Acing Property
Author:
Medill, Colleen E.
Edition:
3rd
Copyright Date:
2022
21 chapters
have results for acing property law
Chapter 3. Present and Future Interests 140 results (showing 5 best matches)
- Dealing with ambiguous exam language concerning present and future interests causes many students to lose their concentration (in other words, they blow it). The entire first year of law school is about learning to recognize and debate the multiple possible outcomes for a given legal issue. Yet, when faced with ambiguous future interest grant language on a first-year Property exam, most of the class will discuss only one possible interpretation of the grant’s language. The students who ace their Property exam approach ambiguous grant language just like any other garden-variety legal issue on a law school exam. They:
- Some of the illustrations below tell you to assume certain facts about who is alive and who is dead “at the time the grant is made.” The grant is made when it becomes effective to transfer a property interest. For property rights transferred by a will (a “devise”), the grant becomes effective at the time of the death of the testator O. For property rights created by inter vivos transfer (a transfer made by the grantor O while O is still alive), the grant becomes effective when the transfer becomes irrevocable, either under the property law of gifts or under the law of contracts in the case of a sale.
- In each of the above examples, the grantor O has retained present possession of the property. B’s entitlement to the property depends on whether the stated event ever occurs in the future. At common law, B has a springing EI. The common law did not have a special name for O’s retained present interest. O’s retained present interest is simply described as a FSA that is “subject to” a springing EI held by B.
- of B’s children born after A’s death (not just the firstborn B1) will be entitled to share in ownership of the property. The rationale for this special exception is that if the law is going to be inconvenienced by waiting for the first child of B to be born, then there is little additional harm in waiting to vest ownership of the property until all of B’s children are born. Once B dies, present ownership will vest in all of B’s children. Until B dies, however, O will retain present possession of the property.
- Under the common law rule, a conveyance by O “to A” granted only a LE to A, not a FSA. For O to convey a FSA to A, the magical words of limitation (“and his heirs,” “and her heirs,” or “and their heirs”) had to be added. Modern statutes create a rebuttable presumption that if O owns a FSA in the property and grants the property “to A,” then O conveyed a FSA to A (thereby making the cumbersome “and his/her/their heirs” language unnecessary).
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Chapter 4. The Rule Against Perpetuities 51 results (showing 5 best matches)
- any students punt learning the Rule Against Perpetuities (“RAP”) and still pass Property. But it is unlikely you will ace Property without being able to perform a RAP analysis.
- If the future interest has not RAP-vested within the perpetuities period, under these modern approaches the court will reform the grant language. In reforming the grant language (unlike the common law’s striking approach), the court will consider the grantor’s intent. To the extent possible, the court will rewrite the grant to RAP-vest the future interest while still approximating the grantor’s intent for the disposition of the property.
- Your client is a private developer who would like to buy 1,200 acres of vacant land from the current owner, Tom Smith. The land is located in the State of Bliss. The State of Bliss has adopted the traditional common law rules on matters involving real property. The client plans to develop the vacant land as a $20 million exclusive housing development. You have been retained to advise the client concerning the state of the title to the 1,200 acres and to investigate whether there are any title obstacles to the client’s proposed housing development.
- Once you have studied the real estate transactions part of your Property course, come back to Problem 4.4 and let your imagination run wild. After studying the rules unique to real property transactions, you will understand how the sections of your Property course on present and future interests and the RAP intersect with the rules for buying and selling real property, the concept of marketable title and deed warranties, and the concept of a recorded chain of title to the real estate. Problem 4.4 presents a basic fact pattern that you can use to add layers of additional imaginary facts, and then expand your analysis to practice applying the unique rules for real property transactions.
- S. Alexander, and Michael H. Schill, Property
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Chapter 2. Gifts 48 results (showing 5 best matches)
- If you are reading this book toward the end of your Property course, you may be thinking, “I have studied real estate transactions, recording acts, and deed covenants, and I do not think I could have made those connections on the fly during the exam.” Perhaps you might have, but why leave it to chance? The student who aces Property identifies these types of connections while studying
- If you are reading this book at the beginning of your Property course, you may be thinking, “I don’t understand this very well.” Of course not! You have not yet learned about real estate transactions, the recording act system, BFPs, or deed covenants. These areas of Property law usually are not covered until much later in your Property course. But you are now aware of how these later topics may fit together with the law of gifts. Once you study this more advanced material in class, you can focus on these points of intersection with the law of gifts.
- traditional common law rule
- Common Law Rule on Void Testamentary Gifts.
- he concept of a gift arises in three distinct areas of the first-year Property course. For many Property students, the concept is introduced through gifts of tangible personal property. Gifts arise again in the study of partial ownership interests in property, where a donee may receive a present, a future, or a co-ownership interest in the gifted property. Finally, gifts of real property involve unique issues. This chapter addresses the concept of a gift in all three areas.
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Introduction 8 results (showing 5 best matches)
Chapter 5. Co-Ownership 160 results (showing 5 best matches)
- Determining Marital Property.
- Determine if the property is held as community property or in a common law form of co-ownership using Part A.1 of the Checklist below. If the property is not community property, proceed to Part A.2 of the Checklist to determine the specific type of common law coownership, and to Part B to analyze how subsequent events may affect title to the property. If the property is community property, proceed to Part C to analyze how subsequent events may affect title to the property.
- The potential for a windfall to the surviving spouse arises because longtime community property state residents who later change their domicile to a common law state are likely to have accumulated significant wealth as community property. Merely changing the state of domicile from a community property state to a common law state does change the presumed ownership of these assets as community property. Absent an agreement by the couple to transmute, these assets retain their character as community property even though the domicile of the couple has changed to a common law state.
- Modern rule jurisdictions may not strictly enforce the common law requirements of the four unities and may prefer to focus instead on the intent of the grantor. In a modern rule jurisdiction, A’s conveyance of the property from sole ownership by A “to A and B, as joint tenants with right of survivorship” creates a JTWROS. At common law, such a conveyance would fail to create a JTWROS because it would fail the unities of time and title. The common law would view the grantor A as acquiring his original interest in the property at an earlier time and through a different instrument than B did. The common law would not permit the owner of property (here, A) to be both the grantor and a grantee of the same property. Because A already owned the property, the common law treated this conveyance as a transfer of a one-half TIC share from A to B.
- Common Law Form of Ownership.
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Chapter 10. Takings 106 results (showing 5 best matches)
- Nuisance law is often covered in Torts rather than in the first-year Property course. If, however, your Property professor covers nuisance law in detail, beware a zoning ordinance, environmental law, or other regulation that prohibits or restricts an owner’s use based on public health and safety concerns, and thereby decreases the economic value of the property. Such an ordinance or regulation presents the opportunity to test both a nuisance law issue and a regulatory taking issue in a single essay question.
- Reasonableness is an objective standard. Every person is presumed to know and understand the law. Therefore, a post-enactment purchaser who is subjectively ignorant of the impact of a pre-existing regulation on the property cannot claim to have a higher level of DIBE concerning the property. In evaluating the reasonableness of the property owner’s DIBE, further noted that background principles of state law based on “common, shared understandings of permissible limitations derived from a For example, reasonable DIBE would not include the right to engage in an activity on the property or use the property in a way that would violate the common law of nuisance.
- State law may award compensation to a property owner whose business is lost or disrupted by the taking. State law also may award compensation to a tenant on the property (as opposed to the fee title owner) who is displaced by the taking. These types of damages are
- On the other hand, property owners could attempt to manipulate the law of regulatory takings through severing their properties. For example, after the enactment of the regulation, should an owner be permitted to transfer or rearrange legal title to the property in such a manner as to eliminate all economically beneficial use of part of the property, and then argue that the regulation works a categorical taking of the severed part under
- Subjective ignorance of the law is no excuse. Reasonable DIBE do not include the right to use the property in such a way as to violate a background principle of law, such as nuisance law.
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Chapter 9. Easements, Profits, Real Covenants, and Equitable Servitudes 111 results (showing 5 best matches)
- A bona fide purchaser of a parcel burdened by an express easement or a profit who lacks notice of the easement or profit can take the property free of the burden only if the requirements of the jurisdiction’s recording act are satisfied. A bona fide purchaser always takes property subject to the burden of an easement that arises by operation of law because implied-by-law easements are outside the protection provided by a recording act.
- Express easements and profits are illustrations of rights that are protected by a property rule —a voluntary transfer of property rights between private parties. Normally, an involuntary (“forced”) transfer of a property right from the owner to someone else is protected by a liability rule, which requires that the owner must be compensated for the loss of the property right by a judicial award of damages. Easements that arise by operation of law are an exception to the liability rule because no compensation is due to the owner of the parcel that becomes burdened by an easement right that arises by operation of law.
- Real covenants and equitable servitudes arose as a special type of property right due to the inherent limitations of Contracts law. Under the common law, contractual promises concerning restrictions on land use by two or more adjacent landowners were not enforceable against subsequent owners because there was no direct legal relationship (no “privity” of contract) between the original adjacent landowners and the successor owners.
- The modern approach permitting enforcement of a contract by a third-party beneficiary did not come into being until long after the real property law of covenants and servitudes was developed. Moreover, even modern Contracts law only permits the benefit to the promisee to run to a third-party, not the burden of the promisor.
- The English courts, and later the American courts, responded to these privately created landowner agreements by recognizing a new type of property right—the . A real covenant is enforceable at law through a claim for damages for breach of the promises (the “covenants”) in the land use agreement. For the common law, the real covenant was a radical development because recognizing this property right allowed one party, who may not have been a party to the original landowners’ agreement, to recover damages for breach from another party, who also may not have been a party to the original landowners’ agreement.
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Chapter 12. Practice Exam #1 24 results (showing 5 best matches)
- The State of Peace follows the majority common law rule on all matters of real property law and the modern rule for the conveyance of a fee simple absolute. The recording statue adopted by the State of Peace is a notice statue, and the statute of limitations for breach of deed covenants is ten years. Cass County has only a grantor-grantee index for recording interests in real property.
- Governing Law.
- Buyer’s maximum recovery from Seller is $1 million, plus prejudgment interest, which is not nearly enough to cover the loss of a $2 million property plus the costs of litigation. Therefore, Buyer will want to sue prior grantors in the chain of title for breach of the future covenants of warranty and quiet enjoyment. Buyer cannot sue prior grantors for a breach of present covenants because under the common law rule present covenants do not run to more remote grantees.
- The traditional common law rule is that the burden of a real covenant will not run if the benefit is in gross. Subtenant will argue that the benefit of the covenant is personal to Landlord, who otherwise would have to clear the parking lot to service tenants in Landlord’s adjacent retail building. A court is likely to find, however, that the burden of the snow removal covenant is appurtenant to land for two reasons. First, the benefitted land does not have to be the leased property itself. Here, the benefit is to Landlord’s
- Hank Hilder acquired his title to the Big Red Estate in 1998 as an inter vivos gift from his father, Oscar Hilder. Oscar conveyed the Big Red Estate to his son by a property recorded general warranty deed, which read as follows:
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Chapter 1. Captured and Found Property 88 results (showing 5 best matches)
- If the court characterizes the property as , the law assumes that the true owner placed the item in a particular spot. Eventually (so the law assumes), the forgetful true owner will remember where the found property was placed and will return to retrieve it. For mislaid property, courts favor leaving possession of the property with the owner of the locus where the item was found over awarding possession to the finder.
- If the court characterizes the property as , the law assumes that the true owner did intentionally place the item in a particular spot, but rather was careless and accidentally lost the item. If the property was lost accidentally (so the law assumes), the true owner will not be able to remember and retrieve the item. For lost property, the courts struggle with whether to award the lost property to the owner of the locus or to the finder of the lost item. Here, judicial decisions tend to rely heavily on the conduct of the finder and whether that conduct in finding the item involved a trespass on privately owned land.
- any students begin Property law by studying cases involving captured or found items of tangible personal property. Captured property has no original or true owner—it typically consists of things found in nature, such as wild animals, minerals, and other natural resources. In contrast, found property is assumed to have had a prior owner, who either lost, mislaid or abandoned the item. The underlying theme of captured and found property cases is the concept of possession, and how possession determines who has the superior legal right to the captured or found property.
- Generally, the first two elements of a conversion claim are undisputed. Proof of the third element often turns on whether the plaintiff possessed the disputed property before the defendant did. For captured property (which has no original owner), prior possession of the disputed property gives the plaintiff the superior legal right to the property under the fundamental Property law rule of
- Defendant No Longer Possesses the Converted Property.
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About the Author 2 results
- She is a four-time winner of the student-selected Outstanding Teacher Award at the University of Nebraska College of Law and the recipient of the Outstanding Teaching and Instructional Creativity Award, the highest honor for teaching in the University of Nebraska system. Professor Medill is the author of two other Property-related books.
- lawlawlawbecoming a law school professor.
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Title Page 4 results
Acing 1 result
Copyright Page 1 result
Chapter 7. Real Estate Transactions 127 results (showing 5 best matches)
- Current Easements Burdening the Property.
- Potential Violations of Law Making Seller’s Title Unmarketable.
- Jurisdictions are divided concerning whether the seller has an affirmative duty to disclose latent (hidden) material defects that are known to the seller and are not discoverable by the buyer upon a reasonable inspection. Under the common law (minority) rule of caveat emptor, the seller has no duty to disclose hidden defects that are known to the seller. The modern (majority) rule is that the seller has an affirmative duty to disclose material latent defects in the property that are known to the seller and are not discoverable by the buyer upon a reasonable inspection. In a modern rule jurisdiction, the majority rule is that the seller has this affirmative duty of disclosure even if the sales contract provides that the buyer takes the property “as is.” Disputes concerning the physical condition of the property usually focus on whether each of the necessary elements for the buyer’s nondisclosure claim are satisfied, or whether the seller had a duty to disclose an off-site condition...
- The seller’s title will be unmarketable if the property is subject to an unreasonable risk of litigation. Normally, the mere existence of various federal, state, and municipal laws and private agreements that restrict land use do not make title unmarketable. A of such laws or private agreements that by the closing date may make title unmarketable because such a violation would subject the buyer to an unreasonable risk of litigation. Examples of violations that may be difficult or impossible for the seller to cure include violations of local zoning ordinances and building codes, federal and state laws and regulations protecting the environment, and violations of privately created real covenants that impose restrictions on the development and use of the property.
- An “as is” clause in the sales contract prevents the buyer from rescinding based on obvious defects or if a hidden defect is discovered during an inspection of the property. Under the modern rule, an “as is” clause in the sales contract does not relieve the seller of the affirmative duty to disclose latent (hidden) material defects that are not discoverable by a reasonable inspection. An “as is” clause never relieves the seller (even in a common law rule jurisdiction) from the duty not to make fraudulent misrepresentations concerning the physical condition of the property.
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Chapter 13. Practice Exam #2 42 results (showing 5 best matches)
- Fred Farmer is the owner of Tranquility Farm, a 100-acre tract of vacant pasture and crop land located in Peaceful County in the State of Bliss. The State of Bliss follows the majority common law rules on matters of real property and does not recognize community property as a form of joint ownership. The State of Bliss recording statute provides as follows:
- Governing Law.
- Sam purchased the property via a properly executed general warranty deed containing the six traditional warranty deed covenants from Joellen Jones in 2003. Sam did not record the deed until 2004. Two hours after Sam’s deed from Joellen was recorded, a mortgage on the property given by Joellen to secure a $100,000 loan from the individual Mark Law was recorded. Sam had no actual notice of this mortgage. You called Mark Law and learned that the loan has not yet been fully repaid by Joellen. The remaining balance on the loan is $8,000.
- land ever actually flooded, only that an intersection two miles away flooded. Although some courts may increasingly be willing to require disclosure of “off-site” defects, common law rule limits the duty to disclose to the property being sold and does not extend the duty of disclosure to off-site conditions.
- Laurie Landlord owned a free-standing retail building (the “Store”) in the State of Anxiety, which generally follows the majority common law rules on matters of real and personal property. The State of Anxiety does, however, follow the minority rule that a landlord may exercise self-help to evict a commercial tenant who breaches a lease agreement if: (1) the lease authorizes the landlord to re-enter and retake possession upon such a breach, and (2) the landlord’s means of eviction are “peaceable.”
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Chapter 6. Landlord and Tenant 116 results (showing 5 best matches)
- Common Law (Retained Reversion) Test for an Assignment.
- Under the common law, a tenant was still liable for rent due under the terms of the lease if the leased property was destroyed. Today, the vast majority of states provide that, absent express language in the lease to the contrary, the lease is terminated if the leased premises are destroyed. The lease is not terminated, however, if the destruction of the property is due to the tenant’s own negligence.
- Other possible defenses to a claim for nonpayment of rent for a tenant who has abandoned the leased property arise if circumstances change significantly after the tenant executes the lease. A drastic change in circumstances may make it illegal or impossible to perform under the lease, thereby terminating the lease. For example, there may be a change in the law so that the tenant’s use of the property becomes illegal. Or the property itself may be destroyed, thus making it impossible for the tenant to occupy the leased premises.
- Did the tenant damage the leased property or change its physical condition? Under the common law rule, the landlord can recover damages for any change to the condition of the leased premises by the tenant (even a change that enhanced the property’s value) as waste. The modern rule is that the tenant does not owe damages to the landlord for changes to the premises that enhance the value of the property (ameliorating waste).
- Breach of the CQE is tantamount to a constructive eviction by the landlord that relieves the tenant of the obligation to pay further rent to the landlord. The most difficult hurdle for the tenant to overcome in asserting a breach of the CQE usually is showing that the landlord has engaged in wrongful conduct that caused the problem leading to the constructive eviction. Prove of wrongful landlord conduct may be established by showing that the landlord violated one of the landlord’s express covenants (promises by the landlord) in the written lease agreement, or that the landlord violated one of the common law duties imposed on landlords by Property law. The common law duties imposed on landlords are:
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Chapter 8. Recording Acts and Adverse Possession 85 results (showing 5 best matches)
- he material in Chapter 8 addresses the fundamental problem of how to resolve conflicting claims of superior property rights involving the same parcel of real estate. Such conflicts generally arise in two situations. The owner of the property may transfer an interest in the property to more than one grantee, in each instance conveying by a written instrument that is capable of being recorded. Or a competing claim of superior title may arise by operation of law, as in the case of adverse possession.
- Which Grantee Acquired a Property Right First?
- The classic dispute over superior property rights involves competing claimants who both claim to have acquired their property interests from the owner of the property through a written instrument. The property interests in dispute may be the fee simple absolute title to the property, or a lesser property interest such as a mortgage or an easement. The written instrument that conveys the property interest to the first grantee, although capable of being recorded in the land records system, is not recorded immediately. This omission makes it possible for the owner of the property to convey an interest in the property to a subsequent grantee, who may lack knowledge of the prior conveyance.
- The common law rule obviously is unfair if B purchases Greenacre from O without knowing of O’s prior transfer of title or a lesser property interest in Greenacre to A. For this reason, every state has enacted a A recording act is a statutory rule that supersedes the common law rule of FTFR if the subsequent grantee B satisfies all of the technical requirements of the statute. If the subsequent grantee B cannot qualify for protection under the recording act statute, the prior grantee (here, A) wins in a title dispute under the common law default rule of FTFR.
- A Mother Hubbard clause is a provision in a deed that purports to convey title to or a lesser property interest in “all of the grantor’s property located in” a specific county. A Mother Hubbard clause, which substitutes for a specific description of the property or properties affected by the deed, is not considered recorded because the indexing system used by title searchers relies on specific property descriptions.
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Chapter 11. Master Checklist for Issue-Spotting on Essay Exams 28 results (showing 5 best matches)
- these three fundamental errors separates the “A” student in Property from the rest of the class. Think of your Property exam with multiple questions as a gymnastics competition with multiple events. Your goal is to
- a compilation of the Chapter Checklists into one very long list. The two types of Checklists have very different purposes. Each Chapter Checklist is designed to lay out the rules governing a particular topic in Property and present the systematic, in-depth analysis associated with legal issues that commonly arise under that topic. (In other words, the Chapter Checklists show you how to “think like a Property lawyer” about the particular topic.)
- This imaginary experience describes the fundamental mistakes often made by Property students on their final exams. To summarize the errors:
- Failing to make connections across Property topic areas.
- The Master Checklist below is a beginning template for designing your own issue-spotting Master Checklist that highlights the points of emphasis in your Property course. Remember, any Checklist is simply a tool that helps you to save time and perform better on the exam. Below are suggestions for customizing your own Master Checklist.
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Dedication 1 result
Table of Contents 8 results (showing 5 best matches)
West Academic Publishing’s Emeritus Advisory Board 14 results (showing 5 best matches)
- Arthur J. Kania Dean and Professor of LawVillanova University Charles Widger School of Law
- Professor of LawUniversity of Houston Law Center
- Dean and Joseph L. Rauh, Jr. Chair of Public Interest LawUniversity of the District of Columbia David A. Clarke School of Law
- Professor of Law, University of Houston Law Center
- Professor of LawYale Law School
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- Publication Date: March 9th, 2022
- ISBN: 9781683284499
- Subject: Property
- Series: Acing Series
- Type: Exam Prep
-
Description:
This study aid features an innovative method of content organization. It uses outline-like checklists that are designed to lead students through the analytical steps necessary to evaluate and resolve property issues. Each chapter begins with a review and explanation of the important rules, concepts and principles that govern a particular area of property law. The review material is then synthesized into a checklist. Each chapter concludes with practice problems and solutions that illustrate how students can use the checklist to analyze property issues when writing their exams. Although other study aids may offer summaries of the law and practice questions, none offer the systematic analytical approach represented by the checklists in this book. In addition, the fourth edition includes:
- Two full-length, four-hour practice essay exams (with model answers)
- A new Master Checklist for issue-spotting essay questions
- Updated discussion and Chapter Checklists for new developments in the law
- New exam tips for regulatory takings and real covenants questions
- Additional discussion of bailments, co-ownership, servitudes, and real estate transactions
- Updated cross-references to additional supplemental sources for further reading