Notes on Jurisprudence: The Lease of State Private Property and Its Intuitu Personale Nature

<p>Starting from a case of the jurisprudence of the Cluj Court of Appeal, this study probes into the different aspects of the contract of lease for lands pertaining to the State’s private domain (that is, under the Local Council’s management) through which the lessees, in consideration of certain special criteria, procure the right to employ the land for a fixed term of 99 years, in order to build individual housing units. The fundamental issue that needs to be addressed is whether the lesser can one-sidedly increase the rent due to the fact that a third party buyer, to whom the initial lessee sold the building, failed to comply with the special conditions that led to the initial abatement of rent. It is reasonable to assume that such a decision would be illegal taking into account that the lease contract has a civil nature and not an administrative one (as a result the lesser cannot unilaterally alter the contract) and, on the other hand, the fact that this type of contract does not retain its <em>intuitu personae </em>nature throughout its period of enforcement (considering the provisions under art. 41 of Law no. 50/1991 on construction permits), even though that attribute was essential at the moment when the contract was concluded.