Land Law

Land Law Revision Guide for First-Year LLB Students

A topic-by-topic breakdown of what actually gets tested, with cases, traps, and exam technique for first-year land law.

Land law has a reputation for being the hardest first-year subject, and honestly, it earns it. The concepts are abstract, the vocabulary is archaic, and the statute you need most (the Land Registration Act 2002) reads like it was written to confuse. But the exam questions are actually quite predictable once you know the architecture of the subject. This guide takes you through the major topics, tells you what examiners are really testing, and flags the cases you need to know cold.

The Foundations You Cannot Skip

Before anything else, you need to understand the distinction between legal and equitable interests in land. It sounds basic. Students consistently underestimate it and then lose marks on every question because they get the proprietary effect wrong.

Legal interests bind the world. Full stop. If a legal easement or legal charge has been properly created and (where required) registered, anyone who buys the land takes it subject to that interest, no questions asked. Equitable interests are more fragile. Whether they bind a purchaser depends on the registration system.

England and Wales runs a registered land system under the Land Registration Act 2002 for most land, with old unregistered land rules still alive for land that hasn't triggered first registration. Your exam will probably focus on registered land, but check your syllabus. Some modules still test unregistered land in detail.

For registered land, the core framework is:

• Registered charges and registered easements appear on the register and bind everyone.
• Overriding interests under Schedule 3 LRA 2002 bind purchasers even without registration. The big ones are legal easements (paragraph 3) and interests of persons in actual occupation (paragraph 2).
• Minor interests need to be protected by a notice or restriction on the register. If they aren't protected, a purchaser for valuable consideration takes free of them.

The actual occupation override (Schedule 3, paragraph 2) is a favourite exam topic. Know the conditions: the person must be in actual occupation at the date of disposition, their interest must not have been disclosed on reasonable enquiry, and their occupation must not be reasonably discoverable where the disposition is registered. Williams and Glyn's Bank v Boland [1981] AC 487 is the leading authority here, though check whether your module has updated you on how courts have refined "actual occupation" since.

Leases: The Certainty of Term Problem

A lease requires three things to be valid: certainty of term, exclusive possession, and rent (though the third is contested after Street v Mountford [1985] AC 809). Examiners love the certainty of term requirement because it produces some genuinely strange results.

The rule from *Lace v Chantler* [1944] KB 368 is that a lease must be for a fixed or ascertainable maximum duration at the time of grant. In that case, a tenancy "for the duration of the war" failed because nobody knew at the outset how long the war would last. A lease cannot have an uncertain maximum term.

That rule was confirmed and extended in *Mexfield Housing Co-operative v Berrisford* [2011] UKSC 52, which is a genuinely interesting case and one you should read properly. The tenancy in Mexfield ran month to month but contained clauses restricting when the landlord could terminate. The Supreme Court held that because the term was uncertain, it could not take effect as a lease at law under the Lace v Chantler rule. The court then reached for an old Chancery solution: treating it as a lease for life (which under s.149(6) LPA 1925 converts into a 90-year term). That saved the tenant. The reasoning is convoluted, but the takeaway for exams is clear: always check whether a lease satisfies certainty of term before you go anywhere near the landlord and tenant relationship.

Distinguishing a Lease from a Licence

Exclusive possession is the key test from Street v Mountford. If you have exclusive possession of premises for a term at a rent, the courts will treat it as a tenancy regardless of what the document calls it. Landlords tried calling arrangements "licences" to avoid security of tenure legislation. Courts were not fooled.

The traps in problem questions are the "sham" clauses. A clause saying the landlord can move the occupier to another room at will, or that the landlord can share the premises with the occupier, will be ignored if it is not a genuine commercial term but just a device to avoid the Rent Acts. AG Securities v Vaughan [1990] 1 AC 417 and Antoniades v Villiers [1990] 1 AC 417 (decided together) show how courts apply this. Four occupiers in AG Securities had separate agreements at different times: genuine licences. The couple in Antoniades had identical agreements signed simultaneously: a sham. The practical question is always whether the clause reflects reality.

Trusts of Land and Co-ownership

When two or more people own land together, they hold it on a trust of land under the Trusts of Land and Appointment of Trustees Act 1996 (TOLATA). This is where land law and equity overlap, and where the exam questions get factually messy.

The two forms of co-ownership you need are the joint tenancy and the tenancy in common. Joint tenants hold as one unit: there are no separate shares, and survivorship applies (the last survivor takes everything). Tenants in common hold in distinct shares. No survivorship. You can leave your share by will.

Severance converts a joint tenancy into a tenancy in common in equity. The legal title remains jointly held (you cannot sever the legal estate, only the equitable interest). Methods of severance under Williams v Hensman (1861) 1 J&H 546 are:

1. Written notice under s.196 LPA 1925 (must be in writing, served on all other joint tenants)
2. Act operating on a party's own share (e.g. mortgage, assignment)
3. Mutual agreement
4. Mutual conduct

Forfeiture rules after Dunbar v Plant [1998] Ch 412 add a further wrinkle: if a joint tenant unlawfully kills the co-owner, the forfeiture rule prevents them profiting. But courts can modify this under the Forfeiture Act 1982. That fact pattern appears in problem questions more than you'd expect.

Disputes Under TOLATA

Section 14 TOLATA 1996 lets any interested person apply to court for an order concerning the trust. Section 15 lists the factors the court considers: the intentions of those who created the trust, the purposes for which the property is held, the welfare of any minor occupying the property, and the interests of any secured creditor.

When the co-owner is bankrupt, s.335A Insolvency Act 1986 takes over. After one year from the bankruptcy, there is a presumption in favour of sale unless the circumstances are exceptional. "Exceptional" is interpreted very narrowly. Re Citro [1991] Ch 142 established that personal hardship to a spouse and children is not in itself exceptional. That is a harsh outcome and examiners know students find it uncomfortable. Acknowledge the policy tension: the creditors' interests vs. the family home.

Constructive Trusts and Resulting Trusts: The Cohabitation Problem

This is the topic that generates the most problem question marks. An unmarried cohabitant has no statutory rights on separation (unlike a spouse under the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973). Their only routes to an interest in the family home are:

• A resulting trust (rare now in the domestic context after Stack v Dowden [2007] UKHL 17)
• A common intention constructive trust
• Proprietary estoppel

The leading case is *Lloyds Bank plc v Rosset* [1991] 1 AC 107. Lord Bridge set out the two-stage test. First: was there an express common intention (an agreement, arrangement or understanding between the parties that both would have an interest)? If yes, did the claimant rely on it to their detriment? Second: if there was no express agreement, can an intention be inferred from direct contributions to the purchase price or mortgage?

The controversial bit is Lord Bridge's second category. He said that "in the absence of... agreement... the court must rely entirely on the conduct of the parties." And he suggested only direct financial contributions would do. Subsequent cases, particularly Stack v Dowden and Jones v Kernott [2011] UKSC 53, have loosened this in the domestic context. The court now looks at the whole course of dealing to determine the parties' intentions. But Rosset remains the formal starting point, and the tension between Rosset and Stack v Dowden is itself examinable.

Know the distinction between acquisition (do you have a share at all?) and quantification (how big is that share?). Stack v Dowden is mainly about quantification once an interest is established.

Easements

An easement is a right over someone else's land. The four characteristics from Re Ellenborough Park [1956] Ch 131 are:

1. There must be a dominant and servient tenement.
2. The easement must accommodate and serve the dominant tenement.
3. The dominant and servient tenements must be owned or occupied by different persons.
4. The right must be capable of forming the subject matter of a grant.

That fourth characteristic is the one that generates essay questions. Courts have used it to reject rights that are too vague, that amount to exclusive possession, or that would require positive action from the servient owner. Regency Villas Title Ltd v Diamond Resorts (Europe) Ltd [2018] UKSC 57 extended easements to recreational rights over a leisure complex. Know this case if your module covers it.

Creation of easements: express grant, implied grant, or prescription. Implied grant is where exams get difficult. Wheeldon v Burrows (1879) 12 Ch D 31 implies easements for quasi-easements that were continuous and apparent, necessary for reasonable enjoyment, and exercised by the grantor before the grant. Section 62 LPA 1925 is broader: it can convert a licence or precarious right into a legal easement on a conveyance, which was the point of Wood v Waddington [2015] EWCA Civ 538.

Prescription requires 20 years of use as of right (without force, without secrecy, without permission) in the case of common law prescription or the Prescription Act 1832.

Mortgages

Mortgages are often on first-year syllabuses and often underprepared. The key points:

• A mortgage cannot be a clog on the equity of redemption. The mortgagor's right to redeem must be real and not illusory.
• The mortgagee's power of sale under s.101 LPA 1925 arises when the legal mortgage money is due. It becomes exercisable under s.103 when one of three conditions is met: notice has been served and three months elapsed, interest is two months in arrears, or the mortgagor has breached a covenant.
• Courts can adjourn possession proceedings under s.36 Administration of Justice Act 1970 if the mortgagor is likely to repay within a reasonable period. What counts as reasonable? The courts have said the remaining term of the mortgage in some cases.

For the mortgagee's duty in selling, Cuckmere Brick Co v Mutual Finance [1971] Ch 949 established that the mortgagee must take reasonable care to obtain the true market value. They can choose when to sell. They cannot sell at a deliberately undervalue.

Covenants Affecting Freehold Land

The rules on the running of covenants are notoriously complicated and a frequent source of exam questions.

At law, the benefit runs with the land at common law if the covenant touches and concerns the land, was intended to run, and the claimant has a legal estate. The burden does not run with the land at law: Austerberry v Oldham Corporation (1885) 29 Ch D 750, confirmed by Rhone v Stephens [1994] 2 AC 310.

In equity, the benefit passes under Renshaw v Bean principles or annexation (including s.78 LPA 1925 after Federated Homes v Mill Lodge Properties [1980] 1 WLR 594). The burden passes in equity under the Tulk v Moxhay (1848) rule: the covenant must be restrictive, it must touch and concern the land, there must be a dominant tenement benefited, and the purchaser must have notice (in practice, it must be registered).

The distinction between positive and restrictive covenants is essential. A covenant to maintain a fence is positive. A covenant not to build is restrictive. Only the burden of restrictive covenants runs in equity. This produces the situation where one neighbour is bound by a restriction but not by a positive obligation, which is why estate management schemes and commonhold (a separate regime under the Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Act 2002) exist.

How to Actually Revise This Subject

Land law rewards structured thinking more than memory alone. In a problem question, work methodically:

1. Identify every interest, right, or claim that might exist.
2. Classify each as legal or equitable.
3. Ask whether it was validly created (formalities: s.52 LPA 1925 for legal interests, s.53 LPA 1925 for equitable, s.2 LP(MP)A 1989 for contracts).
4. Ask whether it is protected against a purchaser (registered, overriding, or protected by notice/restriction).
5. Apply the relevant remedy or outcome.

Essay questions usually want you to engage with a tension or a reform debate. The Rosset vs Stack v Dowden tension on constructive trusts is one. The failure of the burden of positive covenants to run at law is another. The Law Commission has repeatedly proposed reform. Knowing what the Commission recommended (and why Parliament hasn't acted) is genuinely useful in an essay.

For case reading and past paper practice, the Land Law topic hub is a good starting point for building your case list. And if you want to test your answers under exam conditions, past papers with model answers will show you what a complete answer actually looks like, which is worth more than reading another textbook chapter the night before.