Guide
I paid for it, but the property
is in someone else’s name
Many people abroad bought land or a house in Pakistan and put it in the name of a brother, a father or a friend, because they were not there to sign. Years later the relationship changes and the name on the record is the only thing that counts. This page shows what your position is and what can still be done.
Where this applies This page covers a property in Pakistan that you paid for and that is recorded in another person’s name. The law on property held in another’s name has changed over the years. What applies to your purchase depends on when it was made, and an advocate reads that from the papers.
What this is about
On the record, the owner is the person whose name is written there. That the money came from you is not written anywhere unless you can show it: bank transfers, receipts, the agreement, messages. Without that, the person on the record can sell, mortgage or leave the property to their own heirs, and you are a stranger to it.
Living abroad makes this harder in one way and easier in another. Harder, because you were never on the ground and the papers were handled by the person now holding the property. Easier, because money sent from abroad leaves a trail, and the trail is your evidence.
What has to be in place
What has to be clear before anyone advises you.
What you can show about the money: transfers, receipts, the account it came from.
What was agreed, in writing or in messages, about whose property it was.
What the person on the record has done with it since: sold, mortgaged, built, rented.
Note Your advocate confirms which of these apply to your case.
The documents you will be asked for
The papers an advocate will ask to see first.
- Bank records of the money sent, with dates.
- Any agreement, letter or message that says the property was bought for you.
- The record extract as it stands today, in the other person’s name.
- Your identity document, and a power of attorney for the advocate.
How an advocate helps from where you are
What an advocate does from Pakistan.
- Reads the record and the papers and tells you honestly what your position is under the law that applies to your purchase.
- Tries to get the property transferred to you by agreement, and writes the transfer so that it holds.
- Where there is no agreement, files the case and asks the court to stop any sale while it runs.
- Collects the evidence of the money in the form a court will accept.
What to ask before you agree
- Under the law that applies to my purchase, what is my position, honestly?
- Can a sale be stopped while the case runs?
- What bank records do you need, and in what form?
- What do you need from me, and by when?
- What is your fee, and what is not included in it?
More in Land and property
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Also relevant
Words you will meet
- benami
- A property held in one person’s name that was paid for by another.
- record extract
- The extract from the land record that shows the owner today.
- stay order
- A court order that stops a sale or transfer while a case runs.
Written
11 September 2026
Pakistan.