Md.'s highest court to hear ground-rent registry challenge
Maryland's highest court will consider a challenge to the state law that wipes out ground rents not registered before a September deadline.
Charles J. Muskin, trustee for a family estate that includes ground rents, sued last year, arguing that the law amounted to an unconstitutional taking of property.
A Baltimore judge ruled in favor of the state, saying the registration rule didn't "retroactively create or eliminate property rights, but instead, prospectively conditions the continued ownership of ground rents on compliance with the requirement of registration." Now the state Court of Appeals will review the case.
Another challenge to the raft of ground-rent reform laws passed in 2007 is headed for trial in Anne Arundel County. That class-action suit contends the changes to the way owners are allowed to collect past-due accounts, intended to keep investors from seizing homes over small debts, made ground rents effectively worthless.
The constitutionality of the registry is an interesting legal question, and some will be waiting anxiously for the court's opinion.
On one side are ground-rent owners who didn't register -- many of whom (at least among those who have contacted me) are elderly and were unaware of the provision. On the other are the homeowners who rushed to officially extinguish the ground rent on their property after it wasn't registered, and who don't like the thought that it might come back from the dead.
Muskin, an Anne Arundel County Circuit Court master, was aware of the law but said he only managed to register about two-thirds of the family's 300 ground rents because he tried unsuccessfully to sell before starting the process.
What would happen to the extinguished ground rents if he prevails, I asked?
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Comments
We are a 3 unit condo in which we have had to pay ground for years(and was so before us). If someone else owns the land since we have to pay ground rent to them, why do we have to pay taxes on the land since it is not ours? Also, how can we verify that the ground rent claim is even valid? Any ideas?
Posted by: Pat | February 19, 2011 5:49 PM
More on the tax question in this post (and the comments): http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/business/realestate/blog/2011/01/what_to_do_about_an_extinguished_ground_rent.html
To see if there's a registered ground rent on your property, go here: http://sdatcert3.resiusa.org/rp_rewrite/
Once there, choose your jurisdiction, select "street address" as the search option, put in your address and see if there's a link to "ground rent registration" near the top right corner of the property-information page that pops up.
Posted by: Jamie Smith Hopkins | February 19, 2011 7:06 PM
I think the state went about this wrong because they don't have the money or desire to go about it the right way.
What is the right way? The state should have researched ground rents for all real property. Then they should have published their list and allowed a reasonable period of time for anyone left off to add their ground rents to the list (as long as they could legally prove it).
But the way the state did it appears to be more a way to eliminate ground rents by placing the entire burden of proof of ownership on the ground rent holders.
Posted by: Paul | February 20, 2011 8:44 AM
this ground rent scam is thieft really ,because i own my house and my land ,but i have to pay a rent on for it to somebody else ,that's wrong I am going to fight this .
This is not england
Posted by: sam | November 7, 2011 1:33 PM