The building permit in Serena del Mar: what it authorises and how to check it

The permit is the only document that states what may be built on a property in Serena del Mar, and almost nobody asks for it before signing. When it turns out to be expired, amended or issued for another lot, the project you bought is no longer the one that was authorised.

The licencia de construcción and the licencia de urbanismo (building and subdivision permits) are issued by a curaduría urbana, a private body exercising a public function, and they are checked there by property and by filing number. A permit authorises something specific: an use, a number of units, a height, setbacks and a term. It does not authorise the brochure. It can be expired, it can have been amended after issue, and it can cover the neighbouring lot rather than the one on offer. None of that is visible on a site visit, and all of it can be checked in writing from abroad.

Serena del Mar runs on rules of its own. The land is developed under a plan parcial, a master plan adopted by District decree, and that decree, not a general reading of the POT, the city land-use plan, is what sets uses, land transfers to the city and development obligations for a given lot. So the document to request here is the adopting decree with its drawings; the land-use certificate that serves in a settled neighborhood is not enough. The second difference is a layer of private government that exists nowhere else: the ciudadela, the master community, has its own statutes, an architectural committee and design rules governing façades, fences and renovations, and those rules follow the property on resale, binding a buyer who never negotiated them. The third is the counterparty: you usually deal with the developer or with a fiduciaria, a trust company, administering the stages, and the unit's registry record descends from a very large parent parcel subdivided in phases, so title is verified upward, to the matriz, the parent record, and to the deeds transferring land to the District. Infrastructure was built by the developer: what matters is whether it has been handed over to the utility or is still privately held.

What is specific to Serena del Mar

What to verify, step by step

1. Ask for the complete permit, not the cover page: what it authorises sits in the resolution and the approved drawings.
2. Confirm the registry folio on the permit is the one for the property offered to you in Serena del Mar, not a larger parcel or an adjoining lot.
3. Ask the curaduría urbana whether the permit is current, whether it was extended, and whether it was later amended, and ask for the amending act.
4. Compare the use, the unit count and the height on the permit against the commercial offer; where they differ, ask which of the two is going to be brought into line.
5. Check in addition what Serena del Mar requires in particular, with the authority that imposes it: which stage of the master plan the property sits in, because the development obligations and infrastructure timelines differ between them; which amenities are actually built and which are merely approved, a distinction the sales office does not always draw and how the master-community dues work alongside the individual complex's dues, which are two separate charges that add up.

Mistakes that cost money

• Accepting the permit the seller shows you without checking it at the curaduría. A printed document does not say whether it is still current today.
• Confusing the licencia de urbanismo with the licencia de construcción. The first enables the land, the second the building: it is the mistake of someone buying a developable lot, not of someone buying a finished apartment.
• Treating advanced construction as proof of authorisation. In an already built tower what you compare is what stands against the approved drawings, and that is not done on a site visit.

Frequently asked questions

Can I check the permit for a Serena del Mar property from outside Colombia?

Yes, in writing to the curaduría urbana that issued it, with the filing number or the property address. You do not need to be in Cartagena for that.

What does it mean if the permit has expired?

That the act had a term and the term ran out. What that means for your particular case comes from the curaduría and your own lawyer, not from an article.

Does the permit tell me the height and setbacks for the lot?

Those come from the POT rules for the polygon and are then fixed in the permit. Ask the curaduría for them for that specific property: we publish no figures here.

Where to check it

• Curadurías Urbanas de Cartagena — whether a current building or subdivision permit exists and exactly what it authorises
• Plan de Ordenamiento Territorial de Cartagena — land use, the rules applying to the property and protected land
• Superintendencia de Notariado y Registro — the certificate of title and encumbrances, which is the property's full history
• Ventanilla Única de Registro (VUR) — checking the registry folio online and ordering the certificate without visiting the office
• Cardique, autoridad ambiental del Canal del Dique — environmental permits, water setbacks and mangrove or wetland constraints
• Dirección General Marítima (DIMAR) — public-domain tidal land and concessions over the beach
• Alcaldía Mayor de Cartagena de Indias — property tax, betterment levies and District procedures
• Cartagena de Indias — the rules of the municipality Serena del Mar belongs to

Official bodies. Specific figures are requested there, not copied from a listing.

Updated 2026-11-06