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Adverse Possession/Squatting by renters
steve-brosemer replied 2 years, 11 months ago 14 Members · 32 Replies
From what I understand to gain Adverse Possession in CA you need to pay taxes on the land you are occupying for 5 years.
I can appreciate that. Gets some skin in the game!
@dave-o Permission can never ripen. Excellent way of handling it. I have advised clients to give permission on many occasions. BTW, the “ostrich pen” is a nice touch.
@murphy there’s a phrase used to define the legal term laches, “equity favors the vigilant, not those that sleep”. People like us many times have to fight the urge to punch the vigilant in the face when they’re acting in bad faith or obviously for their own benefit at the cost of the righteous.
dd@k-huerth I’m not sure about CA, but I don’t think that’s true in most states. I’ve even read of cases where the claimant of AP uses that (paying taxes) as a reason to grant title and even though it can be an element of any of the requirements, it doesn’t perfect or define any one of them. Conversely, all three of them can be perfected without any public/govt interaction or acknowledgement.
ddI’ve mentioned it before but the Maine Rule regarding AP requires that the party gaining land through AP must know that the land they are gaining is not theirs. If anyone from the Northeast has any historical documents or court cases that explain why this form of AP was adopted, I would love copies.
@murphyAlthough I am not from the NE and can add nothing other than that would be part of the “knowingly hostile” tenet that some states have.
I haven’t practiced in New York in decades and believe that it is the same. I find the interpretation of the word hostile interesting as applied to adverse possesion.
If I’m being hostile everybody will know it including me. It all falls on the idea that you own what you occupy and control.
Are we talking the the lanlord? The tenants were given permission, via the lease agreement.
Acquiescence always implies that neither party had knowledge or belief of where the line is. As I heard in court once, “we just mowed between the power poles and I kinda assumed that was the line.” This is the opposite of “knowingly adverse.” In my state (KS), the “belief of ownership” in our statute is not too far from acquiescence. Good attorneys will coach their clients to change “I kinda assumed” to “I believed”.
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