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PROP10 topics311 practice questions

NextGen Bar Exam Real Property.

Estates, landlord–tenant, servitudes, real estate contracts, mortgages, and title.

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All 10 topics in Real Property

Scope-aligned

★ marks the 8 topics NCBE flags at memorize level — know these cold; the rest lean on provided materials and reasoning.

  1. 01

    Present Estates & Future Interests (no RAP)

    Present estates (fee simple absolute, defeasible fees, and life estates including pur autre vie); future interests (reversions, remainders both vested and contingent, executory interests, possibility of reverter and right of entry, and rules on survivorship, class gifts, and waste); and restraints on the alienation of these interests — excluding the rule against perpetuities.

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  2. 02

    Cotenancy★

    Concurrent ownership: joint tenancy (the four unities), tenancy in common, and tenancy by the entirety; partition; severance; and relations among cotenants (possession, rents and profits, encumbrance, ouster, and contribution).

  3. 03

    Landlord–Tenant★

    Leasehold estates (tenancy for years, periodic tenancy, tenancy at will, and tenancy at sufferance) and their creation; possession, rent, and actual and constructive eviction; assignment and sublease; early termination of the lease; and habitability and suitability.

  4. 04

    Fair Housing★

    Fair housing and discrimination: discriminatory restraints, discrimination in the sale and lease of property (Fourteenth Amendment and Fair Housing Act), retaliatory eviction, racially restrictive covenants, and reasonable accommodations for tenants with disabilities.

  5. 05

    Easements & Licenses★

    Easements and licenses: nature and types (appurtenant, in gross, affirmative, negative); creation (express grant or reservation, implication from prior use or necessity, prescription, estoppel); scope and apportionment; the effect of transfer of the dominant or servient estate and assignability; and termination.

  6. 06

    Covenants & Servitudes★

    Restrictive covenants and equitable servitudes: their nature and types; creation and enforceability (intent, notice, touch and concern, horizontal and vertical privity, and servitudes implied from a common scheme); transfer; and termination, including equitable defenses.

  7. 07

    Real Estate Contracts★

    Real estate sales contracts: creation and construction (statute of frauds and exceptions, essential terms, time for performance, and remedies for breach including specific performance and part performance) and the marketability of title.

  8. 08

    Mortgages & Foreclosure

    Mortgages and deeds of trust (including purchase-money and future-advance mortgages); the title, lien, and intermediate mortgage theories; and foreclosure (judicial and nonjudicial, acceleration, priorities among the parties, deficiency and surplus, and equitable and statutory redemption).

  9. 09

    Adverse Possession & Deeds★

    Adverse possession (elements, the running of the statutory period, and tacking) and transfer by deed (requirements for a valid deed, delivery and acceptance, and the types of deeds and their covenants of title).

  10. 10

    Recording & Title★

    Recording acts (notice, race, and race-notice statutes and who is protected), indexes and title searches, chain of title, and the treatment of forged deeds.

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4 sample PROP questions

Real questions from the Real Property bank, with the full explanation. The paid bank covers all 10 topics and difficulty levels.

An owner of a vacant lot signed and delivered a deed whose granting clause read, in full, "I convey the lot to my niece." The deed said nothing else about the estate — no mention of heirs, no durational words, and no condition of any kind. Years later the owner died, and a cousin who would have taken the lot under the owner's will claimed the niece held only a life estate, because the deed omitted the traditional words "and her heirs." The niece responds that she owns the lot outright and may sell it free of any claim by the owner's estate.

What estate does the niece hold?

  1. A fee simple absolute, freely alienable by the niece. Correct
  2. A life estate, with a reversion in the owner's estate.
  3. A fee simple determinable, subject to a possibility of reverter.
  4. A life estate pur autre vie, measured by the owner's life.
Why: Modern law has abolished the common-law requirement that a grantor recite "and her heirs" to pass a fee simple. A plain "to my niece" now conveys a fee simple absolute, and a conveyance is presumed to transfer the grantor's entire estate unless the deed clearly limits it to something smaller — so A is correct and the niece may sell free of the estate's claim. B states the discarded common-law rule; today omitting words of inheritance changes nothing. C fails because a determinable fee requires durational language ("so long as," "until"), and this deed has none. D invents a measuring life; nothing ties the niece's estate to the owner's life or anyone else's. When a deed is silent, the tie always goes to the larger estate.

A landowner conveyed a parcel to a school district by a deed stating, "to the district so long as the parcel is used for public school purposes." For decades the district ran an elementary school on the land. Last month the district closed the school, sold the buildings for scrap, and began operating the parcel as a paid commuter parking lot. The landowner's daughter, who inherited everything the landowner owned at death, now claims the parcel. The district responds that it still holds title because no one has yet gone to court to take the land back.

Who owns the parcel, and why?

  1. The district, unless and until the daughter sues and obtains a judgment of forfeiture.
  2. The daughter, because the district's fee ended automatically when school use ceased. Correct
  3. The district, because a mere change in use does not affect a fee simple.
  4. The daughter, but only if she re-enters and retakes possession of the parcel.
Why: "So long as" is classic durational language, so the district held a fee simple determinable. The defining feature of a determinable fee is that it ends automatically, by operation of law, the instant the stated event occurs — here, when the land stopped being used for public school purposes. Title sprang back to the holder of the possibility of reverter, which passed to the daughter by inheritance, so B is right. A and D describe the wrong estate: a right of entry (after a condition subsequent) must be asserted, but a possibility of reverter needs no lawsuit and no re-entry — possession returns on its own. C is simply wrong; a determinable fee is a fee that can end, and the durational limit is exactly what ended it. Naming the estate from its trigger words controls the outcome.

A father's will left the family home "to my son for life, then to my daughter." The son has lived in the house rent-free for eight years. In that time he has stopped paying the annual property taxes — now several years delinquent — ignored a growing roof leak that has begun to rot the attic joists, and let the gutters and downspouts fail. The home's fair rental value comfortably exceeds the taxes owed. The daughter, who holds the remainder and lives nearby, has watched the house deteriorate and the tax lien mount, and she wants to hold her brother responsible.

On these facts, what is the daughter's best claim against the son?

  1. Permissive waste, for neglecting ordinary repairs and unpaid property taxes. Correct
  2. Affirmative waste, because neglecting the house actively destroyed its value.
  3. Nothing, because a life tenant owes no duties at all to a remainderman.
  4. Ameliorative waste, because the changes altered the property's character.
Why: A life tenant who lets the property decay commits permissive waste: he must make ordinary repairs and pay carrying charges — property taxes and mortgage interest — but only up to the income the land produces, or its fair rental value if he occupies it. Here the rental value exceeds the taxes, so the son had ample obligation, and both the unrepaired roof and the tax delinquency are textbook permissive waste (A). B mislabels it: affirmative (voluntary) waste requires overt, destructive acts — demolishing, or extracting timber or minerals — not mere neglect. C is wrong because a life tenant is a caretaker of value he does not fully own and owes enforceable duties to the future interest holders. D is inapt; ameliorative waste involves a change that increases value, whereas the son's neglect only reduced it. Neglect that harms the remainder is permissive waste.

A landowner conveyed a wildflower meadow "to my gardener for life." The deed said nothing about what happens to the meadow after the gardener's death — it named no remainderman and contained no further gift over of any kind. The gardener, now seventy-eight, has tended the meadow for years. The landowner, still living and in her fifties, is reorganizing her estate plan and wonders exactly what interest, if any, she kept in the meadow — in particular, whether she may sell that interest now or leave it by will to someone else before the gardener ever dies.

What interest did the landowner retain?

  1. A possibility of reverter, which becomes possessory only if a stated event occurs.
  2. A right of entry, which she must assert in order to regain the meadow.
  3. Nothing, because conveying a life estate exhausts the grantor’s ownership.
  4. A reversion, which is transferable during life and passes at her death. Correct
Why: When a grantor carves out a smaller estate — here a life estate — and does not give away the leftover, she keeps a reversion. A reversion is always treated as vested; it is fully transferable during life, devisable by will, and descendible to heirs, so the landowner can sell or leave it before the gardener dies (D). A is wrong because a possibility of reverter follows a fee simple determinable and depends on a durational event; this grant has no such condition — the meadow simply returns when the life estate ends naturally. B misnames the interest: a right of entry follows a condition subsequent and must be affirmatively asserted, neither of which fits a plain life estate. C forgets that the estates must add up to a full fee simple: a life estate leaves a gap after death, and the reversion fills it.
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Real Property FAQs

Estates, landlord–tenant, servitudes, real estate contracts, mortgages, and title. The published content scope breaks it into 10 topics, examined through both MCQ formats plus integrated question sets and performance tasks.
10. Our notes are mapped one-to-one against NCBE's published content scope, and starred topics mark what NCBE flags at memorize level.
Active recall beats re-reading. Read the notes once, then practice exam-format questions in mixed order, then revisit weak topics. Our weak-area tracker surfaces the topics dragging your accuracy down.
Yes. The free diagnostic quiz is open to everyone, free accounts get the first topic of every subject — notes included — plus 5 premium questions a day. The full PROP bank (311 questions today) is unlocked with a one-time purchase and covered by the 14-day money-back guarantee.
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