The story
A condominium turned to the court to contest the installation of advertising signs by a condominium company, considering it unauthorized. The actor asked for the billboards to be removed, that the condominium compensated the damage caused and paid the legal fees. The defendant defended himself by opposing all requests.
The company claimed to have acquired, through usucapion, a real right of use on the portions of the condominium wall where the billboards had been placed. He also contested the request for compensation, considering it too generic, and in turn advanced a claim for compensation. After examining the evidence and documentation submitted, the Court only accepted the requests of the condominium only, considering the application relating to the removal of the billboards.
The decision
The Court has noticed that the defendant company, if on the one hand he deduced that he had exercised the right of use on a portion of the condominium facade for a period higher than the twenty years prescribed for the purposes of the usucapion, on the other admitted that this minimal employment has not prevented the use of the other condominiums of the residual common part.
Lacking the total exclusion of the other condominiums from the use of the particular common good, the Court has excluded the purchase for usucapion of the exclusive right of use on the portion of the condominium facade. Consequently, the judge himself sentenced the defendant to provide for the immediate removal of the artifacts installed on the facade in question.
The Court also rejected the further compensation request formulated by the condominium, due to lack of evidence. As the judge noticed, since it is damage from an unanswered occupation of a portion of a condominium asset could have been quantified by the condominiums on the basis of the locative value of the saying said. The judge cannot be asked to establish the amount of the damage “to fairness” (that is, according to common sense), if before it has not proven that damage cannot be quantified precisely. In summary, those who ask for compensation must bring evidence, not just hypotheses.
The reasons for the decision
It should be borne in mind that the usucapion of common goods by a single condominium requires a rigorous and unequivocal demonstration, both in terms of exclusive and duration. In particular, it is necessary to prove that, for the entire period provided for by the law (twenty years) prevented other condominiums from using that common part, behaving as if it were the only owner of the law. This means that he must not have acted as a simple co -owner, but as an exclusive owner, bringing out a real change in the way he exercised possession.
This change must be evident and recognizable, through concrete and unequivocal behaviors that clearly show the desire to exclude others and to treat that portion as their own. The interested party must therefore demonstrate that the other co -owners are unable to have concrete relationships with the good in dispute. Only in the presence of these elements can we speak of usucapion on a common part. In the case examined, the defendant company admitted that the essential condition of the complete exclusion of the other condominiums was not carried out by the use of the specific portion of the condominium facade, with the consequent exclusion of the purchase for the usucapion of the right of exclusive use on this common good.
Although the use of the common part by a single condominium is dominant compared to that of others, leaving them only a marginal portion of the good, the fact that everyone continues to benefit from it prevents us that we can speak of usucapion. The sharing, albeit limited, of the enjoyment by the community excludes the possibility that an exclusive possession has been established such as to give rise to the purchase of the right by the course of the time (Palermo Court of 24 June 2025, n. 2797).
