One of our clients is a manufacturing association that has been producing steel tanks at its production site in Saint Petersburg since Soviet times. The company owns about a dozen Soviet‑era buildings located on this site; however, the land plot beneath them was state‑owned.
Our client applied to the Saint Petersburg Property Management Committee to purchase the land plot. The Committee refused, stating that the buildings had been reconstructed and now displayed features of unauthorized structures, and therefore the company was not entitled to purchase the land.
In case No. A56‑115487/2024, we argued that the presence of features of unauthorized structures does not constitute an obstacle to the purchase, and that no violations of the permitted use conditions had occurred; hence, the Committee’s decision was unjustified.
The Arbitration Court of Saint Petersburg and the Leningrad Region, which considered the case at first instance, sided with the Committee and, by its ruling of 23 April 2025, dismissed the claims.
We filed an appeal with the Thirteenth Arbitration Appellate Court. In the appeal, we provided documentary evidence showing that the first‑instance court’s conclusions regarding violations of the permitted use conditions were based on a technical error; that there were no unauthorized structures on the site; and that the Committee’s allegations of unauthorized construction stemmed from discrepancies in the measurements of the old buildings (taken either along the internal or external perimeter of the structures).
The appellate court accepted our arguments and, by its ruling of 29 August 2025, overturned the first‑instance decision and satisfied our claims.
The Arbitration Court of the North‑Western District dismissed the Committee’s cassation appeal and, by its ruling of 29 December 2025, upheld the appellate ruling. Thus, our client’s right to privatize the land plot was realized.
