Zakat on a stalled housing project

A question about zakat on a stalled housing project, in which Jordan's General Iftaa Department answered that flats held for sale bear zakat on trade goods every year, but if completion stalls so that the owner cannot dispose of them, zakat is not due each year and is paid for one year on sale, following the Maliki school. ¹

A participant in a housing project to build and sell an apartment block, which then stalled, with profits to be shared after sale, asked whether zakat is due for the year in which completion stalled. ¹

The Department answered that zakat is in principle due on everything held for trade, citing Surat al-Baqara 2:267 and Mujahid ibn Jabr's explanation that it refers to trade, as in Tafsir Ibn Kathir (1/697); it said that flats held for sale are valued every lunar year and bear zakat on trade goods, citing the hadith of Samura ibn Jundab, narrated by Abu Dawud and al-Bayhaqi, on paying charity from what is prepared for sale. ¹ It said that when sales stagnate or construction stalls, the Malikis hold that zakat is not due every year but only for a single year upon sale, quoting al-Mudawwana al-Kubra (1/309) that someone who buys goods to sell, without regularly turning over his capital in trade, and whose goods fail to sell over several years, owes no zakat on them until he sells, and then pays a single year's zakat. ¹ It concluded that the owner of the flats owes no zakat while completion is stalled such that he cannot dispose of them, and pays one year's zakat when he sells them, following the Maliki school. ¹

Jordan's General Iftaa Department published this fatwa on aliftaa.jo as no. 4420, dated 5 April 2026. ¹ The museum records this text as a historical document attributed to the body or scholar that issued it; it issues no ruling of its own.