Snagging in Cyprus: Taking Delivery Without Inheriting Defects
Handover is the last moment you hold real leverage: the developer wants the final payment, you want a finished apartment. A structured snagging inspection converts that leverage into fixed defects — skip it, and the same defects become your renovation budget.
Before final payment
when leverage exists
Written snag list
with photos and deadlines
Defects period
typically 12 months post-delivery
01What snagging actually covers
A systematic walk-through against the contractual specification: finishes and tiling, doors and windows operation and sealing, plumbing pressure and drainage, electrical points and switchboard, waterproofing on verandas and bathrooms, A/C provisions, and delivered appliances versus the spec schedule. In Cyprus new-builds the recurring items are veranda drainage falls, window sealing, and finish quality on the last-completed floors — the ones built under deadline pressure.
02Independent eyes beat emotional ones
Buyers inspect the home they've waited two years for; surveyors inspect a building. An independent snagging survey (engineer or specialist firm) costs a few hundred euros, produces a photographed, itemised report, and removes the negotiation from 'you versus your dream apartment'. For remote buyers it is not optional — it is the inspection.
03Paper the process
The snag list goes to the developer in writing with photographs and agreed rectification deadlines.
Where the contract allows, tie the final payment or a retention to rectification — leverage evaporates the day the last euro clears.
If the contract has no retention mechanism, negotiate one at signing stage, not at handover.
04After handover: the defects period
Contracts typically carry a defects liability period — commonly 12 months — during which the developer must remedy faults appearing in normal use; structural matters run longer under general law. Log every issue in writing during the period with dates and photos. Latent defects discovered later are harder but not hopeless — documentation from delivery day is what keeps claims alive.