Real Estate Litigation Law Firm

Experienced Nashville, Tennessee Lawyers for Real Estate Disputes

If you are involved in a real estate dispute or real estate litigation, you need an experienced, knowledgeable and dedicated real estate litigation attorney to assist you. We have over forty years of combined experience representing parties involved in real estate disputes in Nashville and throughout Tennessee. Because of our extensive involvement as litigation lawyers with real estate and land developments, with commercial leases, and with brokers and agents, we understand how to approach real estate disputes to formulate a results oriented, cost-effective strategy for our clients. Sometimes the best strategy is litigation. Sometimes the best strategy is early, informal resolution of the dispute through mediation or arbitration. In many cases, early negotiation and/or mediation can resolve a real estate dispute so our client can get on with business and avoid incurring attorney’s fees over a protracted period of time.

Our law firm handles the following types of real estate and property disputes and cases:

• Commercial real estate litigation
• Residential real estate litigation
• Title insurance coverage disputes
• Eminent domain and condemnation cases
• Breach of real estate contracts
• Lease disputes and breach of lease disputes
• Partition actions
• Disputes between joint tenants, tenants in common and co-owners of property
• Partition actions and partition cases
• Easement disputes
• Quiet title actions
• Boundary line disputes
• Restrictive covenant cases
• Ownership disputes
• Mortgage broker commission disputes
• Real estate agent commission disputes
• Defective construction disputes

Frequently Asked Questions about Real Estate Litigation and Property Disputes

Specific Performance

Q: Can a court force the seller to follow through with the sale of real estate even if that seller has refused to do so after signing a contract?

A: Yes. Tennessee law allows a buyer under a real estate sales contract the remedy of specific performance. Specific performance refers to an order whereby the court forces the seller to convey the real property in question. The remedy of specific performance rests on the notion that every piece of real estate is unique and money damages are not a fair substitute for something as unique as a piece of real property.

Joint Tenancy, Tenancy in Common, Partition Actions

Q: I am a joint tenant, cotenant or tenant in common with others in the ownership of real estate. What rights and obligations do we each have as joint tenants, cotenants or tenants in common?

A: In Tennessee, when someone has a joint tenancy or tenancy in common with others, generally speaking, each joint tenant or tenant in common has an equal, undivided ownership interest in the property, and each has an equal right to possess and to enjoy the property. Each tenant in common or joint tenant, generally, has an equal right to share in the profits of the property, but each must also share in the expenses needed for the maintenance and repair of the property, and for the payment of property taxes. If a tenant in common is wrongfully excluded from the property by one or more of the other tenants in common, such an act of exclusion is referred to in legal jargon as an “ouster.” A cotenant that has been ousted by another cotenant or other cotenants, generally speaking, is entitled, under Tennessee law, to his or her proportionate share of the rental value of the property during the period of exclusion or ouster.

Q: What is a partition action (also referred to as a sale for partition or partition in kind)?

A: A general rule of law in Tennessee is that a tenant in common does not have to continue in partnership, so to speak, with other tenants in common. Thus, any person who owns property as a tenant in common may petition a court to partition the real property in which he or she has the ownership interest. Where the court divides the property without ordering it sold, this is referred to as a partition in kind. Generally speaking, if a partition in kind would be unjust to one or more other tenants in common (or joint tenants), a court will order that the property be sold, and that the sale proceeds be divided between or among the cotenants.

Q: Can a court refuse to partition real estate owned by parties as tenants in common where one tenant in common requests a partition but one or more of the other tenants in common do not want a partition?

A: In Tennessee, generally speaking, the answer to the above question is “no.”

Q: In a partition action, when a court orders the sale of property, are the proceeds always divided evenly between the tenants in common?

A: Not necessarily. As a general proposition, in Tennessee, the law presumes that tenants in common and joint tenants are entitled to divide the sale proceeds equally. There are, however, several circumstances under which the sale proceeds might not be divided equally. They are:

1. A cotenant that has spent money to improve the property will be entitled to more of the proceeds than the other cotenant or cotenants who have not done so as long as the improvements enhanced the value of the property;
2. A cotenant that has paid more than other cotenants to satisfy encumbrances on the property such as tax liens or construction liens, will be entitled to more of the proceeds;
3. A cotenant that has paid more than the other cotenant or other cotenants for expenses for necessary repairs and maintenance is generally entitled to more of the sale proceeds;
4. A cotenant that has solely possessed the property and derived profits from it is liable to the other cotenant or cotenants for his or her share, or their share, of the profits and may, therefore, receive less from the sale proceeds;
5. A cotenant that has wrongfully excluded the other cotenant or cotenants from the property must pay the other cotenant or cotenants a pro rata percentage of the fair rental value of the property for the period of exclusion; and
6. Where cotenants have purchased property together and one cotenant paid more for the purchase price than the other(s), the cotenant who paid more may receive more from the sale proceeds.