Land in Bali: SHM, HGB, Hak Pakai and what a foreigner can actually hold

The short answer

A foreigner cannot acquire Hak Milik, the freehold certificate, in their own name: the law reserves it for citizens, and the only exceptions are inheritance without a will and the mixing of marital property, after which the right has to be given up within a year. What a foreigner can hold is narrower: Hak Pakai in their own name if they live in Indonesia and meet a price and use test, or HGB and Hak Pakai through an Indonesian company such as a PT PMA. A girik or Letter C is not a certificate at all: it is old evidence, and the plot still has to go through registration before it becomes one.

The four things you will hear on a Bali land title

Ask what right sits under a listing and you will hear one of four answers.

• SHM (Sertifikat Hak Milik): full ownership, the strongest right Indonesian law recognizes, and the only one of the three closed both to a foreigner and to an ordinary Indonesian company.
• HGB (Hak Guna Bangunan): the right to build and own a building on land held by someone else, granted for a term and renewable, open to an Indonesian company.
• Hak Pakai: the right to use land, the one land title a resident foreigner can hold in their own name; for an apartment in a condominium there is a separate title, Hak Milik atas Satuan Rumah Susun.
• Girik, pipil, kekitir and other village tax records made before Government Regulation 10 of 1961 took effect: not a registered right, and not proof on their own that the land can even be sold.

Hak Milik (SHM): the certificate a foreigner cannot hold

Hak Milik is defined by the Agrarian Law (UUPA, Law 5 of 1960) as the hereditary, strongest and fullest right over land in Indonesia, bounded by the social function principle the article itself invokes (Articles 20 and 6). Only Indonesian citizens may hold it; the law allows only legal entities separately designated by the government, and an ordinary company, a PT PMA included, is not on that list (Article 21).

The law leaves one narrow window: if Hak Milik reaches a foreigner or a dual national through unwilled inheritance or the mixing of marital property, or an Indonesian citizen loses citizenship while already holding it, the holder has one year to divest the right. Miss that year and it lapses by law, and the land reverts to the State. This is not a general rule for any foreigner who ends up with Hak Milik: it covers only these named cases (Article 21, paragraphs 3 and 4).

Any deal built to move Hak Milik to a foreigner, a dual national or a non designated company, directly or through a scheme, is void by law: the land reverts to the State, and the money already paid is not recoverable by the buyer (Article 26, paragraph 2).

Hak Guna Bangunan (HGB): the registered right built for a company

Hak Guna Bangunan is the right to put up and own a building on land that is not the holder’s own. The Agrarian Law grants it for up to 30 years, extendable at the holder’s request, considering the building’s condition, by up to 20 more years, and it is transferable (Article 35). The regulation now in force, Government Regulation 18 of 2021, adds a renewal of up to 30 more years over State land and Hak Pengelolaan land, while over land held as Hak Milik it runs for up to 30 years and is renewed only by a fresh grant deed (Article 37, paragraphs 1 and 2).

HGB may be held by an Indonesian citizen or a legal entity established under Indonesian law and domiciled in Indonesia (Agrarian Law, Article 36(1)). The statute never names a PT PMA by that term; a foreign owned PT PMA qualifies because Indonesian company law makes it an Indonesian incorporated entity.

HGB arises over three categories of land: over State land and over Hak Pengelolaan land by a ministerial decision, and over land already held as Hak Milik by a deed drawn up by the authorized land deed official, the PPAT (Government Regulation 18 of 2021, Articles 36 and 38). That second route is how a PT PMA’s HGB is carved out of a Balinese landowner’s freehold: by a PPAT deed, and the right itself comes into being only once the land office registers it (Government Regulation 18 of 2021, Article 39, paragraphs 2 and 3).

One more difference from the notarial lease: a registered HGB certificate can itself be pledged as security for a loan, hak tanggungan (Agrarian Law, Article 39), exactly the kind of encumbrance a buyer checks a certificate for before money moves.

Hak Pakai: the registered right a resident foreigner can hold personally

Hak Pakai is the right to use land or its yield: land the State directly controls or that belongs to someone else, on terms an official sets or on an agreement with the landowner that the law bars from being a lease or a land cultivation agreement; for a term or for as long as the land serves a stated purpose, free of charge, for payment, or for a service (Article 41).

Four kinds of holder qualify: an Indonesian citizen, a foreigner domiciled in Indonesia, an Indonesian legal entity domiciled here, or a foreign legal entity with a representative office in Indonesia (Article 42). The statute says only domiciled in Indonesia and does not name a visa; the exact document is left to a further regulation, so we do not name one here either.

Over State land or Hak Pengelolaan land, Government Regulation 18 of 2021 sets Hak Pakai at up to 30 years, extendable by up to 20 more, and renewable for up to 30 more after that. Over privately held Hak Milik land it runs for up to 30 years and is renewed by a fresh deed with the landowner (Article 52, paragraphs 1 and 3).

A foreign holder needs immigration documents for as long as they hold the right, and otherwise has to hand it over within a year (Article 50); if the owner dies, the home can pass to heirs, but a foreign heir has to hold those same documents themselves (Article 69).

Separately: an Indonesian citizen married to a foreigner has the same land rights as any other citizen, Hak Milik included (Article 70, paragraph 1); that the land is not part of the couple’s joint property is what a notarial property separation agreement proves (paragraph 2), and without it the land runs straight into the mixing of marital property trap above.

The dwellings a foreigner may personally hold are also capped by law: a minimum price, limits on land area and on the number of units, and residential use only (Government Regulation 18 of 2021, Articles 71 to 73). For a landed house, Ministerial Regulation ATR/BPN 18 of 2021 allows one plot per person or family at most, with that plot no larger than 2,000 m2 (Article 186), while the minimum price is set by a separate Ministerial Decision (Article 187, paragraph 2). The currently published Bali thresholds are on our leasehold versus freehold page.

Girik, Letter C and other unregistered land: what it is, and what it is not

Before 1960, Bali land sat under a list of customary and colonial era rights the Agrarian Law names individually, among them milik, yasan, hak atas druwe and hak atas druwe desa. When the law took effect, each one became Hak Milik once the holder met the citizenship test above; otherwise the land converted into Hak Guna Usaha or HGB by its designated use (Conversion Provisions, Article II). The word girik never appears in this clause: it converts the underlying right, not a document.

Girik is the evidence, not the right. Indonesia’s land registration regulation lists the accepted written proof for land derived from one of these old rights, including the village tax records made before Government Regulation 10 of 1961 took effect: petuk Pajak Bumi/landrente, girik, pipil, kekitir and Verponding Indonesia (Government Regulation 24 of 1997, Elucidation to Article 24, paragraph 1, point k). It is documentary evidence toward a first registration: the land office never measured it, and a girik cannot be sold, mortgaged or transferred as if it were a certificate.

Where written evidence is thin or missing, the same regulation allows an alternative: 20 or more consecutive years of open, good faith possession, backed by credible witnesses and unchallenged by the local community during the registration process’s public announcement (Article 24, paragraph 2). That is one evidentiary path inside the same adjudicated procedure, not a shortcut around it, and not a guarantee that a certificate follows.

Land held on a girik alone has not been through this process yet. Its boundaries are not measured, its right type is not fixed, and it does not appear on the government’s own BHUMI map the way a registered parcel does. That is a real category of Bali land, and usually not what a buyer’s brief is written for.

What a PT PMA actually changes

Nothing above changes when the buyer is a company instead of a person, except the door it opens: an Indonesian legal entity can hold HGB or Hak Pakai where an individual foreigner cannot hold Hak Milik at all. What changes is the diligence subject: the land is still checked the same way, but the company itself, its registration, licensing and litigation history, becomes part of what gets verified before money moves. Our developer check article covers this side in detail: the AHU company registry, the OSS licensing record, and the court case systems.

How to read a certificate

• The right type: SHM, HGB or Hak Pakai, and nothing weaker passed off as one of the three.
• The term: an issue date and, for HGB and Hak Pakai, an expiry date, checked against the object being sold.
• The registered holder’s name, matched against who is signing the deal.
• The surat ukur, the official measurement data, matched against the plot on the ground and on the BHUMI map.
• Any encumbrance note: a bank mortgage (hak tanggungan) or a recorded dispute changes the deal entirely.

A certificate is strong evidence of what it records, not absolute proof. If it was validly issued to someone who acquired the land in good faith and genuinely possesses it, a third party with a competing claim can no longer pursue it once 5 years have passed from issuance with neither a written objection filed with the certificate holder and the head of the land office, nor a lawsuit filed in court (Government Regulation 24 of 1997, Article 32, paragraphs 1 and 2). That protects a good faith holder against a late claim, but says nothing about zoning, buildability, or a mortgage on the certificate, which are separate checks.

What to verify at ATR/BPN before anything moves

Our developer check article already covers the free public checks: the BHUMI parcel map, which shows whether a parcel is registered, its boundaries and its right type though never the owner’s name, and the formal check the land deed official (PPAT) runs against the land book before any deed is signed. What this article adds is what those checks are for on the title side: confirming the right type and its term actually match what is being sold, not assuming an SHM listing is really an SHM.

Zoning decides what may be built, before price ever does

A land right says what can be owned. It says nothing about what can be built. That is answered by KKPR, the document confirming a land use conforms to the spatial plan: a Konfirmasi KKPR where a detailed plan already covers the area, a Persetujuan KKPR where it does not (Government Regulation 21 of 2021, Article 1). It sits before the building permit, PBG, covered on our developer check page.

Sea view is a zoning question before it is a design one. The coastal setback is defined by width proportional to the coast’s shape and condition, but never less than 100 meters inland from the point of highest tide (Presidential Regulation 51 of 2016, Article 1).

That 100 meters is a floor, not the answer for a specific beach: the province sets only the guideline for that boundary in its own spatial plan, while the regency fixes the exact line in its own (Article 2, paragraphs 1 and 2). The same logic runs for a rice field view: what sits next to a plot, and what its zone permits, is a local question, not a listing description.

A short buyer’s checklist

1. 01

   Confirm the right type

   SHM, HGB, Hak Pakai or unregistered girik land, matched against what the listing actually says.

2. 02

   Match the term to the sale

   For HGB and Hak Pakai, the certificate’s own expiry date, not just the years quoted in a marketing badge.

3. 03

   Check the entity, if one is involved

   A PT PMA’s registration, licensing and court history, alongside the land itself. Our developer check article walks through this.

4. 04

   Confirm the zoning, not just the view

   KKPR and the relevant coastal or agricultural setback, before price is discussed.

5. 05

   Read the deed with a notary

   Every point above is a question for a licensed Indonesian notary before money moves, and it is the step we coordinate on every object in the catalogue.