Recent Articles

The real estate market is surging across the nation, and California is no different. Real estate in California is expensive, and many tenants can keep their valuable space with favorable lease terms by exercising an option to renew a lease for consecutive, multi-year terms. But what happens when a poorly drafted lease – or a [...]

As I prepare this column, I’m holding a 4 oz container from our medicine cabinet of “Johnson & Johnson’s Baby Powder . . . Clinically Proven Mildness . . . The Number One Choice of Hospitals. Ingredients: talc, fragrance.” I just sprinkled a little on my hand – it smells lovely, just like I remember [...]

 This is a sad case. It involves a sixteen-year-old girl who was struck and killed by a freight train on an at-grade railroad crossing in Santa Clarita. SOLEDAD CANYON RAILROAD CROSSING Kimberly Jimenez-Soto routinely walked along an unpaved path (wearing earphones which we learned from the Opinion) near Soledad Canyon to Santa Clarita to get [...]

The California Coastal Commission enforces the California Coastal Act which gives the public rights to access the coast. Tidelands – lands between the high tide and low tide – are held by the state in trust for the general public to use. As such, the Coastal Commission often exacts public access easements over beachfront landowners [...]

            The collective gasp of the readership is deafening. But fear not. Venerable Law Review columnist Jim Porter is neither dead, nor has he lost his mind – though the latter has been the subject of contentious debate for years. No. Jim is merely off on an adventure and asked [...]

“A conservation easement is a voluntary agreement between a landowner and a land trust or governmental agency that permanently limits land uses to protect the property’s natural, scenic, historical, agricultural, forested, or open-space condition.” (Civil Code section 815.1-3). That is the opening paragraph in today’s case: Sonoma Land Trust v. Peter Thompson. CONSERVATION EASEMENTS ARE [...]

            Many of us have had our homeowner’s insurance canceled as a result of the threat of wildfires. My policy was canceled a couple of years ago even though we are in a Firewise subdivision. The thousands of dollars I spent on defensible space meant nothing to the company. As such, like many of you, [...]

            When a large project is proposed, such as Syar Industries expansion of its aggregate operations in Napa County, the California Environmental Quality Act specifies what must be included in the environmental impact report (EIR) analyzing the project and its impacts. It is not uncommon for a large project to be challenged in court claiming [...]

A common occurrence in my real estate practice involves one person using another’s property, whether it be a path, a driveway, for parking or even a fence over the true property line.All of you jailhouse lawyers know or think you know that if one person uses another’s property for a few years, they can go [...]