Subdividing land in Ecuador is not drawing lots on a plan and starting to sell. It is a municipal process with documents, studies, percentages of land handed to the municipality and an order that cannot be skipped. This guide gathers the requirements that repeat in almost every canton, with the examples published by the municipalities of Cuenca and Quito, and ends where sales begin: the approved plan.
Who approves and under which laws
The authority is municipal. The Decentralized Autonomous Government (GAD) of the canton where the land sits approves the subdivision and sets the conditions with three rules:
- COOTAD (Organic Code of Territorial Organization, Autonomy and Decentralization): the legal basis cited by subdivision approval procedures. Its article 470 requires that, in any subdivision of urban or urban-expansion land, the owner provides the resulting lots with basic infrastructure and access roads. Its article 424 sets the green and communal areas to be handed over.
- LOOTUGS (Organic Law of Territorial Planning, Land Use and Management): defines subdivision as dividing a property into several "through an authorization of the municipal or metropolitan Decentralized Autonomous Government" (article 4) and establishes that land habilitation only takes effect with that authorization (articles 77 and 78).
- Your canton's ordinance: defines the minimum lot, road widths, what counts as a partition and what counts as an urbanization, deadlines and fees.
Before you start: what your land allows
The first thing is not the plan, it is the municipality's report on the property. Its name changes by city:
- In Cuenca it is the IPRUS (Property Report of Land Use Regulations), which replaced the old Affectation Certificate and Urban License.
- In Quito it is the IRM (Metropolitan Regulation Report).
That report says whether the land is urban, urban expansion or rural, the minimum lot allowed, setbacks, affectations from roads or ravines and the land use. With it you know how many lots really fit and whether the project is viable before paying for studies.
The documents almost every municipality asks for
This is the list for the approval of subdivisions over 3,000 m² from the GAD of Cuenca, published on gob.ec. Other cantons ask for almost the same under other names.
- Preliminary subdivision project review form.
- Approved preliminary project (when the project requires it; see below).
- Property Registry certificate confirming the owner has not changed. In Cuenca it is valid for two months.
- Registered deeds.
- IPRUS or the equivalent regulation report.
- Updated property tax payment receipt.
- Owner's ID card and voting certificate.
- Agreement between the owner and the responsible professional, with signatures notarized.
- Inheritance tax payment or SRI release certificate, and registered effective possession, when the land comes from an inheritance.
- Digital proposal in AutoCAD (DWG or DXF) and DWF, with the professional's signature of responsibility.
- The studies required during the review of the preliminary project.
Preliminary project, final approval and registration
The typical order has four steps. In Cuenca, the preliminary project is mandatory for properties over 3,000 m² or when roads fronting more than two interior lots are planned.
- Preliminary subdivision project. You submit the IPRUS, the topographic survey, the proposal in DWF and PDF with an area table and the studies the review requires. In Cuenca the municipality answers within a maximum of 10 days, or 5 if formal errors had to be corrected. Here the municipality checks that roads, lots and green areas comply with the ordinance.
- Final approval of the subdivision. With the preliminary project approved, the full file from the list above is submitted. The technical services fee is paid and, if the project has roads, it goes through additional stages up to approval by the Cantonal Council.
- Notarization. The approved plans and the municipal resolution are notarized.
- Registration in the Property Registry and cadastre update. Each lot gets its own registration and its own property number. From here on, the lots exist.
In Quito, entering the subdivision or urbanization into the cadastre is free and has published deadlines: 15 working days for urban properties and 30 for rural properties, according to the municipality's procedures portal.
Green and communal areas: what is not for sale
This is the point that changes the business the most and the one most often forgotten when running numbers. The COOTAD, in article 424, requires handing over to the municipality at least 15% of the usable urbanizable area of the land for green and communal areas, and at least half of that surface must be exclusively green areas. Several ordinances allow paying that obligation in money on properties of up to 3,000 m², as that same article provides.
Roads must be added to that 15%. In a typical project, between roads, green areas and facilities, the sellable area ends up well below the total area of the land. Do the math with the approved plan, not the deed, before setting the price per lot.
Which works you will be required to build
Article 470 of the COOTAD requires the owner to provide the resulting properties with basic infrastructure and access roads. What "basic infrastructure" means is specified by each ordinance, but it usually includes opening and gravelling or paving roads, drinking water, sewerage or a treatment system, electricity and street lighting. In Cuenca, if the proposal includes roads, the municipality asks for the infrastructure works studies together with the file.
Some municipalities approve the project and allow selling with the works in progress, under guarantees; others require the works finished before granting the final approval. It is one of the first questions to ask at your GAD.
When you can start selling
The short answer: when each lot has its own registration in the Property Registry. Before that, the buyer cannot receive a deed for their lot because the lot does not exist as a property.
What many developers do during the process is take reservations and sign promises of sale conditioned on approval, with the buyer informed in writing of the project's status. It is legitimate if the truth is told; it is a problem if something that is still a plan is sold as a "ready lot". The COOTAD penalizes unauthorized subdivision and selling nonexistent lots can end in a fraud complaint.
From the approved plan to sales
When the municipality approves the subdivision you are left with two things worth gold for selling: an official plan with every lot numbered and measured, and a closed inventory of what you can offer. That is the moment to turn the plan into a sales tool.
At Royaltor360 we take the approved plan and the drone shot of the land and turn them into an interactive masterplan where each lot shows its status and its price up to date, with a 360 tour and a CRM for the sales team and installment collection. To build it we need exactly what you already have when you leave the municipality: the plan in CAD or PDF and the area table. If you want to see how it would look with your project, book a demo below.
If you are still defining prices, terms and payment methods, continue with how to sell a land subdivision step by step. And if the terms of the process sound different in your country, the land subdivision glossary translates them.
Sources
- GAD Municipal de Cuenca on gob.ec: Approval of subdivisions over 3,000 m² and under 3,000 m², updated October 17, 2025.
- GAD Municipal de Cuenca: Approval of preliminary subdivision projects.
- Municipality of Quito: Entry of subdivision, urbanization or neighborhood (procedures portal).
- Organic Law of Territorial Planning, Land Use and Management, articles 4, 52, 57, 77 and 78.
- COOTAD, articles 424 and 470, as cited in the subdivision ordinance of the canton of Morona.