the seller retains legal title of real property in an installment contract.
the seller retains legal title of real property in an installment contract.
who retains legal title of real property in an installment contract?
the seller
equitable conversion is a doctrine of the law of real property under which a purchaser of real property becomes the equitable owner of title to the property at the time he/she signs a contract binding him/her to purchase the land at a later date. the seller retains legal title of the property prior to the date of conveyance, but this land interest is considered personal property (a right to the payment of money, rather than a right to the property). the risk of loss is then transferred to the buyerif a house on the property burns down after the contract has been signed, but before the deed is conveyed, the buyer will nevertheless have to pay the agreed-upon purchase price for the land unless the seller in possession or deemed in possession has failed to protect it. such issues can and should be avoided by parties by stipulating in the contract who will bear the loss in such occurrences. the above rule varies by jurisdiction, but is the general rule.
equitable conversion
land law is also known as the law of real property. it relates to the acquisition, protection and conflicts of people's rights, legal and equitable, in land. this means three main things. first, "property rights" (in latin, a right "in rem") are generally said to bind third parties, whereas personal rights (a right "in personam") are exercisable only against the person who owes an obligation. english law acknowledges a fixed number, or "numerus clausus" of property rights, which create various privileges. the main situations where this distinction matters are if a debtor to two or more creditors has gone insolvent (i.e. bankrupt), or if there is a dispute over possession of a specific thing. if a person or a business has gone insolvent, and has things in their possession which are the property of others', then those people can usually take back their property free of anyone else's claims. but if an insolvent person's creditors are merely owed personal debts, they cannot take back their money freely: any losses have to be divided among all creditors. often, creditors can contract for a proprietary right (known as a security interest) to secure repayment of debts. this gives the same result as having another proprietary right, so the secured creditor takes priority in the insolvency queue. secured creditors, most usually, are banks and for most people the most familiar kind of security interest is a mortgage. in this way, property rights area always "stronger" than personal rights, even though they may be acquired by the same means: a contract. most of the time, property rights are also stronger than personal because english courts have been historically more willing to order specific performance as a remedy for interference with property rights. people with personal rights, such as to the performance of a contract, are presumptively entitled to money in compensation, unless damages would be an inadequate remedy. in its second main feature, english land law differs from civil law systems of most other european union member states, because it allows the separation of the "beneficial" ownership of property from legal title to property. if there is a "trust" of land, then trustees hold legal title, while the benefit, use and "equitable" title might belong to many other people. legal title to real property can only be acquired in a limited number of formal ways, while equitable title can be recognised because of a person's contribution, or the parties' true intentions, or some other reason, if the law deems that it is fair and just (i.e. equitable) to recognise that someone else has a stake in the land.
english land law