground garage will not be allowed to enter the underground garage from June 2022. Later, Company A sent a work letter to Company W in July 2022, requiring Company W to prohibit people and vehicles that have not purchased parking spaces from entering or using the underground parking spaces in the community.

In August 2022, when Xiaomei was driving her car into the underground parking garage in her residential community, she was stopped by the security guard (a staff member of Company W) on the grounds of a "restricted access" notice from Company A, and a dispute arose between the two parties.

Xiaomei therefore sued Company A as the defendant and Company W as the third party in court.

Xiaomei: Half of the property-owned parking spaces in the community involved in the case have not been sold yet, meeting the conditions for renting them out. She requires the defendant to rent out the property-owned parking spaces to her. In addition, the mechanical parking spaces in the community require a 20-year lease term, and there is no short-term leasing option, which is actually a disguised sale.

Company A adopted a model of selling but not renting the parking spaces planned in the underground garage of the community, refusing to allow community owners to use the parking spaces in the form of leasing, thereby infringing the legitimate rights and interests of the plaintiff as a community owner.

Company A: Our company is the owner of the property-owned parking spaces in the community involved in the case. About half of the property-owned parking spaces have been sold. Owners who have not purchased property-owned parking spaces can choose to rent mechanical parking spaces. According to the provisions of the Civil Code and the contract agreement, it has the right to stipulate the ownership of the parking spaces in the community involved in the case by means of sale, gift or lease, etc. The plaintiff has no right to force it to conclude a lease contract.

Court hearing

After trial, the court held that Article 276 of the Civil Code of the People's Republic of China stipulates: "Within the building area, parking spaces and garages planned for parking cars should first meet the needs of the owners." From this, it can be seen that although the development and construction unit has ownership of the parking spaces registered in its name within the building area, the exercise of such ownership should be subject to the restriction of giving priority to meeting the needs of the community owners in accordance with the law.

During the trial, Company A admitted that nearly half of the property parking spaces had not been sold, and that the property parking spaces in the community involved in the case were now eligible for leasing to owners, so Company A should open the unsold property parking spaces in the community involved in the case to the owners of the community for leasing. Xiaomei is an owner of a community developed by Company A and has the right to require Company A to open leasing to her.

The court finally made the following judgment in accordance with the law, that Company A should lease the undisposed parking space in a certain community to Xiaomei on the principle of giving priority to meeting the needs of the property owners.

Company A appealed to the Xi'an Intermediate People's Court, which upheld the original judgment.

Judge's opinion

Lv Ruihan, judge of Qujiang Court of Yanta District Court:

As the number of vehicles continues to increase, some residential communities are in a situation where the number of parking spaces cannot meet the needs of owners. However, given the large number of idle parking spaces in this community, the parking spaces are only sold to owners and not rented, which is obviously contrary to "meeting the needs of owners."

What types of parking spaces are there in the community?

One is the parking spaces or garages planned for parking cars within the building area; although the property rights belong to the developer, when there are sufficient parking spaces, the developer cannot restrict the rights of owners in the community to use the parking spaces through renting or other means. The owners in the community have the right to request the People's Court to order the developer to rent or sell the vacant parking spaces to owners in the community.

Second, the parking spaces occupied on roads or other places shared by owners in non-building areas are owned by the owners. According to Article 275 of the Civil Code, "parking spaces occupied on roads or other places shared by owners are owned by the owners." Developers have no right to dispose of or profit from non-planned parking spaces.

The third is the civil air defense garage or parking space. Since the property rights belong to the state, the developer cannot sell it, but can only rent it out, and the maximum lease term is no more than 20 years.

The parking spaces involved in this case are planned within the first type of building zoning. After the development and construction unit builds parking spaces and garages, it should first rent or sell them to the owners, rather than sell them to third parties. If the owner is able to buy, it should be sold; if the owner is unable to buy, it should be rented out, and parking services should not be refused in the name of "only selling, not renting".

Legal links

Civil Code of the People's Republic of China

Article 275 The ownership of parking spaces and garages planned for parking cars within a building area shall be agreed upon by the parties through sale, gift or lease.

Parking spaces that occupy roads or other areas shared by owners for parking cars are shared by the owners.

Article 276: Within the building area, parking spaces and garages planned for parking cars should first meet the needs of the owners.