Real Property

An implied easement may be recognized and enforced even though it precludes most uses by the owner of the servient tenement in the area covered by the easement.  Here, one owner held two adjoining lots, built a house on one lot with a driveway framed by a brick planter area on the house side and a fence on the far… Read More

Plaintiff filed Action #1 against DiMartini and recorded a lis pendens.  DiMartini's motion to expunge the lis pendens was granted because the action sought to enforce an arbitration award and did not allege a real property claim.  After abandoning Action #1, plaintiff filed Action #2 and again recorded a lis pendens.  This decision holds that under CCP 405.36, a plaintiff… Read More

McKee owned a Palmdale house with her domestic partner, but she moved out of that house years before filing her bankruptcy petition because, she said, the domestic partner who lived there was abusive to her.  Because McKee did not live in the house and did not intend to return to live in it (at least so long as the domestic… Read More

Prior owners had deeded land to various grantees, reserving to the grantor-owners a partial interest in “all oil, gas, and other hydrocarbons and minerals” beneath the surface.  This decision holds that "minerals" in the reservation includes sand and gravel that owners of the surface estate intended to obtain from the subsurface by open pit mining.  To reach that conclusion, the… Read More

This decision holds that the trial court erred in denying defendants' Anti-SLAPP motion to strike this malicious prosecution action.  While the defendants made a bunch of mistakes in conducting the underlying quiet title action, they did not lack probable cause because two instruments describing the same easement signed by the same grantor gave conflicting information about the easement's temporal duration. … Read More

Yee owned a home in LA; Hon owned one in San Francisco.  They were romantically involved and were business partners in a company that ordered $141,000 of goods from Panrox, giving Panrox deeds of trust on both houses.  The business didn't pay Panrox which commenced an action to collect the debt.  Court records reflected it was settled in 1998, and… Read More

Before a nonjudicial foreclosure sale, the borrower/owner filed a worngful foreclosure suit against the deed of trust beneficiary and recorded a lis pendens.  This case holds that the purchaser at the nonjudicial foreclosure sale who thereafter brought an unlawful detainer action against the borrower/owner was wrongly awarded judgment because it did not prove it duly perfected title given the lis… Read More

Three parcels of real property were owned 50-50 by two trusts established by different trustors and both were administered by the same trustee.  Charitable organizations were the sole beneficiaries of both trusts.  The museum that was the sole beneficiary of one of the trusts wanted the properties distributed in kind to avoid adverse tax consequences.  The beneficiaries of the other… Read More

The trial court erred in granting homeowners an injunction against the county Road Commissioner barring the county from enforcing ordinances banning encroachments on a county road leading to a popular public hiking trail.  Courts may not enjoin enforcement of the laws, which in this case make encroachments a misdemeanor offense.  Contrary to the homeowners' claim, CEQA does not require any… Read More

Borrowers lacked standing to challenge the assignment of their deed of trust from the prior beneficiary to La Salle Bank as Trustee for  WaMu 2006-AR19 when the correct name of the assignee was La Salle Bank as Trustee for WaMu Mortgage Pass-Through Certificates Series 2006-AR19 Trust.  Whether an abbreviation of the full name or a misnomer, the incorrect designation of… Read More

The Common Interest Development Open Meeting Act (Civ. Code 4900 et seq.) requires HOA boards to take action on HOA business at board meetings open to the HOA's membership.  It defines a "meeting" as a congregation of a quorum of board members.  This decision holds that an email exchange between members of the HOA board is not a "meeting" and… Read More

This decision holds that the trial court erred in granting defendant summary judgment against plaintiff's claim to quiet title to a railroad easement across plaintiff's property benefiting defendant's parcel.  Plaintiff claimed the railroad had abandoned the easement.  Abandonment depends on cessation of use of the easement for permitted purposes and the easement owner's intent not to use the easement in… Read More

The county's sale of plaintiff's condo at a tax sale to collect delinquent taxes plaintiff owed.  The sale netted a sum greater than the taxes owed.  The county kept the surplus sale proceeds.  That was a taking of plaintiff's property that violated the Fifth Amendment even though state law allowed the county to keep the surplus.  To determine the scope… Read More

A successor owner of the property is entitled to reinstate a defaulted deed of trust under Civ. Code 2924c even if the successor owner is not a party to the defaulted loan and deed of trust and does not assume any obligation under that loan and deed of trust.  Here, plaintiff bought the property at a foreclosure sale held by… Read More

Most time deadline statutes and rules are now construed as non-jurisdictional unless Congress has clearly stated otherwise.  The 12-year statute of limitations on quiet title actions against the United States (28 U.S.C. §2409a(g)) is a claims processing rule, not a jurisdictional statute.  The time limit appears in a section separate from the Quiet Title Act's jurisdictional provision and does not… Read More

This decision affirms the granting of a defendant law firm's Anti-SLAPP motion to strike a malicious prosecution action against it, finding the firm had probable cause to name a citizens group and some of its individual members as defendants in a quiet title action that sought to confirm the law firm's client's ownership of water rights in a creek.  The… Read More

A real estate broker whom the court appointed to determine the listing price and sell the property in a partition action is entitled to quasi-judicial immunity from one of the co-owner's claims for breach of fiduciary duty and other torts. The broker was appointed by the court for his expertise to carry out the court’s order to sell the property… Read More

Property that the debtor has properly claimed as exempt (here, a homestead interest under Arizona law) is not property of the estate.  Therefore, the bankruptcy lacks authority under 11 USC 724(a) to avoid secured claims with liens on the exempt property since that section allows avoidance of liens only on property of the estate. Read More

The trial court did not abuse its discretion in declining to apply the merger doctrine to void a driveway easement which was the only means of access to the plaintiff's property.  Defendant had owned both adjoining parcels at one point, but had promptly taken out a loan on the property benefited by the easement--a loan that probably wouldn't have been… Read More

Reasoning that Kirkeby v. Superior Court (2004) 33 Cal.4th 642 impliedly overruled BGJ Associates v. Superior Court (1999) 75 Cal.App.4th 952, this decision holds that when a plaintiff seeks to impose a constructive trust on specific property so as to become (again) the owner of that property wrongfully taken from him, the action "affects title to real property" sufficiently so… Read More