The Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic decided on the matter of payment of real estate tax in the disputed territory between the municipality of Sokoľany and the city of Košice-Šaca

On October 29, 2025, the Supreme Administrative Court of the Slovak Republic, by judgment case file no. 3Sfk/49/2024, annulled the judgment of the Administrative Court in Košice and returned the matter to it for further proceedings. It was a proceeding related to the assessment of real estate tax, which was in the territory, in relation to which the registration of the cadastral territory to which it belongs was changed. The Court of Cassation stated that although the situation as of January 1 of the tax period is decisive for the assessment of real estate tax, the annulment of the decision of the Constitutional Court of the Slovak Republic, in which a suspension of enforceability was granted, is undoubtedly a circumstance that the tax authorities must consider.

The decision of the Supreme Court of the Slovak Republic case file no. 4Sžr/3/2019 from November 4, 2020, the change during the cadastral border between the municipality of Sokoľany and the city of Košice-Šaca became final, so that the entrepreneur’s property became part of the cadastral territory of the municipality of Sokoľany. The municipality of Sokoľany asked the businessman to submit a tax return for real estate tax for the year 2021, then in March 2021 he was charged real estate tax, and the businessman paid it in the months of March, May and September 2021. On June 29, 2021, the Constitutional Court issued a resolution suspending the enforceability of the judgment of the Supreme Court regarding the jurisdiction of the given cadastral territory and subsequently cancelled it in October 2021. The cadastral border between the village of Sokoľany and the city of Košice was changed so that the real estate once again belonged to the cadastral territory of the city of Košice – part of Šaca. Therefore, in January 2023, the city of Košice assessed real estate tax on the businessman for the tax period of 2021, and the defendant confirmed this decision. The administrative court annulled the decisions of the financial administration authorities and returned the matter to them for further proceedings. He believed that the determination of the local and subject- matter jurisdiction of the local tax administrator and its assessment, the decisive facts are known as of January 1, 2021. In this period, although according to the extract from the real estate cadastre, they belonged to the cadastre of the city of Košice, but the administrative court considered the judgment of the supreme court to be a fact that disproved this information.

According to the Court of Cassation, the determination of which tax administrator is responsible for the administration of real estate tax is of great importance not only from the point of view of procedural costs, but it also has an impact on the income side of individual municipalities. He confirmed that the administration of real estate tax is carried out by the municipality in whose cadastral territory the real estate is located on January 1 of the tax period, according to the data contained in the real estate cadastre. Real estate cadastre data are granted a presumption of bindingness and reliability, therefore it is necessary to rely on them until evidence to the contrary is presented. The Court of Cassation stated that to dispute the data of the real estate cadastre, relevant evidence to the contrary must be presented, which in itself and without any doubt proves other facts necessary for determining the local and material jurisdiction of the tax administrator.

The local court stated that the administrative court made a mistake when it did not consider the finding of the Constitutional Court in decision case file no. II. ÚS 342/2021 from October 28, 2021 (on the annulment of the decision of the Supreme Court case file no. 4Sžr/3/2019 from November 4, 2020) and the following resolution on the postponement of execution dated June 29, 2021. In the opinion of the Court of Cassation, these decisions cause legal effects ex tunc ( with retroactive effect) and on the decision of the Supreme Court case file no. 4Sžr/3/2019 from November 4, 2020 was therefore viewed at the time of the decision of the city of Košice as the tax administrator as if it had not been issued at all (did not exist). At the same time, the Court of Cassation, from the point of view of the effects of the findings of the Constitutional Court, points out the difference in the situation in the case of “derogatory findings” in proceedings under Art. 125 paragraph 1 of the Constitution of the Slovak Republic (on the basis of Article 125, paragraphs 3 and 6 of the Constitution, these effects are always directed to the future “ex nunc”) and proceedings on complaints by natural and legal persons pursuant to Art. 127 paragraph 1 of the Constitution. In proceedings under Art. 127 paragraph 1 of the Constitution (individual complaints), according to the cassation, the situation is different and follows from Art. 127 paragraph 2, where if “the Constitutional Court upholds the complaint, it will declare in its decision that the rights or freedoms according to paragraph 1 were violated by a valid decision, measure, or other intervention, and cancel such decision, measure, or other intervention. If the violation of rights or freedoms according to paragraph 1 was caused by inactiveness, the Constitutional Court can order that the person who violated these rights or freedoms take action in the matter.” The Constitutional Court will provide protection to the violated right of the complainant with an authoritative statement; with retroactive effect (ex tunc) with the fact that in the relevant time period in the past the law was violated, and the verdict was also based on this fact.

These facts should have been taken into consideration and were taken into account by the financial administration authorities as well, since Section 74 paragraph 2 of the Tax Code allows them to also take into account new facts (in this case, the finding of the Constitutional Court) that could influence the operative part of the decision, both in favour and against the appellant. The Financial Directorate should have complexly assessed, and it did assess and reflect, all the facts that relate to the determination of the local and material jurisdiction of the tax administrator for the administration of real estate taxes as of January 1 of the tax period (in this case, January 1, 2021).

 The Court of Cassation concluded that it is not possible to expect the tax subject to separately investigate the legal status on the basis of which the municipality’s area Sokoľany was sent to him, but on the other hand, in order to maintain legal certainty, it is not possible for two different tax administrators to tax the same subject of tax and for both of them to require the taxpayer to remit the same tax for the benefit of each of them for the identical subject of tax in the same tax period.

For all mentioned before reasons, the Court of Cassation annulled the judgment of the administrative court and returned the matter to it for further proceedings.

This decision was adopted by the Panel of the Supreme Administrative Court unanimously, no legal remedy is allowed against this decision.

The Panel No. 3 of the Supreme Administrative Court, composed of President of the Panel JUDr. Michal Dzurdzík, PhD. and judgescon JUDr. Katarína Benczová and JUDr. Zuzana Šabová, PhD.