Evicting an unlawful occupier of your home can be time consuming, but you must follow the correct process for everything to be above board when it comes to the law. Residential evictions in South Africa must comply with the Prevention of Illegal Eviction from and Unlawful Occupation of Land Act No. 19 of 1998 (PIE Act). Below are the steps you need to follow.
Step1: Send an eviction notice to the occupants. This gives them 30 days to vacate the premises. It can be served by a Sheriff of the Court, by hand to the occupant at the property in question or by registered post.
Step 2: A court application for eviction must be made. This includes a ‘notice of motion’ document and a founding affidavit from the owner that describes the situation. The Sheriff will then serve this application on the unlawful occupants and the relevant municipality, detailing the court dates and dates when documents must be filed by if they want to defend their case.
Step 3: You go to court for the hearing of the eviction application, where it will be decided whether or not to grant you the eviction order. If granted, the court will give the occupants a time by which they need to be out of the property. If they do not leave within this time, the
Sheriff is authorised to remove the occupants and all belongings from the property – and the occupants (not the owner) will have to pay for the Sheriff’s services.
Tips:
- The PIE Act is there to protect property owners and tenants.
- Eviction requires a specific process, and if you don’t follow this process you could find yourself in trouble with the law should the “unlawful occupier” take legal action against you for not following the right processes.
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* This is only basic advice and cannot be relied on solely. Names have been changed to protect identity.