Property Law
The Cocaine Cowboy’s Trojan Horse: Dirty Real Estate
Sarah Cate Harrison
Abstract The United States’ real estate market has suffered a complex issue for decades: money laundering. Money laundering through real estate is commonplace and presents a two-fold issue: one, compromised real estate transactions are extremely difficult to trace; and two, such transactions can, unfortunately, be beneficial to local economies. This economic gain is short-lived, however, […]
Religious Covenants
Nicole Stelle Garnett & Patrick E. Reidy, C.S.C.
Abstract When religious institutions alienate property, they often include religiously motivated deed restrictions that bind future owners, sometimes in perpetuity. These “religious covenants” serve different purposes and advance different goals. Some prohibit land uses that the alienating faith communities consider illicit; others seek to ensure continuity of faith commitments; still, others signal public disaffiliation with […]
The Property Law of Tokens
Juliet M. Moringiello and Christopher K. Odinet
Abstract Non-fungible tokens—or NFTs, as they are better known—have taken the world by storm. The idea behind an NFT is that by owning a certain thing (specifically, a digital token that is tracked on a blockchain), one can hold property rights in something else (either a real or an intangible asset). In the early part […]
Reallocating Redevelopment Risk
Michael C. Pollack
Abstract Scores of cities across the country face devastating financial crises, and the COVID-19 pandemic has brought even more to the brink. But economically distressed municipalities have few places to turn for help. Saddled by rising unemployment, weak tax bases, and state law limitations on deficit spending and debt assumption, they generally cannot spend their […]
Restoring Federal Takings Claims
Shelley Ross Saxer
Abstract Response to Stewart E. Sterk & Michael C. Pollack, A Knock on Knick‘s Revival of Federal Takings Litigation. As Professors Sterk and Pollack noted, “many have cheered” the United States Supreme Court’s holding in Knick v. Township of Scott that overruled the second prong of Williamson County’s ripeness test. Litigants challenging state or local […]
Swallowing its Own Tail: The Circular Grammar of Background Principles Under Lucas
Gregory M. Stein
Response to Michael C. Blumm & Rachel G. Wolfard, Revisting Background Principles in Takings Litigation Abstract The exception to the rule the United States Supreme Court established in Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council undercuts that rule more than the Court probably anticipated, as Professor Michael C. Blumm and Ms. Rachel G. Wolfard persuasively demonstrate […]
Differentiating Exclusionary Tendencies
John Infranca
Abstract Despite an academic consensus that easing land use regulations toincrease the supply of housing can help lower housing prices, localopposition to new development remains prevalent. Onerous zoningregulations and resistance to new housing persist not only in wealthysuburbs, but also in lower income urban neighborhoods. In addition tomaking housing more expensive, such policies increase residentialsegregation, […]
Requiem for a Heavyweight: The Decline and Fall of Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council
Daniel Farber
Abstract Response to Michael C. Blumm & Rachel G. Wolfard, Revisiting Background Principles in Takings Litigation Part I of this comment reviews Lucas and its use of the concept of background principles as an exception to takings liability. Part II will discuss Professor Blumm and Ms. Wolfard’s important contribution to our understanding of the Lucas […]
Swallowing the Rule: The Lucas Background Principles Exception to Takings Liability
Robert L. Glicksman
Abstract Response to Michael C. Blumm & Rachel G. Wolfard, Revisiting Background Principles in Takings Litigation This essay explores the authors’ assessment of the long-term impact of Lucas and why it was not transformative in precisely the way that many had expected it to be, and their valuable documentation of how the lower courts have […]
A Knock on Knick’s Revival of Federal Takings Litigation
Stewart E. Sterk & Michael C. Pollack
Abstract In Knick v. Township of Scott, the United States Supreme Court heldthat a landowner who claimed to have suffered a taking at the hands ofstate or local officials could seek redress in federal court without the needto first seek compensation through state proceedings. This holding raisesserious theoretical and practical concerns. On the theoretical side, […]
Revisiting Background Principles in Takings Litigation
Michael C. Blumm & Rachel G. Wolfard
Abstract Libertarian property rights enthusiasts celebrated the United States Supreme Court’s 1992 decision in Lucas v. South Carolina Coastal Council as a landmark decision that would revolutionize interpretation of the Constitution’s takings clause and finally fulfill its potential as a vehicle for deregulation. Over a quarter-century later, the Lucas decision has failed to meet those […]
Transfer on Death Deeds: It Is Time to Establish the Rules of the Game
Written by: Stephanie Emrick
Abstract A transfer on death deed is a form of deed that allows real property assets to pass at death outside of the probate process. Through the twentieth century, there has been a movement in the world of property law—dubbed “the nonprobate revolution”—that focuses on using will substitutes to transfer personal property assets at death […]
Pierce Giboney, Don't Ground Me Bro! Private Ownership of Airspace and How It Invalidates the FAA's Blanket Prohibition On Low Altitude Commercial Drone Operations
Abstract In years past, society has typically associated the word “drone” with the War on Terror and far-off battlefields. With the advent of the smart phone revolution, however, the once prohibitive costs of the technology have decreased to a level the general public can afford. As a consequence, a rising number of entrepreneurs associate the […]
William C. Matthews, Aventura Management, LLC v. Spiaggia Ocean Condominium Association: Condominium Associations Beware
In late January 2013, the Third District Court of Appeal sent shockwaves throughout the real estate community with regards to condominium associations’ rights as unit owners. In AventuraManagement, LLC v. Spiaggia Ocean Condominium Association1 (Spiaggia), the appellate court interpreted Florida Statute § 718.1162 in an unprecedented way. The court held that if a condominium association […]
Katrina M. Wyman & Nicholas R. Williams, Migrating Boundaries
The boundaries between land parcels usually are assumed to be static and unchanging. However, not all land borders are stable. An important land boundary that routinely ambulates is the border between what is publicly and privately owned along U.S. coastal shores. This coastal boundary recently has been the subject of renewed attention from the courts, scholars, and even the popular […]
Adam Mossoff, The Trespass Fallacy in Patent Law
The patent system is broken and in dire need of reform; so says the popular press, scholars, lawyers, judges, congresspersons, and even the President. One common complaint is that patents are now failing as property rights because their boundaries are not as clear as the fences that demarcate real estate—patent infringement is neither as determinate nor as efficient as trespass […]
Victor B. Flatt, Essay: Adapting Laws For A Changing World: A Systemic Approach To Climate Change Adaptation
64 Fla. L. Rev. 269 (2012)|
Sarah Krakoff, Planetarian Identity Formation And The Relocalization Of Environmental Law
64 Fla. L. Rev. 1 (2011)| | Local food, local work, local energy production-all are hallmarks of a resurgence of localism throughout contemporary environmental thought and action. The renaissance of localism might be seen as a retreat from the world’s global environmental problems. This Article maintains, however, that some forms of localism are actually expressions, […]
David Markell and J.B. Ruhl, An Empirical Assessment of Climate Change In The Courts: A New Jurisprudence Or Business As Usual?
64 Fla. L. Rev. 15 (2012)| | | With the demise of climate legislation in Congress, and the Supreme Court’s rejection of climate-related lawsuits brought under federal common law, rapt attention has turned to the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) efforts to bring greenhouse gases into the regulatory fold. Certainly, as the works in this special […]
Robert W. Adler, Balancing Compassion And Risk In Climate Adaptation: U.S. Water, Drought, And Agricultural Law
64 Fla. L. Rev. 201 (2012)|
Dave Owen, Critical Habitat And The Challenge Of Regulating Small Harms
64 Fla. L. Rev. 141 (2012)|
Jeffrey Manns, Building Better Bailouts: The Case for a Long-Term Investment Approach
63 Fla. L. Rev. 1349 (2011)| | | | The Article seeks to fill a crucial gap in the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act: the failure to create a framework for dealing with future financial bailouts. It argues that the federal government’s ad hoc, “break even” approach to the recent bailouts not […]
Benjamin J. Steinberg and Dwayne Antonio Robinson, Making BP's Blood Curd-Le: Duty, Economic Loss, and the Potential Cardozian Nightmare after Curd v. Mosaic Fertilizer
63 Fla. L. Rev. 1245 (2011)| | | ARTICLE :: The traditional economic loss rule precludes plaintiffs-such as those affected by the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill-from recovering losses not resulting from damage to person or property. Most states have applied the rule to various circumstances and have carved out several exceptions over time, including […]
Frances H. Foster, Should Pets Inherit?
63 Fla. L. Rev. 801 (2011)| | | ARTICLE :: On August 20, 2007, billionaire hotelier Leona Helmsley died, survived by her brother, four grandchildren, twelve great-grandchildren, and her beloved companion of eight years, a white Maltese dog named Trouble. One week later came news that shocked the world. Helmsley left $12 million to Trouble.
R. Benjamin Lingle, Post-Kelo Eminent Domain Reform: A Double-Edged Sword for Historic Preservation
63 Fla. L. Rev. 985 (2011)| | | NOTE :: The preservation of historic structures provides communities across the nation with both a source of pride in our national history and a window through which to view that history. Governments’ powers of eminent domain have long served as a tool for historic preservation; however, eminent domain […]
Lauren A. Kirkpatrick, Treading on Sacred Ground: Denying the Appointment of a Testator's Nominated Personal Representative
63 Fla. L. Rev. 1041 (2011)| | | PDF CASE COMMENT, Schleider v. Estate of Schleider, 770 So. 2d 1252 (Fla. 4th DCA 2000) :: Muriel’s mother had just died. She and her sister, Orit, had been fighting for years during their parents’ guardianship. Now Orit was bringing Muriel to court over who would act as […]
Wendy F. Hensel & Leslie E. Wolf, Playing God: The Legality of Plans Denying Scarce Resources to People with Disabilities in Public Health Emergencies
63 Fla. L. Rev. 719 (2011)| | | | ABSTRACT :: Public health emergencies can arise in a number of different ways. They can follow a natural disaster, such as Hurricane Katrina, the 2004 tsunami, and the recent earthquakes in Haiti and Chile. They may be man-made, such as the September 11 attacks and the […]
Juliet M. Moringiello, What Virtual Worlds Can Do for Property Law
62 Fla. L. Rev. 159 (2010) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: Disputes over virtual world items, such as virtual money, Second Life islands, and even “sex beds,” can inform property law generally. Rights in these virtual world items, such as rights in software and many other intangible assets, are transferred by […]
Sarah B. Schindler, Following Industry's LEED®: Municipal Adoption of Private Green Building Standards
62 Fla. L. Rev. 285 (2010) | | | | ABSTRACT :: Local governments are beginning to require new, privately constructed and funded buildings to be “green” buildings. Instead of creating their own, locally-derived definitions of green buildings, many municipalities are adopting an existing private standard created by members of the building […]
Creola Johnson, Renters Evicted en Masse: Collateral Damage Arising from the Subprime Foreclosure Crisis
62 Fla. L. Rev. 975 (2010) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: Across the country, innocent renters are becoming victims of their landlords’ inability to avoid foreclosure on their rental properties. Many are not receiving the legal rights that they are entitled to under federal and state law. For example, Marjorie Benedum and her husband […]
Steven Hetcher, The Kids Are Alright: Applying a Fault Liability Standard to Amateur Digital Remix
62 Fla. L. Rev. 1275 (2010) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: The term “remix” is used mainly in a digital context, although there is nothing inherently digital about remix. For instance, fan fiction, a widely discussed form of remix, has developed into an important cultural phenomenon in the past forty years, clearly exhibiting a […]
Heather Howdeshell, Didn't my General Contractor Pay You? Subcontractor Construction Liens in Residential Construction Projects
61 Fla. L. Rev. 151 (2009) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: During the past eight years, the housing market boom carried the United States economy out of the 2000 recession. Due in part to low interest rates for mortgages and home-equity loans, Americans have constructed millions of custom-built homes and renovated their current homes […]
Sarah Harding, Perpetual Property
61 Fla. L. Rev. 285 (2009) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: Property interests, unlike contracts, tend to adhere to a limited set of specific forms-the numerus clausus principle. Much scholarship in the past decade has focused on this distinction in an attempt to understand both the nature of and the reasons for the limitation […]
Christine A. Klein, Mary Jane Angelo, & Richard Hamann, Modernizing Water Law: The Example of Florida
61 Fla. L. Rev. 403 (2009) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the Earth, with its diverse and abundant life forms, including over six billion humans, is facing a serious water crisis. All the signs suggest that it is getting worse and will continue to do so, unless […]
Dayna B. Royal, Take Your Gun to Work and Leave It in The Parking Lot: Why The OSH Act Does Not Preempt State Guns-At-Work Laws
61 Fla. L. Rev. 475 (2009) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: Two robbers entered an Alabama restaurant and forced customers and employees into a walk-in refrigerator at gunpoint. Fortunately, one of the customers, legally armed with his own pistol, shot the robbers before any hostage was injured. In New York City, a fifty-six year-old […]
Brent J. Horton, In Defence of Private-Label Mortgage-Backed Securities
61 Fla. L. Rev. 827 (2009) | | | | ABSTRACT :: The House Financial Services Committee recently concluded that lack of regulation of private-label mortgage-backed securities (MBS) is to blame for the unsustainable housing bubble that peaked in mid-2006-and consequentially, the economic crisis that ensued when the bubble burst. It is true that the […]
Vincent J. Galluzzo, When “Now Known or Later Developed” Fails its Purpose: How P2P Litigation Has Turned the Distribution Right Upside-Down
61 Fla. L. Rev. 1165 (2009) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: In 1999, a Northeastern University freshman needed only a quiet dorm room to design the catalyst that would spark the peer-to-peer (P2P) downloading phenomenon. That freshman, the then-teenaged Shawn Fanning, spawned the now-infamous computer program Napster-a program that facilitated the free transfer of […]
Richard M. Hynes, Broke but not Bankrupt: Consumer Debt Collection in State Courts
60 Fla. L. Rev. 1 (2008) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: Virginia, with a population of about seven million, has averaged more than a million civil filings a year since the late 1980s. The overwhelming majority of these filings seek to collect debts from consumers, and most judgments go unpaid. Despite this apparent insolvency, […]
Scott J. Kennelly, In Honor of Walter O. Weyrauch: Florida's Eminent Domain Overhaul: Creating More Problems than it Solved
60 Fla. L. Rev. 471 (2008) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: A knock at your front door wakes you. Blurry-eyed, you open your door to a government official who tells you that the city would like to purchase your home for a price slightly greater than fair market value. According to the official, most […]
Bradley T. Borden, The Like-Kind Exchange Equity Conundrum
60 Fla. L. Rev. 643 (2008) | | | | ABSTRACT :: The tax-free treatment of like-kind exchanges presents one of tax law’s most compelling equity conundrums. Tax law generally does not tax property holders on the property’s appreciation but does tax gain or loss recognized by property sellers and exchangers of non-like-kind property. In […]
Timothy Zick, Clouds, Cameras, and Computers: The First Amendment and Networked Public Places
59 Fla. L. Rev. 1 (2007) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: It seems to be a common assumption that physical places like parks, sidewalks, and public squares, and “cyber-places” like the Web, constitute separate locations of communication. In reality, however, the intersection and collision of these two spaces is imminent. In some respects it […]
Dustin G. Hall, Constitutional Law: What to Do When a State Fails to Take Notice that its Notice has Failed?
59 Fla. L. Rev. 453 (2007) | | | | TEXT :: After Petitioner paid off his mortgage, his annual property taxes went unpaid. Respondent, Commissioner of State Lands, subsequently certified Petitioner’s property as delinquent. Under the applicable state statute, Respondent sent, via certified mail, a notice of delinquency to Petitioner’s property. The notice indicated […]
Julia Patterson Forrester, Still Crazy After All These Years: The Absolute Assignment Of Rents In Mortgage Loan Transactions
59 Fla. L. Rev. 487 (2007) | | | | ABSTRACT :: This Article explores the problems caused by the absolute assignment of rents in mortgage loan transactions, which have continued for more than a century, and discusses possible solutions. Rents are a significant part of the security for loans secured by income-producing properties such […]
Bruce W. Burton, In Search of John Constable's the White Horse: A Case Study in Tortured Provenance and Proposal for a Torrens-Like System of Title Registration for Artwork
59 Fla. L. Rev. 531 (2007) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: At least forty percent of valuable artwork circulating in the marketplace is either forged or misattributed. Apart from this significant problem of art authenticity, the chains of title showing current ownership of many genuine and properly attributed objects are defective. These defects are […]
Jason Marques, To Bear a Cross: The Establishment Clause, Historic Preservation, and Eminent Domain Intersect at the Mt. Soledad Veterans Memorial
59 Fla. L. Rev. 829 (2007) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: High above San Diego, a solitary Latin cross casts its shadow over the picturesque coastline of Southern California. The cross, a towering icon of concrete and faith, is encircled by several massive walls of granite into which thousands of names are meticulously carved. […]
Benjamin H. Barton, Tort Reform, Innovation, and Playground Design
58 Fla. L. Rev. 265 (2006) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: The playground at the St. James Episcopal Church is a nice, short walk from my home in Knoxville, Tennessee. The church generously allows neighborhood kids to use it, and with two young daughters (ages two and four), I spend quite a bit of […]
John H. Rains IV, Construction Law: Enforcing the Notice and Filing Time Requirements of "Florida's Little Miller Act"-An Adventure in Statutory Construction
58 Fla. L. Rev. 425 (2006) | | | | TEXT :: Respondent, a materials supplier, sought payment from bonds issued by Petitioner, a surety, for materials Respondent supplied for the construction of a public highway. After the subcontractor and general contractor failed to pay Respondent and both filed for bankruptcy, Respondent looked to Petitioner’s […]
Baher Azmy, Squaring the Predatory Lending Circle: A Case for States as Laboratories of Experimentation
57 Fla. L. Rev. 295 (2005) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: Like obscenity, “predatory lending” in the home-mortgage market eludes a precise or uniform definition; the phenomenon instead frequently evokes an “I know it when I see it” understanding among consumer advocates, responsible lenders, and concerned regulators. As a result, accelerating debates about predatory […]
Charles T. Douglas, Jr., Compensating for Canker: A Sore Subject for Florida's Citrus Growers: Haire v. Florida Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services, 870 So. 2d 774 (Fla. 2004)
57 Fla. L. Rev. 421 (2005) | | | TEXT :: Florida’s citrus canker law (the Canker Law) requires the State to destroy healthy-appearing citrus trees that are within a 1900-foot radius of an infected tree. The Florida Legislature enacted this eradication program to thwart the spread of canker and to protect Florida’s second largest […]
Laurie Reynolds, Taxes, Fees, Assessments, Dues, And The "Get What You Pay for" Model of Local Government
56 Fla. L. Rev. 373 (2004) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: The economic gap between affluent suburbia and the central city has recently received widespread attention in the state and local government law literature. Articles by prominent scholars representing a broad range of doctrinal approaches have coalesced around a consensus that the current concentration […]
Justin Smith, Expert Testimony in Eminent Domain Proceedings: Oh Frye, Where Art Thou?
56 Fla. L. Rev. 831 (2004) | | | | INTRODUCTION :: Respondent, a shopping center owner in Broward County, sought damages resulting from an eminent domain taking by Petitioner, the Florida Department of Transportation. Petitioner’s partial taking resulted in a decrease in the number of available parking spaces on Respondent’s property. Respondent sought “severance […]