Settled Land Acts - Disadvantages of Strict Settlements

Disadvantages of Strict Settlements

• The eldest son could not sell the land.
• It was not feasible to grant a long lease of the property.
• He often could not even open and work any mines on the land himself as the laws of waste apply to life estates and they provide that you cannot open new mines unless you are unimpeachable for waste. Even if he was unimpeachable for waste he would often not have the money to open them. This meant that the optimum benefit could not be obtained from the land and meant that many landowners became impoverished.
• The life tenant would have to pay the widow her annuity and the other children their portions.
• It was difficult to mortgage the land.
• Land would very often be mismanaged and fell into severe disrepair.
• These difficulties were compounded by the fact that very often the settlement would continue on ad infinitum through the process of resettlement. The son’s eldest son who was entitled to the fee tail could by barring the entail create a fee simple and bring the settlement to an end. He was not entitled to his interest in possession until his father died. While his father lived he could not bar the entail unless his father consented to it. His father would be reluctant to give his consent as this would mean the land would pass outside the family. Obviously the son would be in need of money to sustain him until he became entitled in possession. A compromise would be reached which would enable the land to remain in the family but at the same time satisfy the son’s need for cash. The father and son would bar the entail but there would be a resettlement of the land which usually took the form of a conveyance to the father for life, to the eldest son for life remainder to his eldest son in tail. Ie the fee tail was passed back another generation. As part of the settlement the eldest son would be granted an immediate annuity on the land or a lump sum. These resettlements meant that the deterioration of the land and the impoverishment of the landowners continued for generation after generation.