Relativity of Title

Question 1

Adverse possession

Answer 1

• When someone obtains possession of goods or land, they thereby obtain a right to possession which is good against everyone else in society, except someone with a better right to possession. However, the person with the better right may lose it if he or she does not enforce it in time.
• The Limitation Act 1980 sets time limits in which claims may be commenced, including claims based on the torts of trespass or conversion. If the claim is not brought in time, the claimant’s right to possession may be lost. Sections 2-4 apply to chattels.
• The Limitation Act 1980 no longer applies to registered land
• The Land Registration Act 2002 provides a different set of rules for dealing with it: see ss 96-98 and Schedule 6
• Disputes in court are about who has the best title as between the parties to the dispute*, and *not about who has the best title overall

Question 2

Dimensions of land ownership

Answer 2

Possession (seisin – physical possession) is the root of all title

• Title – the abstract right to physical possession
• Tenure – the conditions of possession (how land is held)
  
  • The terms and conditions on which land is possessed
  • There is only free and common socage today
• Estate – the temporal extent of possession (how long the land is held)

Question 3

Possession

Answer 3

• Seisin: physical possession of land
• A person ‘seised of’ the land was entitled to possession or rents and profits from it
• “Livery [delivery] of seisin” was the method of transferring land

Question 4

Estates in land

Answer 4

• Freehold: unlimited right to possession
• Leasehold: limited in time
• These are the only ‘ownership’ interests in land
  
  • Their value is the market value of the land
• An ownership interest in the land is not the same as the right over the land

Question 5

Freehold estates

Answer 5

• Fee simple absolute in possession
• Fee – inheritable
• Simple – by anyone (not just lineal descendants, can be handed down to nephews)
• Absolute – with no conditions
• In possession – with immediate right to possession or rents and profits
  
  • A kind of legal possession
  • Some estates take effect not in possession but in remainder* or *in reversion, which is in the future
• The unconditional right to use the land forever starting from now
• The only necessary interest in land
  
  • All other interests derive from it
    *

Question 6

Obsolete fees

Equitable only

Answer 6

• Fee tails and life estates are no longer allowed at law as of the 1926 LPA
• Fee tail: no longer possible after Trust of Land and Appointment of Trustees Act 1996, but will come up in older cases
  
  • Became equitable only after 1926
  • Property that can only be inherited by direct descendants
    
    • E.g. male tail
  • You can have a life interest, but that cannot exist in law (it must exist in equity)
• Life estate: now only possible in equity under a trust of land
  
  • Lasts for the lifetime of a person (usually the owner of the interest)
  • Now only possible in equity behind a trust of land
  • Usually followed by the fee simple in remainder

Question 7

Leasehold estate

Answer 7

• Term of years absolute (a misnomer)
  
  • Term – must be for fixed period known at outset; includes repeated terms
  • Years –can also be for weeks or months
  • Absolute – but can also include conditions
  • It is a derivate interest (carved out of the freehold or the greater leasehold)
  • Can be in possession* or *in reversion
• Leases began in contract where they conferred personal rights on the lessee, and where akin to what are now called licences
  
  • They were considered a form of personal property called “chattels real (unmoveable chattel – a contradiction in terms)”
• Under a lease, a merely permits a lessee to use his land in exchange for money or services, but unlike the tenant, a lessee is not seised of the land

Question 8

Legal estates

Answer 8

• s1(1) LPA 1925
• Freehold
• Leasehold
• These are big bundles which include the use and exploitation of the land

Question 9

Legal interests

Answer 9

• Legal interests – s1(2) LPA 1925
• Easements: the right to use another’s (adjacent) land to benefit your own
  
  • In order to claim an easement, you have to own land
  • It must be adjacent to the land over which the easement is claimed
• Charges by way of legal mortgages: the right to call for land to be sold to repay a debt (security interest)
• Rentcharge: right to be paid, attached to property
• Right of entry: right of landlord to re-enter leased premises
• Profit a prendre: right to take something from another’s land (e.g. wood, fish, etc.)
• These are small bundles which contain a few functions or even a single right