Since 1 January 2024, the notary at your Portuguese deed no longer checks whether the property you are buying is legally built. Decreto-Lei n.º 10/2024, de 8 de janeiro removed that verification from the transaction, and Article 342.º/1 of the Civil Code puts the burden of proving a defect on the person claiming it, which after signature is you. A property condition report is the document that carries that burden. It is a dated, signed technical record of what the building was on the day an engineer looked at it. An InspectOS Pre-Purchase Inspection produces one in Portuguese and English within 48 hours of the visit.
A property condition report sets out what an inspector verified, what they found, how serious each finding is, and what it would take to put right. It covers the paper trail and the physical building in one document, because in Portugal those two things diverge more often than buyers expect. The report is not a valuation and it does not tell you what the property is worth. It tells you what you are buying, in enough detail that you can price the work, ask the seller to do it, or decide the deal is not worth signing. Under Article 916.º of the Civil Code a buyer has one year from discovering a hidden defect to give notice, and six months from that notice to bring an action, with a hard cap of five years from the sale. Proving the defect was there before you bought is the part that fails without a dated report.
Table of Contents
- What is a property condition report, and what does it prove?
- Why does the report carry more weight since January 2024?
- What happens before the inspector arrives?
- What does the site visit cover, and with what instruments?
- How are findings graded, and what does a severity rating mean?
- How do buyers use the report before signing the CPCV?
- Frequently Asked Questions
What is a property condition report, and what does it prove?
A property condition report is a dated technical record of a building's documented and physical state, signed by an engineer, and it is the buyer's evidence under Article 342.º of the Civil Code.
The report answers one question in writing: on this date, at this address, what was the condition of this building and its paperwork. Everything else in it follows from that. Findings are described, located, photographed and graded. Repairs are estimated as ranges, not quoted, because an inspector prices risk and a contractor prices work.
Three properties make the document useful rather than decorative.
It is dated. Portuguese hidden-defect law runs on discovery, and the seller's standard answer to a claim is that the buyer knew, or should have known, or that the problem appeared afterwards. A report signed before the deed fixes the state of the building at a moment the seller still owned it.
It is signed by a named engineer registered with the Ordem dos Engenheiros, with the cédula number in the document. That number is publicly verifiable in the OE register, which is what separates a technical report from an opinion.
It is bilingual. A Portuguese court, a Portuguese lawyer and a Portuguese seller read the Portuguese version. A foreign buyer and their bank read the English one. Both say the same thing.
Portugal has no mandatory inspection standard and no licensing regime for the people who carry inspections out, which is covered in full in the guide to property inspection standards in Portugal. The practical consequence for a buyer is that the report's structure, not the label on its cover, is what tells you whether the work behind it was serious.
Why does the report carry more weight since January 2024?
Decreto-Lei n.º 10/2024 removed urban-planning verification from the deed, so no public official now confirms a Portuguese property was legally built before you sign.
Before 2024 the notary checked that the property held a valid urban-planning title, and the ficha técnica da habitação changed hands at the deed. Both requirements went. Since 1 January 2024 the notary authenticates identity, capacity, declared will and the settlement of IMT and Imposto do Selo. Urban-planning legality sits outside the transaction, and the buyer requests the ficha técnica from the Câmara Municipal themselves.
Decreto-Lei n.º 108/2026, de 29 de maio was written to move one piece of that back onto the seller, through a declaration in the transmission contract about the título urbanístico. Its entry into force was deferred to 1 October 2026 by Decreto-Lei n.º 155-B/2026, de 31 de julho, so until 30 September 2026 the RJUE applies in its earlier wording and the DL 10/2024 position above is the one that governs a purchase today. A declaration is not a verification, though. A seller who declares having a title without exhibiting it has satisfied the law and told you nothing you can act on, and the título urbanístico is not the licença de utilização in any case. One says the construction was authorised. The other says the building may be occupied.
So the gap the report fills is unchanged. Nobody in the transaction chain inspects the building. The mediador sells it, the advogado checks title and debts, the notary authenticates the deed, and the bank's valuer prices the security. None of them opens a wall or reads a moisture meter. The full account of that gap sits in the guide to inspecting a property before signing the CPCV.
Scale gives the point some weight. INE recorded 35.8% of Portuguese buildings as needing repair in the Censos 2021, split into 21.8% needing light repair, 9.4% medium and 4.6% deep (INE, Censos 2021). Serious condition problems, the medium and deep categories together, sit at 14% of the stock.
What happens before the inspector arrives?
Desktop verification precedes every site visit, because a document mismatch changes what the inspector looks for once inside the building.
The report opens with paperwork, and the sequence matters. An inspector who reads the file first knows which walls to be suspicious of.
Registry against tax record. The certidão permanente from the Conservatória do Registo Predial and the caderneta predial from the Autoridade Tributária describe the same property in two separate systems, and the two drift. Under Article 28.º-A of the Código do Registo Predial, harmonisation is waived where the area difference against the larger figure stays within 10% for urban property, 20% for rural land without geometric cadastre and 5% for rural land with it. Above those thresholds the difference has to be corrected before a clean sale, through a topographic survey, a Modelo 1 do IMI rectification and then a registry correction. Discovered at CPCV stage, that sequence runs for months and can collapse a financed purchase.
The document spine by construction era. Which papers should exist depends on when the building was built or altered. The licença or autorização de utilização anchors legality for anything built after 7 August 1951, the date of the RGEU under Decreto-Lei n.º 38382. Pre-1951 buildings escape that requirement only if nobody has altered them since, which in Lisbon and Porto is a strong claim to test rather than accept. The ficha técnica da habitação applies from 30 March 2004 under Decreto-Lei n.º 68/2004. Energy certification has applied to Portuguese buildings since the SCE was established in 2006, so any building altered or legalised since then should have a certificate in its file.
Energy certificate status. Not the letter on the front, but whether the certificate is registered, current and issued by an ADENE-qualified perito. Certificates run 10 years for housing and for commercial and service buildings, 8 years for large commercial and service buildings. Selling or letting without a valid one carries a fine of €250 to €3,740 for individuals and €2,500 to €44,890 for companies under Article 35.º n.º 1 of Decreto-Lei n.º 101-D/2020.
Condominium position. The declaração de não dívida ao condomínio has been a mandatory deed document since April 2022 under Article 1424.º-A of the Civil Code, unless the buyer expressly waives it, and waiving it means inheriting the seller's arrears. The assembleia minutes matter more than the declaration for a condition report, because approved-but-unstarted works on the roof or the façade become the new owner's bill.
Municipal file dates. The dates in the Câmara Municipal file tell the inspector whether the building on site matches the building in the process. A terrace enclosed in 2013 that appears in no municipal record is the sort of finding that only exists when someone compares the two.
Gas installation date. Installations executed before 21 August 2018 need their first periodic inspection by 26 August 2028 or on reaching 20 years, whichever comes first, under Decreto-Lei n.º 97/2017 as amended by Lei n.º 59/2018. Installations after that date get theirs at 10 years, then every 5. Non-compliance runs to €3,500 for individuals under Article 29.º, with DGEG notification and supply cut-off after a three-month period. An installation turning 20 in 2027 is already late by the 2028 headline.
What does the site visit cover, and with what instruments?
The visit runs exterior first, then interior, then escalation, and the instruments named in the report are what distinguishes measurement from opinion.
The exterior scan covers roof covering and drainage, façades and renders, balconies and their waterproofing, window and door frames and their seals, visible structure, ground levels against damp-proof provision, boundary walls and any annex or pool. Coastal properties in the Algarve and along the Atlantic front get closer attention on exposed reinforced concrete, where chloride ingress and carbonation attack the steel from two directions at once. LNEC specification E464 sets the exposure classes for that, with XS covering chlorides from seawater and XC covering carbonation, and E465 the performance methodology behind them.
The interior scan covers structure and any cracking, damp in all three of its forms, electrical installation and consumer unit, plumbing and visible drainage, gas installation and its documentation, ventilation, joinery and finishes, and thermal performance at the building envelope.
Naming the instruments is the part most reports skip.
A moisture meter reads what sits behind the surface, which is how a leak inside a wall becomes visible without opening anything.
A cover meter, also called a pachometer, locates reinforcement bars and measures the depth of concrete covering them. Cover depth is what decides how long the steel stays protected.
Phenolphthalein solution shows carbonation depth on a freshly broken concrete surface. Compared against the cover depth from the pachometer, it tells you whether carbonation has already reached the steel or how much protection is left.
Moisture meters give quantified readings rather than a hand on a wall, which matters because damp arguments turn on numbers.
A borescope inspects cavities, ducts and voids through a small opening, and it is used only with the owner's written consent, since it involves drilling.
Escalation thresholds are stated rather than implied. Where a finding passes the point at which a general inspection can characterise it, the report says so and names the specialist study needed: a structural assessment, a materials laboratory analysis, a drainage camera survey, a full electrical test. Crack widths sit here. A crack width is a trigger for escalation and a reason to bring in a structural engineer. It is not a threshold in any Portuguese norm, and any report that presents one as though it were is overstating what the measurement can carry.
How this compares with an RICS Level 2 or Level 3 survey in the UK, an ASHI or InterNACHI inspection in the US, or a Dutch bouwkundige keuring is set out in the guide to international home inspection standards against Portugal.
How are findings graded, and what does a severity rating mean?
A severity rating tells the buyer what to do next, which is the only function of a grading system on a report meant for a live negotiation.
Every finding carries a location, a description, photographs, a severity grade and a recommended action. Grades run from monitoring items through to safety-critical, and the report states what each grade means at the front so a reader is never guessing.
Monitoring items are defects that cost nothing now and might cost something later. A hairline shrinkage crack in a render, a slow-degrading seal. The action is to look again in a year.
Maintenance items are ordinary wear with a known cost and no urgency beyond the ordinary. Repointing, a worn gutter run, tired sanitary silicone.
Material items change the price. Something the buyer would have paid less for had they known, which covers most damp findings, most roof findings and most electrical installations that predate the current rules.
Safety-critical items stop the conversation. A gas installation with no valid boletim, an unearthed circuit, a structural movement with no established cause. The recommended action is not a negotiation position but a specialist study before anything else happens.
The report also records what could not be inspected and why. Locked rooms, a covered floor, a roof with no safe access, a tenanted flat where the occupier refused entry. Those limitations are part of the finding set, because a buyer needs to know where the report is silent.
What the report never states is how often any of these findings turn up. No Portuguese dataset supports a frequency claim at that level, and a report that offers one is describing an impression rather than measuring anything.
How do buyers use the report before signing the CPCV?
The contrato-promessa de compra e venda binds from signature, so the report has to exist before it, not between it and the deed.
Timing decides everything about how useful the report is. Once the CPCV is signed the buyer's sinal is exposed, and withdrawing over a defect discovered afterwards means arguing about whether the defect justified withdrawal, with the deposit sitting on the table.
Buyers use a completed report in four ways.
They renegotiate on price, with the finding list and the repair ranges as the working document. A seller argues with an opinion. A seller has a harder time arguing with a photographed, located, graded finding and a cost band attached to it.
They make the works a condition. The seller completes named repairs before the deed, with the report defining what "completed" means and a re-check confirming it.
They write a condition into the CPCV. An inspection clause or a suspensive condition tied to a finding gives the buyer a defined exit rather than a dispute, provided a Portuguese advogado drafts it.
They walk away. Some findings are not worth negotiating, and the report is the cheapest way to reach that conclusion before the sinal is committed.
There is also the case where the report finds little. That result is worth having in writing too, because it is the document that says the building was checked, by whom, on what date, and against what.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What is a property condition report?
A property condition report is a dated technical document recording the documented and physical state of a building on a given day, produced by an engineer who inspected it. It lists findings by location with photographs, grades each one by severity, estimates repair cost ranges and states what could not be inspected. In Portugal it is the buyer's evidence under Article 342.º/1 of the Civil Code, which places the burden of proving a defect on whoever claims it.
What is a property inspection?
A property inspection is the visual and instrumented examination of a building by a qualified technician, covering structure, damp, electrical and gas installations, plumbing, the building envelope and the legal document set. In Portugal it is voluntary, since no law requires a buyer to inspect what they are purchasing, and no national standard governs how it is carried out. The condition report is the output of that inspection, and it is what the buyer actually buys.
Is a property condition report the same as an RICS Level 1?
No, and the naming causes real confusion for British buyers. In the UK, "condition report" is the label for the RICS Home Survey Level 1, the most basic tier, which is a visual traffic-light rating with no instruments and no repair costings. A Portuguese property condition report as described here is closer in depth to a Level 2 or Level 3: it uses a cover meter, phenolphthalein testing for carbonation depth, moisture meters, hygrometers and a borescope, it costs repairs as ranges, and it states escalation thresholds where a finding needs a specialist study. There is no RICS equivalent in Portugal because there is no mandatory inspection standard and no licensing regime for inspectors, so the structure of the report, not the label on its cover, is what tells you how serious the work behind it was.
Is a mortgage valuation the same as a survey?
No. A mortgage valuation, called an avaliação bancária in Portugal, is commissioned by the bank to price its own security, and the valuer's duty runs to the lender rather than to you. It does not investigate defects, does not use instruments and produces a figure, not a finding list. UK and Irish buyers used to an RICS Level 2 or Level 3 survey should treat the Portuguese bank valuation as the equivalent of a Level 1 at best. The distinction is set out in more depth in the guide to structural and seismic inspection in Portugal.
How long does the report take to arrive?
An InspectOS report reaches the client within 48 hours of the site visit, in Portuguese and English, signed by the inspecting engineer with their Ordem dos Engenheiros cédula number in the document. That turnaround exists because of where the report sits in the transaction. A buyer negotiating before the CPCV usually has days, not weeks.
Conclusion
Portugal moved the risk onto the buyer in January 2024 and has not moved it back. The notary does not check whether the building is legal, the mediador acts for the seller, the bank's valuer prices the loan, and the law gives you one year from discovery to give notice on a hidden defect while requiring you to prove it was there before you bought. A property condition report is the only document in the purchase that answers what the building actually is, on a date, under a signature, in both languages.
Book it before the CPCV, not after. The InspectOS Pre-Purchase Inspection costs a fraction of the sinal at risk once the promissory contract is signed, and the report arrives in 48 hours.
→ Book a Pre-Purchase Inspection · get a quote at inspectos.pt/en/home-inspections
Updated August 2026 | Reviewed by the InspectOS Engineering Team, Ordem dos Engenheiros licensed | InspectOS Portugal
Sources
- Código Civil, Arts. 342.º, 916.º, 917.º, 1424.º-A (PGDL)
- Código do Registo Predial, Art. 28.º-A
- Decreto-Lei n.º 10/2024, de 8 de janeiro
- Decreto-Lei n.º 108/2026, de 29 de maio, e Decreto-Lei n.º 155-B/2026, de 31 de julho
- Decreto-Lei n.º 101-D/2020, Art. 35.º n.º 1
- Decreto-Lei n.º 97/2017, Art. 29.º, as amended by Lei n.º 59/2018
- Decreto-Lei n.º 38382, de 7 de agosto de 1951 (RGEU)
- Decreto-Lei n.º 68/2004
- LNEC specifications E464 and E465
- INE, Censos 2021, "O que nos dizem os Censos sobre a habitação"
- ADENE
- DGEG
- Ordem dos Engenheiros