Posts Tagged ‘law’

Encroachment This, Encroachment That: Beyond Definitions

Thursday, June 30th, 2011

Sometimes, boundary line mix-ups happen when it comes to property. Maybe the initial land surveyor mucked up. Maybe water erosion changed a boundary line. Or maybe your neighbor plain just wasn’t paying adequate attention.

It probably comes as no surprise that misunderstands happen.The real surprise may come in the myriad of different varieties of encroachments. Not all of them even manifest physically. Check this out.

The easiest way to describe an encroachment is that it is, quite simply, some kind of illegal intrusion onto property that belongs to someone else. Intrusions on highways or navigable rivers don’t even require actual obstructions. An intrusion that is simply illegal by nature is deemed adequate. For a street or highway, on the other hand, encroachments requires a fixture of some sort. Something as simple as even a wall or a fence is enough. All it takes for an encroachment to exist is an illegal intrusion or invasion of someone else’s property in some way.

Encroachment also brings up the additional legal issue of adverse possession. This term is the legal means by which someone can claim title to a parcel or portion of land to which they technically do not hold true title. Many factors need to be met in order to obtain title, or quiet title as most lawyers would say. This includes remaining in open, notorious, continuous and hostile possession of the piece of land in question for a specified statutory period. The length of time varies by state. If you do not want this occurring on your land, be sure to act quickly and effectively. It is sometimes wise also to seek the advice of a legal professional.

There’s also something called temporal encroachment, as a fun little aside. This is actually an action that affects a person’s perception of time, instead of being an actual structure. It can also affect a person’s ability to take action in the future, in the alternative. You can essentially tell that annoying co-worker of yours to stop temporally encroaching on your work day the next time they decide to stop by your desk to gossip for 20 minutes. See how they react to that!

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In the Seller’s Best Interest: The Contract for Deed

Thursday, June 23rd, 2011

Look no further than the contract for deed if you’re considering selling your home soon but are hoping to make a bit more of an immediate profit than what is traditionally made during the home selling process. Assuming you have the finances to pull it off, this legal real estate concept is a great way to achieve just that.

The contract for deed goes by a lot of different names, such as a land contract or even an installment sale contract. Much like other home sale contracts, both the seller and buyer enter into it, except this time the seller is the one providing the buyer the financing needed to buy the home. Instead of a bank or similar type of lending institution getting involved, the seller becomes this type of lender by providing the buyer funds to buy the home in its entirety.

While the buyer is allowed to take actual possession of the property for every conceivable use except legal ownership, you as seller retain legal title to the property as a result. The agreed upon price of the property is paid in installments, just like a traditional mortgage. At a much closer time to the sale of the house than would otherwise be typical in a traditional mortgage, usually what happens is a balloon payment is required. Before the seller agrees to offer financing, the buyer is also often required to make a downpayment.

The reasons why someone would choose a contract for deed over a traditional mortgage are varied. Using it as a form of short-term seller financing is one of the most common reasons. The seller stands to benefit in the long run a lot quicker, since the purchase price must usually be paid in full many years earlier than it would be in a traditional mortgage. Not having to pay additional closing fees for a lending institution to investigate a potential buyer’s financial background before determining whether or not they will approve a home mortgage for them is another reason.

Since the rules about contracts for deed vary by state, make sure to understand the laws in your own jurisdiction before proceeding. If a seller both has the money and trusts the buyer in such a way, offering a contract for deed could pay off in more ways than one for a seller.

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The FHA: Protecting Buyers and Renters from Housing Discrimination Since 1968

Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011

Imagine you have your sights on purchasing or renting property. Everything might seem perfect, until the subject of your child comes up. Maybe it’s the seller’s or landlord’s discovery that your unmarried partner lives with you and you plan to move in together. Other factors such as ethnicity, disability or religion can be just as easily substituted. In any event, not based on financial considerations, your offer to purchase or rent is subsequently denied.

The FHA, or Fair Housing Act, comes in at this point. Federal fair housing laws date back to the 1960s in the United States. As that was a time of great civil rights achievements, those surrounded the desegregation of all-white and all-black neighborhoods included, this makes sense.

Enacted in 1968, the Fair Housing Act went into effect on the federal level. The Fair Housing Act aimed to protect those vulnerable to discrimination based on certain criteria in the realm of property buying or renting. Lack was financial resources would soon become the only reason a landlord or a seller could restrict a buyer or renter from obtaining the property in question, instead of taking into account personal background, as a consequence of the Act.

When the Fair Housing Act was originally created, it prohibited housing discrimination based on race, color, religion and national origin. Six years later in 1974, sex also became a protected class. In 1988, disability and familial status, relating to the existence of children in a household, were also added. Many states’ fair housing laws mirror the federal Fair Housing Act exactly. Others, like California’s, are even more inclusive, naming sexual orientation as a protected class, as well.

If you believe you have experienced housing discrimination, a complaint needs to be filed with the Housing and Urban Development office (HUD). These complaints are investigated by the Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity (FHEO). If FHEO determines there is reasonable cause for the complaint, it will schedule a hearing before a HUD administrative law judge who will ultimately decide the case in question.

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The Highest and Best Use Principle: What It Is and How It Relates to Real Estate

Saturday, June 4th, 2011

American law is where the highest and best use principle has its roots. Principles of real estate appraisal are also an area to which it relates. The value of your home is extrinsically linked to this principle, as well.

Also known as HBU, the highest and best use is considered to be a use that is reasonably probable that produces the highest value for your property. It is essentially a designation that identifies a piece of property that has the potential to have a higher value if it was used for a different purpose. In real estate appraisals specifically, a piece of property is assessed at its highest or best use in order to maximize its total value and also to increase the money ultimately made from it.

In order to be determined to be a property’s highest and best use, each potential use must pass a set of tests. The use must usually meet tests to ensure it is legally allowable, physically possible, financially feasible and maximally productive, although this can vary.

Only uses that are allowed by law can be considered highest and best uses, first. Governmental regulations, zoning prohibitions, and deed and covenant restrictions are all uses that are not legally allowable.

Second, the property’s size, shape and terrain dictate its eligibility for the second factor often tested. If a highest and best use is not physically possible because it would require a larger plot of land, it does not meet this test. In the same vein, if a highest and best use requires a flat parcel of land and the land in question is mountainous, its highest and best use would not be physically possible, thus failing this test.

Feasibility in a financial sense is also required for a property’s highest and best use as a third test. Enough revenue must be generated to justify things like construction costs and profit for the builder in order for any proposed highest and best use of a property to be financially feasible. The highest and best use would not be considered financially feasible if it would cost more to improve the property than the property could ever hope to earn in revenue.

The highest possible return must be created for the builder in order for the last highest and best use test to be met. The property might still only have one of those uses as its highest and best use, even if any type of residential or commercial property could feasibly be built on the property. It must meet all four of these tests for a highest and best use of a property to be unquestioned.

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Dissatisfied With Your Property Tax Assessment? Here’s How to Fight it.

Monday, May 30th, 2011

In this day and age, the market is not strong. While there is hope that in the near future market rates will increase with a strong economy, homes are still losing their value quite rapidly. It’s an unfortunate situation, to be sure, but there is a silver lining. A drop in home values means your property assessment should also be lowered, lessening the property taxes you would owe in a given year.

What should you do if you think you received too high of an assessment? Would it benefit you to fight it at all? There is a possibility it would be.

Understanding how the county values your home is the first important thing to do. You can choose to do this with comparables and replacement or rebuilding value. You may have heard them referred to before as “comps,” and these are just a comparison between what other similar homes in your neighborhood sold for to figure out what yours might be worth. Assessors will note how much similar home sellers received during the sale in order to value your own home. Based on how much it is presumed to cost to replace your home, a bank can appraise the value of your home based on replacement or rebuilding value.

If you believe your home was valued too high, you must first build yourself a case for a lower property assessment. This can be done by meeting with assessor and informing him or her you believe you were assessed too high. Next, you must file an appeal. Most locations have a time limit for such an appeal, as well. 60 days tends to be about average, but it varies, so be sure to check what the actual time limit is where you live so you don’t miss out. During the appeal, you will go through an appeal board and give an eight to ten minute presentation. It is appropriate here to bring pictures with comparables and all the data supporting your case, such as floor plans on these comps that are similar to your own and any other evidence that your home was assessed too high.

Doing your research and filing an appeal is the most direct and uncomplicated way to fight your property assessment, despite there being other options. Dress and act professionally, as well as lay out the facts that support your side clearly and concisely during your presentation. If you’ve done your homework, you have a good shot. It’s definitely worth your time and effort in that case to fight your assessment and consequently reduce your annual property taxes.

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The Advantages Of A Vehicle Accident Advocate

Monday, May 23rd, 2011

In the event you have been injured in a car accident you need to call immediately an accident lawyer to help you handle the legal issues. This is extremely important because lawyers are the only qualified professionals able to negotiate your compensation with the insurance company.

You require an expert adviser that helps you to deal with your claim for compensations to cover your medical costs and other types of expenses related to the accident. Besides, a lawyer knows the legal time frame to start the negotiation. This way, with the assistance of your legal adviser you will be able to obtain the expected results from your insurance policy.

When you are injured in a car accident you can get a free consultation to check your personal case. Many elements will be analyzed to settle your rights and the possible compensation you can receive from your insurance company. Most of the time, they will be interested in reducing the amount of money you can get from them. That’s why, settling a specific amount to prevent you from other kinds of claims is a very common trick of insurance companies.

An expert lawyer can assist you when it comes to obtaining the compensation you deserve from your insurance company. Usually the lawyer receives an agreed percentage once the settlement is made. However, if you cannot get a fair agreement, the lawyer will take your case to court and you won’t have to pay for these services.

According to studies, people assisted by lawyers in these kinds of legal processes always get bigger settlements. When you have a car accident the best solution is hiring one of these professional lawyers that can protect your rights and financial interests and bring an action in case your company refuses to cover your expenses. This is the best way to guarantee you a proper development of this legal procedure.

The vast experience in law issues of these insurance companies makes them a very powerful rival. So, it is advisable to avoid facing them on your own. That’s why, the assistance of an expert lawyer is so essential to avoid negative results.

So, after a traffic accident you need to find the way to hire a legal adviser to help you with the insurance negotiations. This is the best solution to make your life easier and to obtain the best possible results from those kinds of actions. Remember, law is a complicated issue and only qualified and expert professionals are able to deal with these procedures. So, don’t try to swing against the tide. Hire a lawyer and you won’t have regrets.

Rick W. Star is an expert lawyer who has written several books related to insurance companies and frauds. He has given many conferences in different law faculties to help students realize the importance of a reliable accidents settlement lawyer. You can find many of his article at: www.srnlaw.com.

Tampa Injury Law Firm: Providing Unbeatable Legal Support

Saturday, November 13th, 2010

Filing for personal injury law suits can be made easily with the help of expert lawyers from Tampa injury Law firm. Nobody would like to risk their lives in an accident that is why people are getting so careful in their everyday dealings in their respective workplaces. But accidents can happen anytime and what is more hurting is that there are individuals who will take advantage of someone’s innocence of the injury law like insurance companies.

It is for the great benefit of the victims to file for injury law suits against the company but sometimes the legal expenses and professional fees will hinder them from doing so. But this is not the case with Tampa injury law firm because charging a portion from their claims takes place only when the court favors their side. Taking legal actions could be very exhausting due to stress of coming to court during litigation cases but your personal injury lawyers will make things easier for the aggrieved parties since representing the injured is their mission and coming up with concrete actions for fast resolution of your case is what they are aiming for.

Everybody works in a team in a Tampa injury law firm for there are other support groups who worked hand in hand to provide fast and quick response for the needs of the injured victims. They are the paralegals, team of responsible legal assistants and clerks ad investigators who are independently discovering on the in dept details of the case. The combined expertise of all professionally trained individuals and personal injury attorneys makes them the excellent legal representatives of the injured in any court proceedings.

Tampa injury law firm will give free assessment of your case once you hire their services. It’s all free only that the victim will undergo detailed personal assessment. If possible be honest and open to discuss the minute details of your injury and where it exactly happened. You’ll go through a step by step process after the case evaluation and your personal injury lawyers will represent you in court without monetary obligations on your end. The normal process of settlement claims will normally have 5 steps before it is settled. You go through prior consultation before the investigation proper, mediation comes next then arbitration and finally case litigation in court. It is the ardent hope and goal of your lawyers to achieve a winning case for their clients all the time.

Despite your fears and doubts about the possible outcome of your litigation case, you can now hope for the best thing to happen because you have the best team with you. They are not only experts in legal practice but also human beings with feelings for others. Tampa injury law firm conducts its activities in a systematic and orderly manner. They follow a step-by-step process to achieve satisfactory results for the injured. You can easily asses how they work by the number of cases they won in court.

If you are facing personal injury claims or other lawsuits, you need to visit Tampa Injury Law Firm for professional legal help.

No Win No Fee Claims - Obtaining Money For Your Auto Accident Personal Injury

Thursday, November 11th, 2010

Do you wish to find out more about no win no fee claims? We are going to speak more about getting paid for your car accident personal injury in this article.

Many people throughout the United states of america have had to deal with car accidents. If you feel it appears like the number of accidents that happen on our roads every day is rising you’re correct. This raises the number of people that are looking for details on no win no fee claims too. Let’s now go on to talk more about getting funds for your car accident personal injury.

If you’ve been injured and you aren’t sure what to do, avoid being afraid to ask questions. In the event you don’t ask questions you may never know all of the details that you have to know to file a claim and get the results that you really want to come out with in the end.

You will discover that all this term really means is that if you make a claim and do not win then you don’t have to pay any money whatsoever. There’s no retainer, no hourly charge or any other fees. The one thing that you are going to pay is a small percentage of your claim in the event the lawyer wins the case.

Most lawyers aren’t likely to take on a case such as this when they do not feel that they’ll win. If you’ve got a lawyer accept your claim in this manner you can be certain that they believe they have quite a good chance to win.

No win no fee claims certainly are a fantastic way to get the money that’s coming to you because you don’t have to put out any cash upfront.

Basically all that you simply need to do is locate a good car accident attorney in your area (or have someone else take action for you), get the information gathered together and present it to your attorney.

Once you have completed this you don’t have to stress out or worry anymore because the vehicle accident lawyer is going to take care of any problems that arise and if they have to contact you and ask any concerns then they’ll simply give you a call.

In this article we’ve discussed getting cash for your vehicle accident personal injury.

Ready To Get The Cash You Deserve? Get an auto accident settlement right now.

Tampa Personal Injury Attorney - Helping You Attain True Justice

Sunday, November 7th, 2010

It is possible that you or your loved one will experience a personal injury due to the fault of another person, and so you need the service of Tampa Personal Injury Attorney for your legal requirements. Getting all the required information from your attorney on dealing with your situation will help you feel less frustrated and disappointed. As a victim, you are entitled to more benefits and privileges aside from compensation to the extent of hospital bills and medicines that the offending party should pay you. You need to secure yourself from too much losses, may it be physical and financial loss. These needs can be address by your personal injury lawyer.

Your legal rights as a client and a victim

Discuss with Tampa Personal injury attorney everything that happened on the incident. Normally, you will undergo a preliminary assessment and interview with your lawyer to evaluate your case and to know the extent of the damages to you. Lawyers don’t charge you for this, since you haven’t signed a contract with them yet. To help them assess your case, say everything about the incident regardless if that information is relative to your injury or not. Every detail is important to evaluate the chances of winning your claims.

Before proceeding to the case, you should talk to Tampa personal injury attorney to haggle for the rate and discuss your proposed fees for his or her services. You should also consider the education, training and experience of your lawyer before hiring him or her. Remember that you will be spending money for their services so it is important for you to know if your lawyer is competent enough to win your case. There is personal injury case that needs the expertise of more than one attorney, make sure that before signing a contract you already discuss this matter with your attorney. This aspect is vital since you need to know the arrangement of fee sharing between the lawyers.

In every steps of the case, your Tampa Personal Injury Attorney should immediately inform you for every development including all possible results whether positive or negative. Your lawyer should also inform you beforehand if there are probable increase in the service fees and all other related costs. As the case ends, your lawyer will send you the closing statement for approval. Make sure that you carefully examined all the financial details of the statement before you sign it. You can refer it to another attorney to evaluate accuracy and fairness of the statement.

Important things to bear in mind

You might receive a lot of proposals from the attorney of the responsible party, so it is important that you refer it to your lawyer for further examination. Proposals made by other party usually is for the benefit of the offending party not for you, you will end up receiving measly benefits if the proposals were not properly evaluated You might be tempted by the offer, so you better ask advises from your Tampa personal injury attorney if you are going to accept it or not. Nonetheless, the final decision is still up to you as a client. So be careful and be keen to details for every decision made regarding your case.

Getting the best lawyer is demanding, so for all your legal problemscontact a Tampa personal injury attorney because Tampa lawyers are experienced in handling various cases.

What Are Low Interest Debt Consolidation Loans?

Wednesday, October 27th, 2010

Are you looking for a low interest debt consolidation loan? If you have bad credit, you might feel the quest is hopeless. A low interest debt consolidation loan is a loan that helps a person reduce his debt payments by lumping all debts into one, which may go on for longer, but which will demand lower repayment installments.

The disadvantage is that occasionally the debt consolidation schemes might cause your total debt to go up by a few hundred dollars because of additional arrangement and cancellation fees. It will also mean that it will take longer to repay your debts.

These programmes will also add one-off-charges, management charges and interest, which is quite normal, but it can feel as if you are beginning all over again.

However, it is better to start again in the correct manner, knowing that the repayments are affordable than to struggle on with the fear that one day you will not be able to meet all your financial responsibilities.

It is also far simpler to pay one bill per month than many and, if the worst comes to the worst, it is far simpler to renegotiate a loan with one lender than it is with many.

Many a low interest debt consolidation loan requires collateral before approval is granted for the loan. In this event, you want to be careful of what collateral is expected of you, since some loans might require that you put your home as collateral. If you cannot repay the debt, then the lender will repossess your home and put you out on the street.

Most people would not want to risk this, but, if you have other quality collateral, it may be in your best interest to take the gamble if it represents a sound way out of debt.

A low interest debt consolidation loan has a rate of interest attached to it. This means that you will pay the interest rate and the monthly installment toward the amount owed. The advantage of a low interest debt consolidation loan is that it presents a way to get out of debt. Therefore, you ought to look for a low interest debt consolidation loan that has a low rate of interest and low monthly repayments.

How should you go about looking for a low interest debt consolidation loan? To start with, you should avoid advertising ploys talking about low interest debt consolidation loans, since most of the scams are devised to suck in borrowers who are less knowledgeable about low interest debt consolidation loan measures.

So, once the low interest debt consolidation loan has been approved, you will observe that the rate of interest is higher than for regular loans. This is because you have already proved yourself to be a bad credit risk and they are hoping that you will be willing to pay for doing wrong. Therefore, instead of going on line and looking for a loan, you might want to check with the local banks first.

If the banks cannot give you a low interest debt consolidation loan, then ask for suggestions from family members and friends you trust. You could also go to a Citizens’ Advice Bureau, if you do not want your friends to know that you are experiencing financial difficulties.

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