On the basis of their capacity to acquire or hold lands of

the public domain, the following may acquire private

lands:
a. Filipino citizens;
b. Filipino corporations and asscociations as defined in
Section 2, Article XII of the Constitution; and, by
exception;
c. Aliens, but only by hereditary succession; and
d. A natural-born citizen of the Philippines who has lost his
citizenship under the terms of Section 8.

Section 14. Who may apply. The following persons may file in the
proper Court of First Instance an application for registration of title
to land, whether personally or through their duly authorized
representatives:
(1) Those who by themselves or through their predecessors-ininterest have been in open, continuous, exclusive and notorious
possession and occupation of alienable and disposable lands of
the public domain under a bona fide claim of ownership since
June 12, 1945, or earlier.
(2) Those who have acquired ownership of private lands by
prescription under the provision of existing laws.
(3) Those who have acquired ownership of private lands or
abandoned river beds by right of accession or accretion under the
existing laws.
(4) Those who have acquired ownership of land in any other
manner provided for by law.
Where the land is owned in common, all the co-owners shall file
the application jointly.
Where the land has been sold under pacto de retro, the vendor a
retro may file an application for the original registration of the
land, provided, however, that should the period for redemption
expire during the pendency of the registration proceedings and
ownership to the property consolidated in the vendee a retro, the
latter shall be substituted for the applicant and may continue the
proceedings.
A trustee on behalf of his principal may apply for original
registration of any land held in trust by him, unless prohibited by
the instrument creating the trust.

Section 15. Form and contents. The application for

land registration shall be in writing, signed by the
application or the person duly authorized in his

behalf, and sworn to before any officer authorized to

administer oaths for the province or city where the
application was actually signed. If there is more than
one applicant, the application shall be signed and
sworn to by and in behalf of each. The application
shall contain a description of the land and shall state
the citizenship and civil status of the applicant,
whether single or married, and, if married, the name
of the wife or husband, and, if the marriage has been
legally dissolved, when and how the marriage
relation terminated. It shall also state the full names
and addresses of all occupants of the land and those
of the adjoining owners, if known, and, if not known,
it shall state the extent of the search made to find
them.

Requisite steps in bringing land under the Torrens system.

In order that land may be brought under the operation of
the Torrens System, the following steps should be
observed:
a. Survey of land by the Lands Management Bureau or a duly
licensed private surveyor;
b. Filling of application for registration by the applicant;
c. Setting of the date for the initial hearing of the application
by the court;
d. Transmittal of the application and the date of initial
hearing together with all the documents or other
evidences attached thereto by the Clerk of Court to the
Land Registration Authority;
e. Publication of the notice of the filing of the application and
date and place of the hearing in the Official Gazette and
in a newspaper of general circulation;
f. Service by mailing of notice upon contiguous owners,
occupants and those known to have interests in the
property;
g. Posting by the sheriff of the notice in a conspicuous place
on the land and in the bulletin board of the municipal
building or city where the land is situated;
h. Filing of answer to the application by any person whether
named in the notice or not;
i. Hearing of the case by the court;
j. Promulgation of judgment by the court;
k. Inssuance of an order for the inssuance of a decree
declaring the decision final and instructing the Land
Registration Authority to issue the decree of
confirmation and registration;
l. Entry of the decree of registration in the Land Registration
Authority;
m. Sending of copy of the decree of registration to the
corresponding Register of Deds; and
n. Transcription of the decree of registration in the registration
book and the inssuance of the owners duplicate original
certificate of title to the applicant by the register of
Deeds, upon payment of the prescribed fees.
CITIZENSHIP REQUIREMENT

1. The Krivinko doctrine disqualified from acquiring public

and private lands.
The(1947) landmark case of krivinko v. Register of Deeds
has seetled the issue as to whoa re qualified (and
disqualified) to own public as well as private lands in the
Philippines. The court, through Chief Justice Moran,
held that aliens may not acquire private or public
agricultural lands, thus:
Under Section 1 of Article XIII [now Sec. 2, Art. XII] of
the [1935] Constitution, natural resources, with the
exception of public agriculture land, shall not be
alienated, and with respect to public agricultural lands,
their alienation is limited to Filipino citizens. But this
constitutional purpose conserving agricultural resources
in the hands of Filipino citizens may easily be defeated
by the Filipino citizens themselves who may alienate
their agricultural lands in favor of aliens. It is partly to
prevent this result that Section 5 is included in Article
XIII, and it reads as follows:
Sec. 5. Save in cases of heredity succession, no private
agricultural land will be transferred or assigned except to
individuals, corporations or associations qualified to
acquire or hold lands of public domain in the
Philippines.
2. A natural-born Filipino citizen who has lost his citizenship
may be transferee of private land.
3. Re-acquisition of Philippine citizenship under RA No. 9225
obviates area limitation
1. Foreigners allowed to purchase condominium units.
Under RA No. 4726, foreign nationals can own Philippines
real estate through the purchase of condominium units or
townhomes pursuant to Section 5 thereof which states:
SEC. 5. Any transfer or conveyance of a unit or an
apartment, office or store or other space therein, shall
include the transfer or conveyance of the individual interest
in the common areas or, in a proper case, the membership
or shareholdings in the condominium corporation;
Provided, however, That where the common areas in the
condominium project are held by the owners of separate
units as co-owners thereof, no condominium unit therein
shall be conveyed or transferred to persons other than
Filipino citizens or corporations at least 60% of the capital
stock of which belong to Filipino citizens, except in cases
of hereditary succession. Where the common areas in a
condominium project are held by a corporation, no transfer
or conveyance of a unit shall be valid if the concomitant
transfer of the appurtenant membership or stockholding in
the corporation will cause the alien interest in such
corporation to exceed the limits imposed by existing laws.
2. Donation in favor of a religious corporation controlled by
non-Filipinos not registrable.
3. Land acquired by an American citizen in 1945 can be
registered under the Ordinance appended to the 1935
Constitution.
4. A corporation sole may acquire and register private
agricultural land.

5. Can a Filipino vendor revover land sold to an alien?

6. Rule Restated.
Evidenced deemed sufficient to established classification of
land as A and D land.
The following may be considered sufficient to established
the classification of land as alienable and disposable land
for purposes of original registration:
1. Certification of the Bureau of Forest Development that the
land has been released as alienable and disposable land.
2. Land Classification Map showing that the land lies within
the alienable and disposable portion of the public
domain.
3. Executive proclamation withdrawing from a reservation a
specific area and declaring the same open for entry, sale
or other mode of disposition.
4. Legislative act or executive proclamation reserving a
portion of the public domain for public or quasi-public
use, which amounts to a transfer of ownership to the
grantee.
5. The report of a land inspector of the Bureau of Lands that
the subject land was found inside an agricultural zone
and is suitable for rice cultivation is binding on the
courts inasmuch as it is the exclusive prerogative of the
Executive Department of the Government to classify
public lands.
6. A certification by the CENRO of the DENR stating that the
land subject of an application is found to be within the
alienable and disposable site per a land classification
project map is sufficient evidence to show the real
character of the land subject of the application.
7. The Certification by DENR Regional Technical Director
that Lot 249 had been verified as belonging to the
alienable and disposable area as early as July 18, 1925.
As annotated on the subdivision plan, constitutes
substantial compliance with the legal requirement.
Section 2, Article II
The State recognizes and promotes the right of
indigenous cultural communities within the framework of
national unity and development.
Transfer of Land or Property Rights
The right of ownership and possession of the ICCs/IPs to
their ancestral lands shall be recognized and protected.
These lands may be transferred subject to the following
limitations;
a. Only to the members of the same ICCs/IPs;
b. In accord with customary laws and traditions; and
c. Subject to the right of redemption of the ICCs/IPs for a
period of 15 years if the land was transferred to a nonmembers of the ICCs/IPs, under the terms of the law.