“Veto
#153 - An Act to amend the real property actions and proceedings
law, in relation to adverse possession” - State of New York, Executive Chamber, Aug. 28.
2007
Governor Eliot Spitzer vetoed Senate Bill Number 5364-A, to
amend New York’s adverse possession statutes to provide
that a possessor’s actual knowledge of the true ownership
of property will bar a claim of title by adverse possession.
“This bill could have significant adverse consequences
for New York property owners.”… “[I]f this
bill becomes law, a homeowner could be sued by a third party
who claims to be the ‘true’ owner of
the property, and could assert that the homeowner was told this
in a conversation that occurred 25 years earlier.”
See Also
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In-Depth Information
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 “Gov.
Spitzer Vetoes Bill That Would Have Muddled Law of Adverse Possession”
- By Carol W. LaGrasse, Reprinted from the New York Property
Rights Clearinghouse, Vol. 11, No. 4 (PRFA, Fall 2007
On August 28, Governor Eliot Spitzer vetoed a bill that was
said to “reform” the law of adverse possession,
but would have made it difficult obtain title insurance in New
York State and precipitated a host of new lawsuits by setting
up a new test for adverse possession of whether the adverse possessor
had “knowledge” of the correct boundary.
The bill had passed with only two opposing votes, but the Real
Property Section of the State Bar Association and the Property
Rights Foundation let their opposition be known to the Governor
after passage by the legislature.
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- Letter in Opposition
to S 5364 - To Amend the Real Property Actions and Proceedings
Law, In Relation to Adverse Possession - By Carol W. LaGrasse,
President, Property Rights Foundation of America, to Amanda Hiller,
Assistant Counsel to the Governor, August 20, 2007
“The bill passed by the Legislature would poke a hole
in the law of adverse possession by adding the subjective standard
that adverse possession would not apply if the claimant had ‘acquired
actual knowledge’ that he did not have valid title
to the land.” This “would create confusion
in title in New York State by eliminating the ability to quiet
title after a standard statute of limitations.”
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- “Adverse
Possession Heats Up In Legislature After Court Ruling”
- by Carol W. LaGrasse, Reprinted from New York Property Rights
Clearinghouse, Vol. 11, No. 3 (PRFA Summer 2007)
Although a survey existed in the case of Walling v. Przybylo,
both sides were mistaken about the boundary between their properties
until the Przybylos had a survey done many years after they owned
their property. After the 2006 ruling adhering to the traditional
law of adverse possession in favor of the Wallings by the New
York State Court of Appeals, the Legislature reacted in sympathy
to the Przybylos, who lost a strip of surveyed property, by passing
a bill in 2007 that would create a hole in the law of adverse
possession by stopping the claimant’s right if he
can be deemed to have knowledge of the formally surveyed boundary.
However, the traditional law of adverse possession serves the
important purpose of establishing a statute of limitations and
allowing the claimant to quiet title, and should not be muddied.
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