crickets

Real Estate Notes (raw)

Real property (realty) is land, anything attached or affixed to the land, and anything incidental or appurtenant to the land.

incidental: accompanying but not a major part of something.
appurtenant: belonging to.
personal property (chattels or personalty)is defined as anything that isn't real property—anything that is not land, attached to the land, or appurtenant to the land. Something is movable, it's usually personal property.
The owner's bundle of rights includes the right to possess, use, enjoy, encumber, will, sell, or do nothing at all with their property. A property owner is free to sell any of these ownership rights, and they can be sold separately from the land itself.
Selling the right to possess and use property for a period of time is called leasing the property. Rights are ordinarily transferred along with the land, but the landowner can sell certain appurtenant rights (for instance, the mineral rights) separately from the land.
In theory, the landowner owns not only the surface of the land within the boundaries of the parcel, but also everything below or above the surface within the imaginary inverted pyramid.
An appurtenance is something that goes with or pertains to ownership of a piece of real property but isn't necessarily a physical part of the property. such as minerals in the ground, such as the right to sunlight or an unobstructed view. Some appurtenances can be sold separately from the rest of the real property, while others can't be.  
basic appurtenances: Air rights, Water rights, Mineral rights, Support rights  
If you can show in court that the value of your property has been substantially diminished, a judge might order the responsible parties to compensate you for that financial loss.    Air rights can be affected by federal aviation laws, various local laws and private restrictions.  
City zoning law that applies to your neighborhood might impose height restrictions on buildings and other structures, such as radio transmission towers. Or protect the neighbors' scenic views and access to solar energy (sun rights).  
Air rights can be sold separately. condominium developments.  
Water rights can apply both to surface water (channeled and unchanneled) and to subsurface water (groundwater).    Riparian rights are tied to landownership, a landowner has the right to use the water that touches their property for domestic purposes (bathing, washing clothes, or watering your vegetable garden.)   
Riparian water is flowing water, such as the water in a river, stream, or creek.  
Littoral water, on the other hand, is standing water, such as a pond or a lake. This term also applies to tidal waters, such as Puget Sound or the ocean.  
The water may be used only on the riparian or littoral property itself. It can't be transported for use elsewhere, on property that doesn't adjoin the river, lake, or other water source.  
If the property is on a non-navigable lake, the littoral owner owns the portion of the lake bed adjacent to the property. If the lake is navigable, the owner owns the land only to the mean highwater mark. The same rule also applies to oceanfront or other tidal property. As a general rule, the land below the highwater mark (or high tide mark) is public.  
The riparian rights system is inadequate for allocating water in places where it is scarce and in high demand, such as the dry agricultural areas in eastern Washington. The prior appropriation system was developed to address needs.  Someone who wants to use water from a river, lake, or other source must apply to the state for an appropriation permit. The prior appropriation system may also be applied to groundwater beneath a property.   
Mineral rights: the right to extract any solid minerals located within the property's inverted pyramid, can be sold separately from the rest of the property. Once brought to the surface, solid minerals become personal property.  
Under the law, oil and gas are governed by the Rule of Capture. Any oil or gas produced from wells located on a landowner's property becomes the personal property of that landowner. This is true even if the wells caused the oil or gas to migrate from underneath neighboring property. 
Support rights refer to the natural support provided to a piece of land by the surrounding land.  
Subjacent support is provided by the underlying earth.   
Lateral support is provided by neighboring land.  
Attachments are things that are permanently attached to the land, natural or human-made.   
Crops to be harvested are treated as personal property. An orchard of cultivated apple trees would be realty, but the apples growing on the trees could be considered personal property under certain circumstances.   
You could sell your standing timber to a logging company, in much the same way that the US Forest Service sells the timber rights in national forests.  
The doctrine of emblements is a special legal rule pertaining to crops. The doctrine applies when agricultural land has been leased to a tenant farmer. Emblements are crops (corn and wheat) planted annually by a tenant. Under the doctrine of emblements, if the lease terminates (through no fault of the tenant) before a crop is mature, the tenant has the right to re-enter the land later to harvest the first crop that matures after the tenancy terminates.  
Natural attachments can be sold separately from the land. This is sometimes referred to as severance from the real property.  
Human-made attachments (houses, fences, etc) are called fixtures.  
If the seller wants to transfer personal property to the buyer, that should be in the purchase and sale agreement as well. A separate document, called a bill of sale would be needed to transfer title to the personal property.  
Fixture Tests, a court will typically apply the four legal tests listed here: Method of attachment test, Adaptation test, Intention test, Relationship test.  
Method of attachment test: bolts, plaster, cement, roots, sewer pipe, resting on the land on a foundation, gazebo  
Constructively annexed (Specialized tools, keys to a house, statue) is moveable but not attached.   
Adaptation test, specially designed for it (pews in a church).   
Intention Test, the original intention of the person who installed the item that's now in dispute. The intention of the party who attached the item is the most important fixture test.  
Relationship test, did they own the property, or were they just a tenant? At the end of the tenancy, the tenant can remove it and take it with them.  
Trade Fixtures (Manufacturing equipment, Agricultural equipment, hen house, barber chairs) are equipment and other items that a commercial tenant installs to carry on a business, trade fixtures aren't considered part of the real property, no matter how they're attached. After removing a trade fixture, the tenant may be required to either restore the property to its original condition or to compensate the property owner for any damage.   
A manufactured home is assembled at a factory and transported to the dwelling site, is initially personal property and subject to registration similar to motor vehicles, unless you make it a fixture. Title elimination eliminates the vehicle title, making the home a fixture and part of the real property where it is located. The mobile home's new owner may restore the vehicle title; it may also remain as real property if it is installed immediately on another parcel.  
An agent involved in a mobile home sale is not required to have a real estate license, but will need a mobile home dealer's license.
Once a mobile home becomes real property, the owner must pay annual property taxes (general real estate taxes) on the home as well as the site.