Real Property
Scope
Real Property questions run from possessory estates and future interests through landlord-tenant, land sale contracts, deeds, recording, mortgages, easements, and covenants. Michigan specifics matter: Michigan is a race-notice recording jurisdiction under MCL 565.29, retains dower so a spouse must join in a conveyance of the other spouse's realty, and permits sellers to enforce land contracts by forfeiture under MCL 600.5726.
Estates and future interests
Fee simple absolute, defeasible fees, life estates, remainders, and executory interests. The Rule Against Perpetuities voids interests that might vest more than 21 years after a life in being; class gifts and executory interests are the usual victims.
Recording
Under a race-notice statute the later purchaser wins only by recording first and taking without notice - actual, inquiry, or record. A recorded deed outside the chain of title gives no constructive notice.
Landlord-tenant
Quiet enjoyment, constructive eviction, and habitability recur. Assignment versus sublease turns on privity of estate.
Mortgages
The note controls the debt and the mortgage follows it. Foreclosure passes title free of junior liens but not senior ones.
Worked example
O deeds Blackacre to A, who does not record. O then deeds to B, who pays value and records immediately but knows of A's prior deed. In race-notice Michigan, B loses: recording first is not enough without good faith. A keeps title despite never recording. Had B lacked notice, B would have won.
Traps
Confusing vested and contingent remainders under the Rule Against Perpetuities; treating recording as proof of delivery when intent to deliver is missing; and mixing the elements of real covenants (touch and concern plus privity) with equitable servitudes (notice plus intent to bind).