The church sold the land with the inhabitants for PLN 421 million. Fate wanders

The Maltańskie estate in Poznań was established over 100 years ago, and on the hundredth anniversary of the lease of plots to the poorest, their residents are looking for a new place to live.

The Church’s transaction with JHM Development, a member of the listed Mirbud group, opens the way to the construction of approximately 2,000 sq m. apartments, but there are approximately 637 people permanently registered in the estate and they feel cheated.

The Church gave and took away, and whoever gives and takes away…

The plots on Lake Malta, near the ZOO and the water park, which had been the property of the Order of the Knights of Malta for centuries, were leased to the Association of Allotment Garden Societies in the 1930s so that the poorest could grow vegetables there. Until 1994, they operated as Employee Allotment Gardens “Freedom”. In the 1980s, Prelate Kazimierz Królak, parish priest of St. Jan Jerozolimski Outside the Walls brought a case to court to confirm the ownership of this area as parish land. In the case of 260 plots out of 300, the court issued a decision favorable to the parish. In 1988, it was entered as the owner in the land and mortgage register.

In 1994, the Poznań City Hall created the housing estate as an auxiliary unit of the city. In 2004, the city of Poznań adopted the current spatial development plan for this place, and the area is intended for multi-family housing. In 2010, the Maltańskie Housing Estate was incorporated into the Warszawskie-Pomet-Maltańskie local government housing estate.

– This property consists of 287 leased plots, each of the buildings on them is illegal. We live in a situation where they were created without consents and permits. It should be emphasized that the Church is not a typical property owner – for many years the tenants paid rent ranging from PLN 50 to PLN 70 per month and this is still the case today – said Dr. Jacek Masiota, a lawyer from the Masiota i Wspólnicy law firm representing Komandoria, in Głos Wielkopolski in 2025.

Registration and real estate tax

Residents of the estate believe that the city legalized their presence because it not only registered them permanently, but also paid property tax. They also tried to settle their situation for years – they wanted to buy the land from the Church, but the transaction failed.

– The inhabitants of the Maltańskie Housing Estate were payers of real estate tax as independent owners. Intrinsic possession is, for example, a situation in which a person resides in real estate without legal title to it. He is not its owner, but he actually owns and manages it, informed Joanna Żabierek, spokeswoman for the City Hall, in the Poznań press. When the city realized that the tax was incorrectly calculated, it started giving money back to residents. Some say they received all of it, others say they received part of it.

From the very beginning, Komandoria’s plan assumed that residents of the estate would start submitting applications to the city for municipal or social housing or a place in Social Housing Associations. – There is no way to implement any investments until the social problem is solved – declared in April 2024 the parish priest of St. Jan Jerozolimski, priest Paweł Deskur.

Poznań is looking for available apartments

By the time the agreement was signed, 82 plots had been taken over by the Church after the lease agreements expired. Among them, 15 are undeveloped plots, and 42 have been designated for demolition or have already been demolished, local media reported. As part of cooperation with the city, 58 families obtained rights to municipal premises. Of these, 27 families have already received the keys, 29 are waiting for allocation, and one family that refused to accept the premises is waiting to be removed from the list. Additionally, four people were on the TBS list, and one family received a positive decision in the “Mieszkanie dla seniora” program.

The estate’s manager told the media that under the “apartments for renovation” program, he covers the costs of adapting the premises allocated to 11 families. An agreement was also signed in which the municipal company of the Municipal Housing Resources Board declared the transfer of 50 premises. The apartments will be handed over successively until 2030, a maximum of 20 per year. According to Łukasz Kubiak, one contract has already been signed, 10 premises are being renovated, and another six are waiting for approval. People who do not want to move out will be charged fees for non-contractual use of the area – between PLN 500 and 800 per month.

Residents who are still in conflict with the Church claim that the image of the situation presented publicly was created by a PR agency and does not correspond to reality.

– We do not plan to start construction in 2026 – Mirbud spokesman Paweł Bruger told Wprost.pl. He also answered a question about the future of the residents of Osiedle Maltańskie: – We will take steps to ensure that they can be relocated within the appropriate time horizon. These activities will be carried out taking into account the individual situation of each person and in the light of applicable law. In this respect, we will continue cooperation with the current property management, who knows the problems and legal situation of people staying in this area. The revitalization process of this area will be carried out gradually, in a responsible manner, taking into account both the need for residents to move and the urban planning assumptions for this area.