Código Civil y Comercial de la Nación — the Substantive Core

Argentina (AR) — civil law.

Nothing on this page describes United States practice. There is no certificate sold to an investor, no administrative sale, and no post-sale redemption window in Argentina. If you arrived carrying US assumptions, read falsos-amigos first.

Código Civil y Comercial de la Nación

In force since 1 August 2015, replacing the 1869 Código Civil of Vélez Sarsfield and the Código de Comercio. It is national: it applies identically in every province, and it is the source of every substantive rule this wiki relies on.

What the CCyC does not do

It does not tell you how a subasta is run. Procedure belongs to the provinces and to the CPCCN for national and federal courts. Do not answer a procedural question from the CCyC.

Hipoteca — arts. 2205–2211

The hipoteca is a real right of guarantee over property that remains in the debtor’s possession. Two features matter operationally:

1. Form. It must be constituted by escritura pública before an escribano. There is no privately-signed security instrument, and no third-party trustee.
2. Registration. It is oponible a terceros — effective against third parties — only once registered in the provincial Registro de la Propiedad Inmueble under Ley 17.801. Priority runs from registration.

Especialidad (the secured amount must be stated) and accesoriedad (the hipoteca follows the credit) are the two doctrinal constraints most often litigated.

Enforcement is by `ejecución hipotecaria`, a judicial process — see ley-24441-ejecucion-especial-hipotecaria for the one narrow alternative regime.

Propiedad horizontal and expensas — arts. 2037–2072

This is where the most expensive mistake on this wiki lives.

Art. 2050 provides that, in addition to the owner and without releasing the owner, those who possess the unit by any title are obliged to pay the expensas — including expensas accrued before their acquisition.

Art. 1937 provides that the sucesor particular succeeds to the obligations inherent in possession of the thing, but responds only with the thing itself for those obligations — that is, the exposure is limited to the unit, not to the buyer’s whole estate, for charges predating acquisition.

Read together with the plenario in `Servicios Eficientes S.A. c/ Yabra`, the consequence is that a buyer at a subasta takes the unit subject to unpaid expensas even though pre-possession taxes and tasas are relieved when the price does not cover them.

This runs opposite to what a US-trained reader expects.

The association’s claim survives the auction here; the tax claim largely does not. Any bid on a propiedad horizontal unit must be net of an actual expensas figure obtained from the consorcio or the administrador, not estimated.

See expensas-y-el-adquirente-en-subasta for the full treatment.

Judicial sale and the transfer of title

A buyer at a subasta judicial is not a party to a contract of sale with the ejecutado. Title derives from the judicial process itself — the acta de subasta, payment, and the auto de aprobación del remate — and is registered by oficio judicial. See titulo-del-adquirente-en-subasta.

Usucapión

Acquisitive prescription is governed by the CCyC (long prescription of 20 years, short prescription of 10 years with justo título and buena fe), and is Argentina’s answer to the problem of turning long possession into registered title. See usucapion.

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Article numbers above were checked against the CCyC’s numbering. Specific holdings interpreting them are on the linked casos/ pages; where a proposition is not traced to a retrieved source it is flagged needs_verification there.