Title (property) - Elements

Elements

The main rights in the title bundle are usually:

• Exclusive possession
• Exclusive use and enclosure
• Acquisition
• Conveyance, including by bequest
• Access easement
• Hypothecation
• Partition

The rights in real property may be separated further, examples including:

• Water rights, including riparian rights and runoff rights
• In some U.S. states, water rights are completely separate from land—see prior appropriation water rights
• Mineral rights
• Easement to neighboring property, for utility lines, etc.
• Tenancy or tenure in improvements
• Timber rights
• Farming rights
• Grazing rights
• Hunting rights
• Air rights
• Development rights to erect improvements under various restrictions
• Appearance rights, often subjected to local zoning ordinances and deed restrictions

Possession is the actual holding of a thing, whether or not one has any right to do so. The right of possession is the legitimacy of possession (with or without actual possession), the evidence for which is such that the law will uphold it unless a better claim is proven. The right of property is that right which, if all relevant facts were known (and allowed), would defeat all other claims. Each of these may be in a different person.

For example, suppose A steals from B, what B had previously bought in good faith from C, which C had earlier stolen from D, which had been an heirloom of D's family for generations, but had originally been stolen centuries earlier (though this fact is now forgotten by all) from E. Here A has the possession, B has an apparent right of possession (as evidenced by the purchase), D has the absolute right of possession (being the best claim that can be proven), and the heirs of E, if they knew it, have the right of property, which they cannot prove. Good title consists in uniting these three (possession, right of possession, and right of property) in the same person(s).

The extinguishing of ancient, forgotten, or unasserted claims, such as E's in the example above, was the original purpose of statutes of limitations. Otherwise, title to property would always be uncertain.