Abandoned buildings in village cores will get a fresh lease of life once problems between heirs are solved, paving the way for their restoration.

This is the aim of a scheme announced yesterday where multiple heirs will be exempt from paying stamp duty when they transfer the property to one owner to consolidate ownership.

Giving details of the scheme, Environment Minister Mario de Marco said one of the major reasons why buildings remained unused was the fact that they were inherited by a number of people and no decision was ever taken on their use. Such buildings often remained in a derelict state due to disagreements among heirs on the future of the property.

Under the scheme, the heirs would be encouraged to assign the responsibility for the building to one person, he said. This would set the ball rolling for restoration. In so doing, the heirs would be exempt from the five per cent stamp duty on the transfer of their share of the property.

The scheme applies only to 2012 and 2013.

Originally announced in the Budget, the initiative is a follow-up to another scheme involving a 20 per cent refund of restoration expenses, to a maximum of €5,000, for owners of grade I and II scheduled properties and structures in urban conservation areas. That scheme had attracted 800 requests for information but, so far, only 95 applications have been submitted.

Finance Minister Tonio Fenech said that, over the years, the number of abandoned buildings in village cores had increased. Some of these were architectural gems.

He said the government was working on introducing another scheme to encourage the use of these old vacant buildings for residential or commercial purposes.

Mr Fenech said that when such properties were rented out, rather than paying tax at 35 per cent, landlords would pay 15 per cent in the case of commercial use and 10 per cent for residential purposes.