Property Law Developments—Joseph William Singer

The Supreme Judicial Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts held that a man who entered into a civil union with another man in Vermont could not marry a different man in Massachusetts before dissolving the civil union. Elia-Warnken v. Elia, 463 Mass. 29, 2012 Mass. LEXIS 678 (Mass. 2012). The court dismissed divorce proceedings in Massachusetts on the ground that the marriage was void from the beginning since one of the men was still “married” (under a “civil union”) to another man in Vermont. The result denied the “spouse” in Massachusetts any remedies such as equitable distribution of property on the ground that otherwise one person would be married to two people at once with conflicting support obligations. The court cited an article of mine, Joseph William Singer, Same–Sex Marriage, Full Faith and Credit, and the Evasion of Obligation, 1 Stan. J. C.R. & C.L. 1, 29, 36, 50 (2005). Presumably, an action to dissolve the Vermont civil union could still be made but that would not generate  any property remedy against the Massachusetts spouse because that spousal relation never legally existed under the Massachusetts bigamy statute. The court did not address whether there might be any equitable or common law remedies based on a claim of constructive trust or unjust enrichmnet or fraud for failure to reveal the prior relationship.

Applying the standards set down by the Second Circuit in Oneida Indian Nation of N.Y. v. Madison County, 605 F.3d 149 (2d Cir. 2010, a federal district in New York affirmed that a county could not foreclose on tribal land for nonpayment of state property taxes on the ground that the tribe has sovereign immunity that it has not waived and that has not been abrogated by federal law. Cayuga Indian Nation of N.Y. v. Seneca County, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 117245 (W.D.N.Y. 2012).

In Washington state, lenders typically use the deed of trust form for mortgages where the lender is the “beneficiary” of the trust and the “trustee” has the power to act to protect the beneficiary’s interest by foreclosing on the property if the borrower defaults on the note (the underlying loan). MERS is typically listed as the beneficiary of the deed of trust rather than the lender that actually issued the loan  (and signed the note) in order to avoid having to record future assignments of the mortgage; the deed of trust is recorded listing MERS as the beneficiary rather than the lender that issued the note to the borrower/homeowner. Interpreting the meaning of the word “beneficiary” in state foreclosure statutes, the Washington Supreme Court agreed with other courts that have held that MERS is not actually the beneficiary of the note and thus has no power to initiate a nonjudicial foreclosure of the property upon default of the payments. Bain v. Metropolitan Mortgage Group, Inc., 2012 WL 3517326 (Wash. 2012).

The court refused to say what the consequences of this ruling would be, although it did suggest that the proper party to bring the foreclosure is the current holder of the note who actually possesses the note or can demonstrate the chain of transactions that makes it the beneficiary of the note. The court also suggested that MERS might act as an agent of the actual beneficiary but only if it could identify the principal and prove that it had been granted agency power to act on behalf of that principal.

The court also held that the facts might present a violation of the state consumer protection act because MERS misrepresented itself as the beneficiary to the borrower, thus engaging in a deceptive business practice. Whether the statute was violated depended on whether the borrower could show that she was injured by the deceptive statement. This is a potentially explosive ruling because MERS’s entire business model depends on listing it, rather than the lender, as the “mortgagee” or “beneficiary” of the deed of trust. On the other hand, the court finds no consumer protection violation unless the borrower can show injury and MERS could avoid causing injury by keeping track of who holds the note and revealing that information to the borrower. This would represent a significant change in MERS’s original business model since it typically only would reveal to borrowers the identity of the loan servicer, not the current holder of the note and not the chain of assignments from the original lender.

A Massachusetts court has held that owners of lots near the ocean had an implied easement of access to the beach because recorded plans drafted in 1892 showed an unenumerated lot with access to the ocean and the developer had advertised the lots as “Shore Lots” with a “Cool breeze all the time, good bathing, boating and fishing, nice beach, no undertow, shade trees on several of the lots.” Leahy v. Graveline, 82 Mass.App.Ct. 144, — N.E.2d —, 2012 WL 2819395 (Mass. Land Ct. 2012). The case represents an application of the recent decision in Reagan v. Brissey, 844 N.E.2d 672 (Mass. 2006) that similarly found implied rights to use open land depicted on a subdivision map.