Recognizing the deed as invalid is one of the ways to protect the violated right, which is provided for by the Civil and Economic Codes of Ukraine. However, the Supreme Court noted that in certain cases, filing a lawsuit to declare the deed invalid may conflict with the tasks of civil and commercial justice.
In particular, when a person files such a lawsuit not for the purpose of restoring his violated right or interest through restitution (return to the state that existed before the violation), but for the purpose of creating grounds for further filing another lawsuit or for creating a prejudicial circumstance or evidence for another court proceeding .
Also, it can be seen from judicial practice that if certain actions have already been taken for the performance of the contested deed, such as the payment of funds/transfer of property, in itself the satisfaction of the claims for declaring the deed invalid is not sufficient for the effective protection of the right (that is, it does not restore property rights of the plaintiff). In view of this, the Supreme Court noted that together with the request to declare the deed invalid, it is necessary to declare a request for the recovery of the paid funds/return of the transferred property from the possession of the defendant.
According to the conclusions of the Supreme Court, this is explained by the fact that in the case of filing a lawsuit for the invalidation of an executed/partially executed contract without stating the requirement to apply the consequences of the invalidity of the deed, the need for the courts to investigate the consequences of declaring the contract invalid for the plaintiff and the need to find out how the plaintiff's rights will be restored, in particular, the circumstances of the possibility of restitution, the possibility of the defendant returning funds, the obligation to compensate the other party for the transaction's value or damages. And, as a result, such an appeal is an independent basis for the rejection of the claim in connection with the choice of an ineffective way of protecting rights.
In order to prevent claims from being refused, do not delay and contact specialists who will provide you with professional advice and prepare a claim taking into account all the necessary requirements of legislation and court practice.
Violetta Fedorko, lawyer at Dynasty Law & Investment
