Real Estate & Property Law

Menashi on Property Rights, Christian Ethics, and Locke

Posted on March 31, 2011
Steven Menashi has posted Cain as His Brother?s Keeper: Property Rights and Christian Ethics in Locke's Two Treatises of Government (Seton Hall Law Review) on SSRN. Here's the abstract: Those scholars who regard Locke?s theory of property as a reflection...

Confessions of a Black Gentrifier

Posted on March 31, 2011
Shani Hilton has a piece in the Washington City Paper that's generated a lot of discussion in blog-world. She highlights how her experience as a black gentrifier both overlaps with and remains distinct from the experience of white newcomers: Crack...

Iglesias on the FHA and Private Residential Occupancy Standards

Posted on March 30, 2011
Tim Iglesias (U. San Francisco) has posted Moving Beyond the Two-Person-Per-Bedroom: Revitalizing Application of the Federal Fair Housing Act to Private Residential Occupancy Standards on SSRN. Here's the abstract: New empirical evidence demonstrates that the common residential occupancy standard of...

Strand on Inheriting Inequality

Posted on March 30, 2011
Palma Joy Strand (Creighton) has posted Inheriting Inequality: Wealth, Race, and the Laws of Succession on SSRN. Here's the abstract: The article begins by documenting deep inequality in the form of Black-White wealth disparities: While the overall wealth distribution in...

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The Rise of the Israeli Legal Academic: America 1, Israel 0

Posted on March 30, 2011
I spent a few hours last night trying to build a friendship with the work of Hanoch Dagan. As one drink melted into three, the reading got me to thinking about the substantial impact that Israeli academics have made on...

Lind on Public Nuisance Law and Bank-Owned Housing

Posted on March 30, 2011
Kermit Lind (Cleveland State) has posted Can Public Nuisance Law Protect Your Neighborhood from Big Banks? (Suffolk Law Review) on SSRN. Here's the abstract: One manifestation of the mortgage crisis of the past decade is the destabilization of housing markets...

Leaving the Barn Door Open

Posted on March 29, 2011
It's bad to close the barn door after the horse is gone. But it's just as bad to fill the barn back up with horses, then reassure everyone that it is now secure, because the barn door is only open...

50 Years of Urban Planning Histroy in 6 frames

Posted on March 29, 2011
This 1998 cartoon from Tom Toles has been making the rounds through the intertubes: Steve Clowney (Image found with creative commons search tool. For more of Toles' work, see here. Hat Tip, Matt Yglesias) [Comments are held for approval, so...

Gold and Sagalyn on Blight

Posted on March 29, 2011
Martin Gold (Sidley Austin) and Lynne Sagalyn (Columbia Business) have posted The Use and Abuse of Blight in Eminent Domain (Fordham Urban Law Journal) on SSRN. Here's the abstract: Blight findings have functioned as a cornerstone for condemnation since the...

The Cost of Urban Water

Posted on March 28, 2011
An interactive map that shows the cost of water in cities aroung the world, both in raw terms and as a percentage of GDP. It's pretty amazing that water is cheaper in El Paso and Las Vegas than it is...

Penalver and Strahilevitz on Judicial Takings

Posted on March 28, 2011
Eduardo Penalver (Cornell) and Lior Strahilevitz (Chicago) have posted Judicial Takings or Due Process? on SSRN. Here's the abstract: In Stop the Beach Renourishment v. Florida Department of Environmental Protection, 130 S. Ct. 2592 (2010), a plurality of the Supreme...

Parking Meters for Sale

Posted on March 28, 2011
Slate has a good article about the temptation to privatize America's infrastructure: [A] 2008 GAO report looked at the privatizations of the Indiana Toll Road and the Chicago Skyway. It found many benefits to these deals, including the availability of...

Foster on Collective Action and the Urban Commons

Posted on March 26, 2011
Shelia Foster (Fordham) has posted Collective Action and the Urban Commons (Notre Dame Law Review) on SS RN. Here's the abstract: Urban residents share access to a number of local resources in which they have a common stake. These resources...

Modern Studies in Property Law 2012 - Call for Papers

Posted on March 25, 2011
The 9th Biennial Conference takes place at the University of Southampton from Wednesday 21st - Friday 23rd March 2012. The conference series has its origins in the biennial conference first held by the University of Reading in 1996. Those conferences...

Harris on Disputes Over Security Deposits

Posted on March 24, 2011
Lee Harris (Memphis) has posted Judging Tenant Protections: The Evidence from Enforcement of Landlord Penalties on SSRN. Here's the abstract: Critics of pro-tenant residential laws have argued that such laws actually hurt tenants. Law-and-economics scholars, for instance, argue that such...

Does the County Recorder's Office Have a Photocopier?

Posted on March 24, 2011
Maybe, like me, when you teach your students about recording acts and title searches, you tell them the county officials they'll need to work with to complete a title search are helpful. On the other hand, maybe not so much...

90210 Neighbors Protest Mansion

Posted on March 24, 2011
It's common-fare to see the wealthy use zoning codes to exclude the less-well-off. It's much less common to see the wealthy invoking land use rules to exclude the mega-wealthy. But that's exactly what's happening in Benedict Canyon, an enclave of...

Two on Judicial Takings

Posted on March 23, 2011
There are two new pieces on SSRN that touch on judicial takings. First, John Martinez (Utah) has posted No More Free Easements: Judicial Takings for Private Necessity. Martinez writes, "This article bridges the fields of constitutional judicial takings and the...

Conference News

Posted on March 22, 2011
The ABA Section of Real Property, Trust and Estate Law will hold its 22nd Annual Spring Symposia on April 28-29, 2011 at the Grand Hyatt in Washington. Panels that might interest law profs include: * Origination Changes that are Transforming...

Land Restoration in Columbia

Posted on March 22, 2011
Last night NPR ran a short story on efforts by the Columbian government to return land to farmers that was stolen during the country's violent drug wars. All in all, officials believe that warlords wrongfully seized over 10,000 sqaure miles...

Klass on Renewable Energy and the Public Trust Doctrine

Posted on March 22, 2011
Alexandra Klass (Minnesota) has posted Renewable Energy and the Public Trust Doctrine (UC Davis Law Review) on SSRN. Here's the abstract: This Article explores the role of the public trust doctrine in current efforts to site large-scale wind and solar...

These Streets Will Make You Feel Brand New

Posted on March 22, 2011
There's a great article in today's New York Times about the 200th anniversary of the city's no-frills street grid. The piece describes, in a very balanced manner, how the grid spurred development in Manhattan but simultaneously enforced a "relentless monotony"...

Osofsky on Diagonal Federalism and Climate Change

Posted on March 21, 2011
Hari Osofsky (Minnesota) has posted Diagonal Federalism and Climate Change: Implications for the Obama Administration (Alabama Law Review) on SSRN. Here's the abstract: The Obama Administration?s efforts on climate change continue to face daunting challenges domestically and internationally...

The Rise of ARMs

Posted on March 21, 2011
The New York Times reports that more borrowers are opting for adjustable rate mortgages: In the years since the financial crisis, adjustable-rae mortgages, or ARMs, with their low initial interest rates that changed over time, have been considered riskier than...

Brennan on Indigenous Property Rights in Australia

Posted on March 20, 2011
Sean Brennan (New South Wales) has posted Statutory Interpretation and Indigenous Property Rights (Public Law Review) on SSRN. Here's the abstract: Four recent decisions concerning a) native title and b) statutory land rights confirm that the approach of the High...

White on Realtor Responsibility for their "Expert" Advice

Posted on March 19, 2011
Brent White (Arizona) has posted Trust, Expert Advice, and Realtor Responsibility (Real Estate Law Journal) on SSRN. Here's the synopsis: Real estate agents benefit from the trust associated with portraying themselves as real estate experts, yet are generally not legally...

Update on Severance v. Patterson

Posted on March 18, 2011
Matt Festa continues to do the knowledge on Severance v. Patterson, an important case on the Texas Open Beaches Act. Steve Clowney [Comments are held for approval, so there will be some delay in posting]

Echeverria on the Taking of Private Contracts

Posted on March 18, 2011
John Echeverria (Vermont) has posted The Public Takings of Private Contracts (Ecology Law Quarterly) on SSRN. Here's the abstract: This article, part of a larger project analyzing how far public and private contracting arrangements can go in constraining democratic decision-making,...

Bucket List: The Property Prof to Have Before You Die

Posted on March 18, 2011
The National Jurist Magazine has complied a list of the 23 law profs to take before you die. Property Prof Jeremy Blumenthal of Syracuse gets a shout: Jeremy Blumenthal teaches and writes in the areas of property law and the...

The Mounting Costs of Foreclosures

Posted on March 17, 2011
The Home Defenders League, a community activist organization in California, released a report this week with the provocative title of ?Home Wreckers: How Wall Street Foreclosures are Devastating Communities.? You can find the report here. The report concludes that the...

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