How long does the dissolution / settlement of BSM take?

From the question you have formulated, it is not entirely clear to us which method of settling the undivided co-ownership (BSM) you have in mind.

If you are interested in settling the undivided co-ownership as promptly as possible, we recommend reaching an agreement with your former husband. The only thing you would need to do is draw up an agreement on the settlement of the undivided co-ownership, the content of which will consist of the division of the property that belonged to the undivided co-ownership of the spouses. The agreement must be in writing only if a piece of real estate is the subject of the settlement. Otherwise, you are merely obliged to issue a written confirmation regarding the content of the settlement. From our side, we can draft the settlement agreement for you within a few days, meaning the settlement can be taken care of very quickly.

If real estate is the subject of the settlement, it is necessary to send the agreement to the relevant land registry (kataster nehnuteľností). The transfer of real estate from the BSM to one of the spouses takes 30 days; in the case of an expedited application, the time limit is cut in half (to 15 days).

The second method to settle the undivided co-ownership of spouses is by filing a lawsuit for the settlement of the undivided co-ownership with the court. This method of settlement is more time-consuming, and the speed with which your matter is handled will depend on the speed of the acting court and its workload. For this reason, it is not possible to determine exactly how long the settlement of the undivided co-ownership will take. As a rule, however, you must expect that it will take several months to years.

Another option for settlement is to wait for the legal presumption (fiction) of settlement, which occurs after 3 years if the former spouses have not settled their property. In this case:

• All movable things remain in the ownership of the spouse who uses them for their own needs, the needs of their family, or the household.

• Real estate and movable things that are not exclusively used by either spouse automatically become the subject of tenancy in common (podielové spoluvlastníctvo), with both shares being equal (1/2).

The settlement of the BSM through judicial means takes several months longer than a settlement by a written agreement between the spouses. However, it is not possible to give an unambiguous answer as to how long the court proceedings regarding the settlement of the BSM will last. This is because the law does not establish a maximum time limit within which the settlement of the BSM must be carried out.

Everything depends on which court will be locally competent to decide on the matter in your case. If the petition is addressed to a court in a city where the case burden is heavier, the settlement can take several months longer.

The provisions of Section 13 et seq. of Act No. 160/2015 Coll., the Civil Dispute Procedure Code, as amended (hereinafter referred to as the “Civil Dispute Procedure Code”), regulate the competence of the court to hear a matter. In the event of filing a lawsuit for the settlement of undivided co-ownership, the competent court is determined as follows: „The general court of the defendant is locally competent for proceedings in the first instance, unless established otherwise. The general court of a natural person is the court in whose district the natural person has their permanent residence address.“ This means that the lawsuit for the settlement of the BSM must be filed with the court in whose district the permanent residence of the other spouse is located.

After the delivery of the petition for the settlement of the BSM to the court, the court will deliver it to the other party for a statement. Only after the delivery of the statement from the other party (who did not file the petition) is the summons to the hearing typically delivered. The scheduling of the first hearing in the matter can thus take two to three months from the filing of the lawsuit with the court. We recommend specifying the parties’ addresses as precisely as possible in the petition so that the court is able to deliver documents to the parties on the first attempt. A prolongation can occur if the other ex-spouse does not pick up their mail.

The length of the hearing also depends on whether you and your ex-spouse are able to agree, at least in part, on certain items of property (although please note that it is not possible to combine a BSM settlement agreement with a settlement by a court). If an expert witness enters the proceedings for the purpose of property valuation, the length can be extended by several months.

Crucial Warning: > Based on the information you provided that you divorced in September 2018, a significant statutory deadline has already passed. A lawsuit for the settlement of the BSM must be filed within 3 years from the dissolution of the BSM (which occurs when the divorce decree becomes final and effective).

Since it is now 2026, more than 3 years have passed since your divorce. Therefore, the legal presumption (fiction) of settlement under Section 149 (4) of the Civil Code has already taken effect by operation of law. This means that your real estate and any remaining joint liabilities have automatically transitioned into tenancy in common (podielové spoluvlastníctvo) in equal $1/2$ shares. You can no longer file a standard lawsuit for the settlement of the BSM; instead, you must now seek the dissolution and settlement of the tenancy in common.

Dissolution of BSM and Debts

Debts (liabilities) are part of the BSM just like property (assets). Within the meaning of Section 145 (2) of Act No. 40/1964 Coll., the Civil Code (hereinafter referred to as the “OZ”), „both spouses are jointly and severally entitled and obliged by legal acts concerning common things.“ This means that if a debt arises for even just one of the spouses during the marriage, both spouses will be liable for it (with their property).

This follows from the provision of Section 147 (1) of the OZ, according to which „the claim of a creditor of only one of the spouses, which arose during the marriage, may also be satisfied during the execution of a decision from property belonging to the undivided co-ownership of spouses.“ During an execution (exekúcia), property belonging exclusively to the spouse who incurred the debt will be used preferentially; however, in the event that this is insufficient, the bailiff can also target the common property belonging to the BSM.

The Civil Code offers, in principle, two means of protecting the BSM from an execution conducted against one of the spouses:

1. Agreement to restrict the scope of the BSM according to Section 143a of the OZ, by which the spouses agree that certain things that would otherwise fall into the BSM will be in their exclusive ownership. However, this agreement cannot remove things that already belong to it from the BSM regime, i.e., things acquired before the effective date of the agreement. The agreement to restrict the scope of the BSM does not have retroactive effects; it can only apply to property that is yet to be acquired (or debts yet to be incurred) in the future.

2. The right of a spouse to demand the dissolution of the BSM in the event that the other spouse has obtained a business license (Section 148a (2) of the OZ). In such a case, the court has an obligation, not just an option, to dissolve the BSM.

The debts of one of the spouses can also be taken into account within a BSM settlement. According to the principle of settlement expressed in Section 150 of the OZ, „each spouse is entitled to request reimbursement for what they expended from their own funds on the common property, and is obliged to compensate for what was expended from the common property on their other property.“ If one of the spouses had to cover their personal debts using property belonging to the BSM, it can be assumed that the court would take this fact into account during a settlement.