PSI Exam: Property Ownership
Real Property (realty) - correct answer ✔✔land along with improvements, things attached to it, and the
benefits, rights, and interests included in its ownership.
Real Estate - correct answer ✔✔synonymously used with real property; but includes real and personal
property.
Land - correct answer ✔✔earth's surface, subsurface to the center of the earth, the space overhead, and
the rights to each. Rights: common rights in land; surface rights, subsurface rights, mineral rights, water
rights, air rights.
Personal property - correct answer ✔✔also known as personalty or chattel. Considered anything
unattached and moveable, such as furniture, housewares, lawn mowers, throw rugs. Also intangible
assets.
Intangible assets - correct answer ✔✔bank accounts, stocks, securities, financial instruments.
Fixtures - correct answer ✔✔once-moveable items that have been attached to real property. Such as a
sink, ceiling fan, coat screw.
Trade fixtures - correct answer ✔✔used by business tenant. Display cases, supermarker freezers; the
tenant's removeable personal property.
Annexation (accession) - correct answer ✔✔Also includes additions to the property from natural causes,
such as riverfront.
Legal tests for fixtures - correct answer ✔✔(1) Intention of person who attached the item to make it
permanent
(2) Method of attachment, annexation, degree of permanence
(3) Adaptation of item to use of property, custom-made bookshelf
, (4) Relationship and general understanding between parties,
Appurtenances - correct answer ✔✔things that "belong" to something else, generally by attachment,
includes a number of rights that "run with the land", which means rights that do not end when new
owner takes title. Ex: gardens, buildings, certain easements (deeds of right of way).
Emblements - correct answer ✔✔crops that a tenant generally owns as personal property, may return to
harvest even after lease expires. fructus industriales vs fructus naturales.
Tangible (corporeal) property - correct answer ✔✔physically touchable, material property, most notably
land and its improvements
Intangible (incorporeal) property - correct answer ✔✔abstract, "untouchable", yet very real elements,
such as mortgages, rights, and other encumbrances, like stocks and retirement accounts.
Three commonly recognized physical characteristics of land - correct answer ✔✔immobility,
permanence (indestructibility), and uniqueness.
Three economic characteristics of land - correct answer ✔✔scarcity, improvements, permanence of
investment, and area preference.
Property descriptions - correct answer ✔✔may be legal; such as metes and bounds, lot and block, or
rectangular survey or street address. Full legal description is required for a deed to be valid.
Metes and bounds - correct answer ✔✔"walks" the property. Begins at a POB, then describing the
distance and directions along the property line, follows a clockwise direction back to the POB.
Monument - correct answer ✔✔number of landmarks that provides a stable point of reference for
surveys. They can be natural or artificial.
Lot and block - correct answer ✔✔generally used for subdivisions, also called recorded plat system, that
identifies according to a plat map. Or assessor's map (has disclaimer that is only used for taxes)
Real Property (realty) - correct answer ✔✔land along with improvements, things attached to it, and the
benefits, rights, and interests included in its ownership.
Real Estate - correct answer ✔✔synonymously used with real property; but includes real and personal
property.
Land - correct answer ✔✔earth's surface, subsurface to the center of the earth, the space overhead, and
the rights to each. Rights: common rights in land; surface rights, subsurface rights, mineral rights, water
rights, air rights.
Personal property - correct answer ✔✔also known as personalty or chattel. Considered anything
unattached and moveable, such as furniture, housewares, lawn mowers, throw rugs. Also intangible
assets.
Intangible assets - correct answer ✔✔bank accounts, stocks, securities, financial instruments.
Fixtures - correct answer ✔✔once-moveable items that have been attached to real property. Such as a
sink, ceiling fan, coat screw.
Trade fixtures - correct answer ✔✔used by business tenant. Display cases, supermarker freezers; the
tenant's removeable personal property.
Annexation (accession) - correct answer ✔✔Also includes additions to the property from natural causes,
such as riverfront.
Legal tests for fixtures - correct answer ✔✔(1) Intention of person who attached the item to make it
permanent
(2) Method of attachment, annexation, degree of permanence
(3) Adaptation of item to use of property, custom-made bookshelf
, (4) Relationship and general understanding between parties,
Appurtenances - correct answer ✔✔things that "belong" to something else, generally by attachment,
includes a number of rights that "run with the land", which means rights that do not end when new
owner takes title. Ex: gardens, buildings, certain easements (deeds of right of way).
Emblements - correct answer ✔✔crops that a tenant generally owns as personal property, may return to
harvest even after lease expires. fructus industriales vs fructus naturales.
Tangible (corporeal) property - correct answer ✔✔physically touchable, material property, most notably
land and its improvements
Intangible (incorporeal) property - correct answer ✔✔abstract, "untouchable", yet very real elements,
such as mortgages, rights, and other encumbrances, like stocks and retirement accounts.
Three commonly recognized physical characteristics of land - correct answer ✔✔immobility,
permanence (indestructibility), and uniqueness.
Three economic characteristics of land - correct answer ✔✔scarcity, improvements, permanence of
investment, and area preference.
Property descriptions - correct answer ✔✔may be legal; such as metes and bounds, lot and block, or
rectangular survey or street address. Full legal description is required for a deed to be valid.
Metes and bounds - correct answer ✔✔"walks" the property. Begins at a POB, then describing the
distance and directions along the property line, follows a clockwise direction back to the POB.
Monument - correct answer ✔✔number of landmarks that provides a stable point of reference for
surveys. They can be natural or artificial.
Lot and block - correct answer ✔✔generally used for subdivisions, also called recorded plat system, that
identifies according to a plat map. Or assessor's map (has disclaimer that is only used for taxes)
