in this lesson we're going to break down easements profits and licenses so big picture the easement is a non possessory right to use land in the possession of another right so important to recognize from the top right that the easement is an interest in real property right so if we're conveying an easement to a party right that does if we're trying to do it expressly it triggers the statute of frauds because we're conveying an interest in real property but important to recognize that it's a non possessory interest right it's a non possessory right to use the land in possession of another if you think back to our discussion of present estates right freehold and non freehold estates we said those were possessory interests possessory estates where the holder of that possessory interest or that possessory estate could freely use and enjoy the land right there wasn't a lot of scope of limitation to their use and enjoyment they have possessory rights to use and enjoy the land right the easement is much more narrow in scope right it still creates an interest in real property right so if we're doing expressly we know it triggers the statute of frauds but it's a non possessory right to use land in possession of another so it is distinguished from our freehold and non freehold present estates right remember the life estate the fee simple estate right all of our non freehold estates the tendency for years the tenancy it will the periodic tenancy all of these estates are possessory interests and real property right the easement is a non possessory interest and real property and it's really limited right it's the right to use land in the possession of another usually what we think about most classically right you're just crossing somebody's land to get access to something usually a road right that's what this is kind of illustrating right this guy who owns parcel B might want to use parcel a to get to this road to get access to this road parcel be right the guy who lives at parcel B might want to cross parcel AIDS land to get access to this road that's kind of the classic easement right what we might call an access easement it's a non possessory right to use the land in possession of another right it's not giving you a possessory interest you can't just go onto parcel A's land and use and enjoy the land however you want it's much more limited right it's a non possessory right to use the land in possession of another for usually a really narrow purpose right to get access to this road or whatever that purpose is right so if you're thinking about this in terms of kind of like a hierarchy right at the top we might have present estates that actually do convey possessory interest in the property right this would be like the life estate fee simple all of our non freehold estates and landlord tenant law right tenancy for years tenancy it will the periodic tenancy all of those would be possessory interests to use and enjoy the land right below that we have the easement which is still a real property interest which can trigger the statute of frauds we're trying to convey an easement expressly we know there's gonna ask me in writing has to satisfy some formality requirements because it's still conveying an interest and real property but it's a non possessory interest it's a non possessory right to use the land for a more limited purpose right usually to get access to something like a road right and so below the easement so if the easements kind of in the middle right so at the top of our hierarchy we have like present estates right possessory interests and real property then we have non possessory rights to use the land this would be like the easement below that it would be the license right a license is an informal usually revocable permission to use the land of another for a really narrow purpose right the key distinction between the license in the easement is that the license doesn't convey an actual interest in real property it can be very informal it's usually revocable right it can be done orally and probably most of us use licenses engage in licenses is on a daily basis right every time you go into a store right that store is giving you a license to come on to their land and use it for a narrow purpose right a revocable permission to come onto their land and maybe right shop for goods purchase goods right that would be a license they're not actually conveying an interest in real property to every patron that comes into their store right they're just giving them permission a temporary license informally to come into their store for a very narrow scope right to shop and purchase goods right so at the low end we have the license right it's just an informal permission it does not trigger the statute of frauds it can be granted orally or implicitly right you put an open sign on the store right that implicitly grants a license to pass advise to come into your store to shop for goods right above that would be the easement where we actually are conveying an interest in real property so that triggers the statute of frauds we have all the formality requirements that are involved in doing that right so that's still though non-possessory as an interest above that we would have like present estates which are actual possessory interests and real property right so that's kind of our hierarchy and the profit falls in the middle it operates like an easement right a profit is the right to enter the land of another similar to the easement but the difference is once you're on the land you can remove natural resources things like timber oil gas minerals right whatever you're removing so the profit operates very similarly to the easement the main difference is a profit gives you a little bit more of a right right because it's a little bit broader in scope because it's actually letting you remove physical substances from the land where an easement usually you're not going to have the right to actually remove anything from the land right so that's the difference between the easement and the profit but otherwise they actually operate very similarly but for our purposes in this lesson we're really going to focus on the easement right because this is what we're going to see most often tested in real property but we want to be aware of the profit want to be aware of easements profits and licenses right has rights in land okay but with that we can jump right into the easement right and we'll come back we'll circle back to the licenses we'll see that in some situations right the license can actually become irrevocable right which effectively creates an easement so we'll talk about how that happens we're gonna circle back and flush all of these concepts out in more detail I just want to kind of give a big picture first with that we can jump into the easement right so again an easement is a non possessory right to use land in the possession of another so step one we do have some terminology we want to define that will become important as we work through some examples right we have this idea of the dominant land in the serviette land sometimes you hear this referred to as the dominant estate or the serbian to state i'm gonna call a dominant land in serbian land that's just how i think of it and my head either way it's the same thing right so the dominant land refers to the land that is benefited by the easement the serbian land refers to land that is burdened by the easement so in this illustration right here right parcel B would have the benefit of these men so we'd say parcel B is the dominant land parcel a is burdened by the easement right so we'd say parcel a is the servant land right because parcel B gets to cross parcel a to get to the road right so parcel B has the benefit of crossing parcel a parcel a has the burden of parcel B crossing to get to the road so parcel B's are dominant land parcel a is our Serbian land right pretty Strait board also we have this distinction between easements after tenant and easements and gross an easement appurtenant benefits the holder as the owner of the dominant land and easement and gross is personal to the holder it benefits the holder whether or not he owns any other parcels of land right so with easements and gross really no dominant land exists and the reason the distinction is important is because with an easement a poor tenant right the easement actually attaches to the land so if that land transfers right parcel B this is an easement after tenant so if parcel be the owner of parcel B transfers parcel B to somebody else they convey the property that easement has attached to the land it'll go with the conveyance it attaches to it so that new owner gets the easement easement and gross does not attach to the land it's personal to the holder right so if you have an easement and gross it does not attach to the land right but more frequently you're going to see the easement appurtenant right this is an easement that benefits the holder as the owner of the dominant land right in other words here if we look at this example the only person that can benefit from this easement right to cross parcel a to get to this road is the owner of parcel B no one else can benefit by this you have to be the owner of this dominant land to get the benefit of crossing parcel a to get to this road a an easement and gross is the opposite raised personal to the holder there is no dominant land right it benefits the holder whether or not he owns any other parcels of land imagine that there were just right power lines crossing across parcel a right an electric company owns power lines that go across parcel a right well it doesn't matter whether or not that power line company has any parcels of land around here right it just benefits them as the holder of the easement having those power lines go across parcel a is personal to that power line company it's not going to attach to any land because there is no dominant land right the power company could be way over here right it's got these power lines crossing all these people's land right there is no dominant land there right the power line company just is that has a personal benefit of these of these power lines crossing people's land right there is no dominant land whereas with something like this we clearly have dominant land servant land and the only person who can benefit from this easement is the owner of the dominant land so that would be an easement after tenant right so that attached is to parcel be whoever gets parcel be wood whoever the owner is is going to receive that easement ladies man grouse would just be like the power lines crossing through land there is no dominant adjacent land right the power line company could be way down here off the map it doesn't matter there is no dominant land right it benefits the power line company whether or not that power line company owns any other land right it's a personal benefit to the power line company so it doesn't attach to any land right that's the difference between the easement appurtenant in the easement in gross all right with that we can jump into express easements will see that use mints can be created expressly or implicitly in certain situations right now remember we said that the conveyance of an easement is the conveyance of an interest in real property we know conveyance Azur transfers of interest and real property triggers the statute of frauds so to expressly create an easement right it's going to satisfy the statute of frauds we probably are very familiar at this point with what the statute of frauds requirements are but we'll run through them in terms of an easement right so the Express easement is voluntarily created by a written instrument usually this would probably be a deed but any written instrument right a deed or a will is what you might most commonly see but it could be any written instrument right net written instrument must be in writing number one has to be signed by the grantor has to identify the grantor and grantee that's to contain words that manifests intent to create an easement and has to describe the affected land right so most of these elements are if you see an express easement being tested are going to be very binary the facts are they're going to give it to you or not either you're going to have a writing or you're not either the writing is going to be signed by the grantor or it's not it's either going to identify the grantor or grantee or it's not so we're going to describe the affected land or it's not that's all given to you in the fact pattern you just want to look for it all right the third elements the only one that has maybe a little bit of nuance right there in instrument has to contain words that manifest intent to create an ease all right so we want to see language that looks formal like we're actually trying to convey an interest and real property if you see something really informal it might satisfy these other elements but it's not going to contain words that actually manifest and tend to create an easement right imagine you see a note - signed by a neighbor that says something like hey your son left a toy over at my house last weekend feel free to come by my house let yourself in through the back door and retrieve the toy anytime you want right well that would satisfy a lot of these elements right it's in writing it could be signed by the grantor it identifies both parties and it describes the affected land the problem is it doesn't contain words that manifest intend to create an easement right that's more like a license it's very informal very narrow in scope right we're not actually trying to convey an interest in the property to this grantee right the person who wrote that note is just saying hey look if you got some spare time you can come by and retrieve your toy you can come on to my property temporarily to get that right that's much more of a license right that doesn't actually contain words that manifest intent to create an easement right to create an interest in real property we need to see language that's like you know look we're try ideally you'd want to see the word easement and the language right I'm granting you and easement to use the land to do this task right that's the language we're looking for not hey you can swing by my house and retrieve your kids toy right that's not going to create an easement but otherwise if these elements are satisfied right it's in writing and signed by the grantor it identifies the grantor grantee contains words that manifest intend to create an easement and it describes the affected land okay you have an express easement okay but what about oral easements right somebody says orally you know you might see this on a fact pattern hey I'm granting you an easement to use my land to cross my property to get access to this road you know I plan on letting you have this easement for the next five years whatever right they orally state everything doesn't satisfy the statute of frauds but of course that other side relies on that to their detriment we'll see if these elements are satisfied we can actually have an irrevocable license because we know orally remember at the start of this lesson we said hey look licenses can be done orally they're very informal so if we start with a revocable license right an oral license we'll see if certain detrimental reliance elements are satisfied that license can actually become irrevocable so our three elements we'd really be looking for is number one that a license was actually granted remember this could be oral right the requirements for a license are much lower so we could have an oral license if granted the licensee spend substantial money or labor in good faith reliance on the license not being revoked right so we'd want to see something that the license or says right when that license is granted right we'd want to see the license or give some indication that it's not going to be revoked anytime soon like hey you know you can use this property to cross at this point get access to this road you know as long as I'm the owner of this property right you can do this and that with the property you know we'd want to see something that makes it a good faith reliant on the license not being revoked right so of course say the licensee then goes out and spends a lot of money or labor to do something right say you know a person says hey look you can come fishing and my pond anytime you want you can come use my lake you can come across my property and use my lake anytime you want to go boating or to fish whatever right so we're granting a license this is all orally I am in imagine though that that other person the neighbor goes and builds a bridge you know that cost ten thousand dollars to get access to this pond or this lake right well now that licensee right has spent substantial money and labor in good faith reliance on that license not being revoked right they're not going to spend $10,000 on this bridge to get to the lake if they think it's going to be right and then finally we need the license or to have known or should have known that the reliance would occur so we'd look for some sort of response from the licensee right maybe this oral license is granted right the license or says something like hey you know you can use my pond anytime you want as long as I live here you're always free to come back and use my pond my lake whatever for fishing or boating you know we'd love to just have you use it whenever you want right say that then the licensee responds great you know I'm gonna go ahead then and build this bridge it's gonna cost a lot of money to go and use your lake and the license sources yeah sure you know that sounds good right well then then we could say okay well the licensure knew that reliance would occur because that was indicated to the license or all right so if all three of those elements are met we would have that license right the original oral license we would say becomes irrevocable right at that point once that detrimental reliance has occurred the license or is going to be stopped from revoking that license right in terms of equities why we sometimes call this equitable estoppel right because they're now going to be received they're now going to be a stop from revoking that license right so in effect this isn't now an easement by estoppel right because the license or is a stopped from revoking the license you now have an irrevocable license so essentially it's an easement by estoppel if those three elements are satisfied right this would be your kind of classic detrimental reliance equitable estoppel right exception to the statute of frauds requirements but this is how it plays out in terms of the easement right so you want to look for an aural grant of a license or even that back pattern where we have the note right hey feel free to come by and pick up your kids toy imagine the note says something like hey you know we loved having you over at the barbecue last week anytime you want to come and use our lake for boating or fishing whatever you want feel free to do it we'd love to have you anytime you know you want you come by and use all that's written in the note right well it's probably still not an easement because they're not manifesting intend to create an easement it doesn't rise the level of manifesting an actual you know Express easement to create an interest in real property but that still would be granting a license in written form it just doesn't satisfy this third element so if the other two are met right the licensee goes out and builds the bridge spends lots of money to do that and the licensure knew or should have known that this guy was going to go out and build the bridge and spend all the money to do that then we could have that license that little note right that granted the license could become irrevocable essentially a stopping the license or from revoking the license which we would then say is really ease men by estoppel okay so two main situations we look out for maybe like the informal note that somebody relies on to their detriment or an oral license is granted and somebody relies on that to their detriment that's what we're thinking about with easement by estoppel okay so that's the Express easement and easement by estoppel from there we can move on to the implied easement we'll see we really have like three different types of the implied easement thank you so much for watching this video preview of our legal education accelerator program or leap for short if you would like to see the conclusion of this video and gain full access to our entire 1l and 2l video library integrated outlines streamable audio versions additional practice exams with explanations and much more we invite you to head over to our website and join the thousands of law students who have already enrolled to get started with your no risk free trial today simply click the link in the description box below or visit www.flashmavi.com for [Music] hi everyone my name is Serena and I'm currently a law student at South Texas College of Law Houston hi everybody my name is Shiva and I'm currently a law student at Southwestern hi everyone my name is Michelle and I am a first year student at South Texas College of Law Houston I used the Student Code a study video series last semester to help me prepare mostly for contracts and I actually made an A+ in contracts last semester which I greatly dedicate to the Student Code of videos by using pseudo kata to help me prepare for my final exam I was able to score the highest grade out of my class on the final and even have my essay distributed as the model answer not to mention I had done quite poorly on the midterm and was struggling throughout the whole course of the semester understanding the material and keeping up with lectures because of the Student Code of video lectures I was able to go into my 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