Zanzibar Apartments: Unit Title and Shared Costs

What is a Zanzibar apartment in law?#

A Zanzibar apartment is a unit in a condominium, and the instrument that creates it is the Zanzibar Condominium Act, 2010 (Act No. 10 of 2010). The House of Representatives passed it on 10 August 2010 and the President assented on 24 September 2010. It applies in Zanzibar to property that is expressly made subject to it (section 2). Mainland Tanzania runs a separate regime, the Unit Titles Act, 2008, and the two should not be mixed.

A condominium is a system of separate ownership of individual units in multi-unit buildings. The Act says the units are designated for separate ownership, and the remainder is designated for common ownership solely by the owners of those units (section 3). The principal reading a listing for a flat should therefore ask two questions. Is the building registered under this Act, and what exactly is the unit? Everything else in the building belongs to all owners together.

This note reads the primary text, not the agency guides. The 2010 Act and the 2023 amending Act were opened on the House of Representatives website on 16 October 2026. Both are scans of the official hardcopy. Where the law is silent, the note says so. Agency guides appear only as practitioner-reported. The numbers are statutory counts, measured from the text. They are not market data.

The scope is narrow on purpose. The note covers four things. How a unit is defined, how it moves, what a developer must hand over before a sale, and how shared costs are carried. It carries no price, no yield and no personal advice, and it does not replace a Zanzibar-qualified lawyer reading the documents of a specific building.

The unit under the Zanzibar Condominium Act, 2010#

A unit is a space within a building, described in a condominium plan by reference to floors, walls and ceilings (section 3). Each registered unit is then a distinct object of real property, and the owner may dispose of it in whole or in part (section 21). That is the full definition. The unit is the space. The structure around it is not.

The condominium plan fixes the unit. An application to register must carry a plan that numbers each unit, defines its boundaries by floors, walls and ceilings, and states its approximate floor area (section 4(1)). The plan also carries a schedule of unit entitlement, a whole number showing the proportion of the common property allocated to each unit. A principal should ask for the plan before anything else.

Boundary rules are default rules, and the plan can override them. Unless the plan says otherwise, where a wall is load-bearing the unit boundary is the finishing material on the interior side, and all doors and windows belong to the unit (section 11). The common boundary between two units, or between a unit and common property, is the centre line of the floor, wall or ceiling (section 4(5)). Balcony, terrace and wall questions are answered by the plan, not by the brochure.

Registration is a precondition, and older buildings face a stricter test. The Registrar may register a plan only if its heading describes it as a condominium plan. For a building constructed, or permitted, before the Act began, the Registrar must refuse the certificate if the building does not conform (section 10). A unit may be subdivided or consolidated with the approval of the Housing Department and a new registered plan (section 9). Without registration, the principal holds a contract, not a registered unit.

How is a unit title transferred in Zanzibar?#

An owner may transfer the unit without the approval of any other owner. Section 16(1)(b) allows transfer by sale, lease, gift, bequest, devise, pledge or mortgage. As passed in 2010 the clause also dispensed with the approval of the Board. The 2023 amendment replaces the Board with the Registrar in that clause (section 28 of Act No. 6 of 2023).

The amendment is awkwardly drafted at this point. It deletes the words “the Board or” and substitutes “Registrar”. Read literally, the clause becomes “without the approval of Registrar any other unit-owner”. The sense is plain, free transfer, but a consolidated text should be requested from counsel and not assumed. This is flagged as an open point.

The other dispositions follow the general laws. A mortgage is made in accordance with the prevailing law on mortgages (section 26). Inheritance is subject to the prevailing laws of succession (section 25). A lease of the unit is allowed under the Act and the other laws regulating leases (section 24(1)). For each, the Act is a gateway and the rest of Zanzibar law does the work.

A tenancy triggers a notice duty. The owner must give written notice within fourteen days after a tenant rents the unit, naming the tenant, and again within fourteen days after the tenancy ends (section 24(2) and (3)). As passed, the notice went to the Board. The 2023 Act substitutes the Registrar (section 29). A practitioner guide describes this as an easy compliance step to miss (practitioner-reported).

Disposition includes the fractional share and use rights. The definition of disposition covers the fractional share appurtenant to the unit and the right to use restricted common areas (section 3). A parking bay or a rooftop terrace therefore moves with the unit only if it is recorded in the plan or documented as a right. The principal should check that any such area is written down.

What must a Zanzibar developer deliver before a unit sale?#

A proprietor or developer may not sell, or agree to sell, a unit or proposed unit until the purchaser holds eight items (section 22(1)). They are the sale agreement, the proposed rules, the proposed management agreement, the proposed sale agreement, a copy of the lease of the parcel if the parcel is leased, a certificate of title for the unit, any charge that may affect the title, and the condominium plan.

Items (a) and (d) both name a sale agreement. The text lists “the sale agreement”, whose content is to follow the regulation, and then “the proposed sale agreement”. The scan does not explain the overlap, and no regulation prescribing the content was found. The count of eight is therefore a count of lettered items, not of eight distinct documents.

A charge triggers a separate written notice. For any charge or proposed charge the seller must state the maximum principal, the maximum monthly payment, the amortisation period, any grace period and the pre-payment terms (section 22(2)). This matters for off-plan purchases, where a developer's financing can sit behind the unit. The text requires disclosure of those terms. It says nothing on priority or release.

The purchaser may rescind within ten working days after execution, without liability (section 22(3)). The right is lost if every required document was delivered at least ten days before execution (section 22(4)). If the purchaser rescinds, the seller must return all money paid within ten working days of receiving written notice (section 22(5)).

The right turns on timing, and early delivery removes it. A principal who receives the file less than ten days before signing keeps the right. One who receives it earlier gives it up. The delivery date against the signing date is a diligence item and should be evidenced in writing, because the Act does not say how delivery is proved. Section 22 binds proprietors and developers. A resale by an ordinary owner falls under section 23.

The Registrar of Condominium after the 2023 amendment#

The Registrar of Condominium is appointed by the Minister under the new section 5, and the Condominium Board no longer appears in the text. Part Six of the Written Laws (Miscellaneous Amendment) Act, 2023 (Act No. 6 of 2023) replaces section 5, repeals Part Five and section 45 of the 2010 Act, and deletes the definition of “Board” (sections 25, 26 and 30 of the amending Act). Section 25 refers to section 2 of the 2010 Act, although the definitions sit in section 3, a further drafting slip. The amending Act came into operation on assent, dated 7 November 2023 (section 1).

The qualification test is explicit. The new section 5(2) requires a first degree in law from an institution recognised by the Government, at least three years of experience in condominium matters, and a high level of integrity. The 2010 text required only condominium knowledge and made the Registrar responsible and answerable to the Board.

Functions moved from the Board to the Registrar or the Minister. An appeal against a refusal to register now lies to the Minister (section 8(3) as amended). Tenancy notices go to the Registrar. Work required for the conservation of the property is approved by the Registrar (section 16(4) as amended). The effect is one appointed office replacing a collegiate body that had included a representative of a condominium corporation.

The Board's other functions have no visible successor. Under the 2010 text the Board was to arrange and collect maintenance fees for the common properties, settle civil condominium disputes before they reached court, publish guidelines, and supervise owners who wished to form associations (section 34). Part Six of the 2023 Act repeals Part Five and does not re-assign those functions. Whether another instrument does so was not found.

The principal should treat the office as a registry, not a manager. Nothing in the text read gives the Registrar a role in the day-to-day running of a building, and no power over budgets is stated. This is a reading of the statute. It is not a finding about practice, since no published Registrar guidance was located.

Common property and unit entitlement in Zanzibar#

Common property is everything that does not belong to a specific unit and is used in common by the owners. The definition includes the land on which the property is situated, support structures, infrastructure and services (section 3). The remainder of a condominium is designated for common ownership solely by the owners of the units.

Each owner's share is a whole number written on the plan. The unit entitlement schedule states the proportion of the common property allocated to each unit (section 4(1)(d)). It determines the quantum of the owner's share and the proportion of contributions payable by that owner (section 4(6)). Registration must show share values whose sum equals the aggregate entitlement of the parcel (section 6(1)(a)). One number therefore drives both ownership and cost.

Appurtenant rights keep a unit usable. Common property and each unit carry rights of support, shelter and protection, and of passage or provision of water, sewerage, drainage, gas, electricity, garbage, air, telephone, radio and television (section 13(1)). They also carry the right to light through existing windows and apertures (section 13(2)). Easements of lateral and subjacent support are implied between units and common property (section 14).

Restricted-use areas shift cost to their users. Only an owner who uses common areas for restricted use contributes to the costs resulting from those portions (section 16(3)). A principal looking at a unit with an exclusive terrace or garden should confirm in the plan and the rules which portions are restricted, because the cost follows the use.

Phased plans can change the denominator. A developer may deposit a plan to be developed in successive phases, with a schedule for the phases (section 4(2) to (4)). Where entitlement is a share of a whole that is still being built, the principal should ask how later phases alter the existing shares. The text read does not describe that mechanism.

Corporation, rules and owners in a Zanzibar building#

The Act makes a body corporate the operator, and it calls it the condominium corporation (section 18). A company incorporated under the Companies Decree, Chapter 153, or a body established under any other law as a body corporate to operate a property, is a condominium corporation. The Act does not itself create an owners' association with statutory members.

The Companies Decree it cites appears to be superseded. The House of Representatives index describes the Companies Act (Act No. 15 of 2013) as an Act to repeal and replace a law relating to companies. Section 18 still names the Decree. Part Five of the 2023 Act amends the 2013 Companies Act and adds beneficial-ownership records. Which statute governs a given corporation is a point for counsel, not an assumption.

The corporation's statutory duties are specific. It operates the property for the benefit of all owners and enforces the regulations, keeps the common property in good and serviceable repair, and insures the building to replacement value against fire, hurricane, earthquake and sea wave unless the owners by unanimous resolution decide otherwise (section 19). Cover against sea wave and hurricane is stated in the statute itself, which is one reason to read it next to our note on when climate risk gets priced in insurance.

“Unanimous resolution” does not mean unanimity. The Act defines it as a resolution supported by a majority of owners of units (section 3). Other risks are insured as the owners determine by “special resolution”, a term the Act does not define. The definition does not tie voting power to unit entitlement, and the text does not say whether one unit carries one vote. These are open drafting points for the principal reading the rules.

Rules and the management agreement arrive with the sale, not inside the Act. The seller must deliver the proposed rules and the proposed management agreement before sale (section 22(1)(b) and (c)). Voting thresholds, budget approval and the appointment of a manager are left to those documents and to regulations the Minister may make (section 46, renumbered 45 by the 2023 Act). The building's working constitution is therefore a pair of private documents.

How does the Zanzibar Act treat shared costs and arrears?#

Each owner contributes to the costs of maintaining and operating the property, including the contingency fund, in proportion to the fractional share (section 16(2)(c)). That is the general cost-sharing rule in the Act, subject to the restricted-use rule in section 16(3). The Act states no remedy for arrears. The share comes from the unit entitlement. The words “contingency fund” appear once and are not otherwise regulated.

Owners also bear their own outgoings. An owner must pay the rates, taxes, charges, outgoings and assessments payable in respect of the unit, repair and maintain the unit, and allow the corporation to enter on notice to inspect or repair pipes, wires, cables and ducts (section 17). How utility costs behave on an island is a separate question, treated in our note on water, power and waste on a small island.

The collection machinery sat with the Board, and the Board is gone. Section 34(h) gave the Board the function of arranging and collecting maintenance fees. Part Five, which contained it, is repealed. The text found does not name a replacement. The principal should read the rules and the management agreement to find who bills, who holds the funds and who sues.

The Act states no lien, interest rate or enforcement ladder for arrears. No provision read on 16 October 2026 sets interest, a charge over the unit, suspension of use rights or sale for default. Section 42 sends any condominium dispute to the existing laws of Zanzibar. Section 43 makes intentional failure to exercise a duty under the Act an offence, with a fine of up to five hundred thousand shillings, imprisonment of up to two years, or both, where no other punishment is provided. Whether that reaches an owner who does not pay is not stated.

A resale gives the buyer a documented ceiling. On a resale by an ordinary owner, the seller must supply the financial statement declaration, a certificate of the assessments against the unit, the unpaid common expenses currently due, and any other fees (section 23(1)). The acquirer is bound to pay common expenses due at acquisition, yet is not liable for amounts beyond those shown in the sales certificate (section 23(2)). The two sentences sit uneasily, and the certificate is the control.

The parcel's own lease has its own arrears regime. The Land Tenure (Amendment) Act, 2010 (Act No. 11 of 2010) replaced section 48 of the Land Tenure Act with a rule for leases of public land under which a lessee who fails to pay land rent pays an additional rent of 10% of the land rent for each month in default, and the Minister may terminate where land rent and additional rent stay unpaid for one year from the date the additional rent becomes payable, after three months' notice to rectify (new section 48(2) and (3)). That is the 2010 text, and later amendments exist, so it is cited as history only. The Condominium Act does not say how a ground-rent default is shared among owners.

The parcel lease behind a Zanzibar unit title#

The Act fixes no term, so the unit follows the land. An owner is a person registered as owner of a title to a unit, or of the leasehold estate in a unit where the parcel is held under a lease (section 3). No section of the Act states a number of years. The duration question therefore sits in the lease of the parcel and in the land law behind it.

The seller must deliver the parcel lease. Section 22(1)(e) lists a copy of the lease of the parcel, if the parcel is held under a lease, among the documents due before a developer sale. A principal reading that copy should check the lessor, the registered holder, the term and its renewal mechanics, the rent and the conditions on disposition.

“Land” is a Land Tenure Act concept. The Condominium Act defines land by reference to the Land Tenure Act, No. 12 of 1992 (section 3), and the Land Tenure (Amendment) Act, 2010 amended section 47 on leases of public land, replacing subsections (1) to (3) and adding subsections (8) and (9). Later amendments exist. This note does not reproduce the current text of that section, and the principal should take it from the House of Representatives site and read it directly.

The investment law is a separate layer. The Zanzibar Investment Act, 2023 (Act No. 10 of 2023) is titled as an Act to repeal the Zanzibar Investment Promotion and Protection Authority Act, No. 14 of 2018, and to enact the new law. The 2018 Act is therefore not the operative investment statute. Whether a unit purchase touches the 2023 Act depends on the structure, and the note does not assume it does. For the foreign-ownership layer, see our note on what a foreigner can own in Zanzibar.

Guides on lease length are practitioner-reported. Agency guides give lease durations and renewal blocks, and one describes upkeep of the lease as the developer's duty. These statements are practitioner-reported and are not repeated as figures here, because the Condominium Act is silent and the rule belongs to the land statute. The principal's evidence is the lease document itself.

Zanzibar condominium law: what remains unresolved, honestly disclosed#

Six points stay open after reading the primary text. First, a consolidated text of the Act after the 2023 amendment was not located, and section 16(1)(b) as amended reads awkwardly. Second, no regulations under section 46 (renumbered 45 by the 2023 Act) were found, though the Act refers to matters prescribed in the regulation. Third, the successor to the Board's fee-collection function is not identified. Fourth, remedies for arrears are not stated. Fifth, “special resolution” is undefined. Sixth, section 18 names a Companies Decree that a 2013 Act appears to replace. Commencement is not an open point: the 2023 Act came into operation on assent, dated 7 November 2023 (section 1).

Both primary sources are scans. The 2010 Act and the 2023 Act are scanned images, so quotations were read by eye and may carry transcription error. An agency has published a reconstructed text of the 2010 Act with its own warning about scanning errors. It is treated as practitioner-reported and was not relied on for any section cited here.

No market data was used. There are no prices, yields, service charges per square metre or vacancy figures in this note, because no verifiable source for Zanzibar service charges was found. A principal who needs a number should ask for the building's budget and the corporation's accounts, and treat any figure without them as directional at best.

A short reading order for the principal. Request the condominium plan with its entitlement schedule from the developer, and confirm with the Registrar of Condominium that it is registered. Then the parcel lease, the proposed rules and management agreement, the certificate of title for the unit, and a statement of any charge. Then count ten days back from the signing date to see whether the rescission right survives, and keep the delivery record.

Victaura's projects in Zanzibar are in active development. The Nungwi project page is the public statement, and this note adds nothing to it.

Skin in the game disclosure. Victaura, through its parent Greystone B.V. (Netherlands), develops projects on Lake Como (Italy), in Nungwi, Zanzibar (Tanzania), on Gili Air and in Uluwatu, Bali (Indonesia), and holds an off-plan capital position on Al Marjan Island, Ras Al Khaimah (UAE). Readers should assume commentary may be influenced by, or benefit, these positions. This document is classified as marketing material under MiFID II Article 24(3). It is not investment advice.