Quote Quoting Taxing Matters
View Post
When title to the property is obtained by the county in a tax foreclosure sale the SOL period may start when the city has actually provided the deed to the buyer. A federal appeals court decision suggests that is the case, but the state courts have not made a clear decision on that and ultimately the Supreme Court of Michigan has the final say on the issue.
While the courts can be erratic sometimes, as it pertains to the time table to start the SOL I'd like my chances. There was recently a case decided (in Michigan) wherein a plaintiff actually did prevail on an adverse possession claim against the state regarding state owned property. I don't remember the case off the top of my head*, but I believe it triggered a remedy in the legislature to solidify and clarify the statute. The case involved both the elements of adverse possession 'and' acquiescence.

My point is: If a claim was able to prevail against the state (subentity thereof) pertaining to state owned lands, and since there is nothing relevant (off the top of my head - I haven't done a deep dive on this point) pertaining to non-public real property, then I'm hard-pressed to defer to any legislative theory by the state that the state is immune from claims in matters of the public good.

A second, and even stronger point is that this case is exactly the poster child for this sort of situation. In the last 2 or 3 years, the county(s) have literally been working angles, exploring policy, and considering amending the statute specifically to avoid 'abandonment after-the-fact'. There are so many properties after sale (exactly such as this one) where purchasers either don't maintain the property, don't keep up the property taxes, or both. One of the principle policy implementations being considered is a "reverter clause" which would make it easier for the county to automatically regain ownership of the property without having to jump through legal hoops when a purchaser does not fulfill requirements.

All of that said, yes - I did initially (and reluctantly) consider having to accept the date that the buyer took deed from the county as the start date. It was after scrutiny of the statute and determining that the relevant restriction applied to "public lands" did I revise my consideration of that aspect.

Thanks for the input - I will continue to scrutinize that element more closely.

EDIT: *I thought for sure I had it in my library somewhere.... in the TEMP directory, not yet officially filed and added to the (digital) library. The case was Waisanen v Superior Township, No. 311200 (June 24, 2014):
Excerpt: "The court further found that Waisanen satisfied the elements of adverse possession and acquiescence and quieted title in Waisanen. The court noted that it was the Legislature’s responsibility to “fix” the statute if, in fact, subsection 2 did not represent its intent regarding protection for municipal corporations."

Quote Quoting RXBrown
View Post
EDIT: *I thought for sure I had it in my library somewhere.... in the TEMP directory, not yet officially filed and added to the (digital) library. The case was Waisanen v Superior Township, No. 311200 (June 24, 2014):
Excerpt: "The court further found that Waisanen satisfied the elements of adverse possession and acquiescence and quieted title in Waisanen. The court noted that it was the Legislature’s responsibility to “fix” the statute if, in fact, subsection 2 did not represent its intent regarding protection for municipal corporations."
EDIT #2: Ok, I finally made the time to comb through this a little bit. As I mentioned previously, the legislature 'did' clarify the statute; in House Bill 4747 (2015), subsequent PA 52'16, they changed the language of the statute which does tighten the defense of claims against state-owned property. But, that still does not derail the question and/or argument as it pertains to when does the SOL begin in situations like this. I'll look at it more when I have time.