Property law governs the rights of ownership, possession, and use regarding real estate and personal assets. It provides the legal infrastructure for land titling, property boundaries, conveyancing transactions, easements, and resolving disputes over land rights and usage.
Land Ownership & Legal Boundaries: Establishing clean real estate titles, executing valid conveyancing deeds, and utilizing precise legal descriptions to define real property boundaries.
Easements & Access Rights: Regulating rights of way, public and private access easements, and legal restrictions that define how land can be accessed, burdened, or utilized.
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View the condensed outline →Registered Land and the Land Registration Act 2002: Title, Priority, and Overriding Interests Introduction Land registration is one of the central institutions of modern English property law. It provides a formal system for recording ownership, identifying interests affecting land and determining the priority of competing proprietary rights. Its principal purpose Read more
The English Law of Property: Legal and Equitable Interests in Land Introduction The English law of property distinguishes between legal ownership of land and the equitable interests that may exist behind, alongside or in relation to that ownership. This distinction is one of the defining characteristics of the English legal Read more
When Property Rights Conflict Introduction Property law is often presented as a system of rights: the right to possess, use, exclude, transfer, lease, mortgage, and profit from property. But those rights do not always point in the same direction. One person’s property right may interfere with another person’s property right. Read more
Trusts and Property Ownership Introduction Property ownership is often described as though one person simply owns a thing. In law, however, ownership can be divided among different legal interests. A person may hold legal title to property while another person has the right to benefit from it. A trust is Read more
Lapse and Anti-Lapse A will may carefully identify the people who are supposed to receive a person’s property at death. But what happens if one of those beneficiaries dies before the person who made the will? Suppose: Alice makes a will leaving her house to her brother, Bob. Bob later Read more
Descent and Distribution When a person dies without a valid will, the law must determine not only who is entitled to inherit, but also how the property should be divided among those entitled to inherit. These rules are traditionally described as descent and distribution. The phrase has historical roots in Read more
Elective Share and Spousal Property Rights A person generally has broad freedom to decide what happens to property at death. A person can make a will, create a trust, name beneficiaries, give property to friends or charities, and in many circumstances leave little or nothing to particular family members. But Read more
Intestate Succession and Property When a person dies without a valid will, the law still has to determine what happens to the property the person owned. Houses, bank accounts, personal possessions, business interests, investments, and other assets cannot simply remain legally ownerless. Instead, the law provides a system for transferring Read more
Wills and Testamentary Transfers Property ownership gives a person substantial control over property during life. But what happens to that property after the owner dies? One of the principal legal mechanisms for answering that question is a will. A will allows a person to express legally recognized instructions concerning the Read more
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