PROPERTY LAW

414-773 of the Civil Code

What is property Law ?

- Civil law, not criminal law
- Objects not persons
- Objects that can be appropriated
- Acquired and Lost
- Things include Real and Personal Rights
- Nature and Consequence of Real Rights

Propery Consists of things, but not all things are property

Art. 414: All things which are or may not be the object of appropriation are considered either:
(1) Immovable or Real Property; or
(2) Movable or Personal property

 If the thing can be appropriated, then it is property.

 Wild animals, pebbles on the shore abandoned belongs to no one
 Air, wind, sunlight, starlight belongs to everyone
 Your book, you land, your car belongs to someone

To be considered to be property:
1. Utility of capacity to satisfy human wants
2. Individuality and substance or a separate autonomous existence
3. Susceptibility of being Appropriated

Belongs to no one things can belong to someone as long as it’s not illegal
- You can’t sell body parts because it’s against public policy. You can only donate if it does
not endanger your life or if you’re dead.

Mobility – Personal Car/Real Land

Owenership – Public River/Private Swimming Pool
Alienable, transfer from one to another – Within the commerce of man cojtract/Outside the
commerce of man prohibited
Existence – Present plant in pot/Future fruits not yet ripe

RIGHTS as PROPERTy

Distinctions
 Distinctions Real rights Personal rights
Number of Persons involved Active subject =1; Active subject = at least 1
Passive subject = everyone Passive subject = at least 1
Object of Juridical relation Generally corporeal Intangible
Manner Active subject Directly Indirectly
affects the thing
Causes creating juridical Mode and title Title alone
relation
Method of extinguishment of Loss or destruction of the By law
juridical relation thing
Nature of actions arising Real actions against third Only personal actions against
from them persons a definite debtor

CLASSIFICATION of PROPERTY

Art. 415 – Immovable Property

(1) Land, Buildings, Roads and Constructions of all kinds adhered to the Soil
(2) Trees, plants, and growing fruits while they are attached to the land or form an integral part
of an immovable
(3) Everything attached to an immovable in a fixed manner, in such a way that it cannot be
separated therefrom without breaking the material or deterioration of the object
(4) Statues, reliefs, paintings, or other objects for use or ornamentation, places in buildings or
on lands by the owner of the immovable in such a manner that it reveals the intention to attach
them permanently to the tenements
(5) Machinery, receptacles, instruments or implements intended by the owner of the tenement
for an industry or works which may be carried on in a building or on a piece of land, and which
tend directly to meet the needs of the said industry or works;
(6) Animal houses, pigeon-houses, beehives, fish ponds or breeding places of similar nature, in
case their owner has placed them or preserves them with the intention to have them
permanently attached to the land, and forming a permanent part of it; the animals in these
places are included;
(7) Fertilizer actually used on a piece of land;
(8) Mines, quarries, and slag dumps, while the matter thereof forms part of the bed, and waters
either running or stagnant;
(9) Docks and structures which, though floating, are intended by their nature and object to
remain at a fixed place on a river, lake, or coast;
(10) Contracts for public works, and servitudes and other real rights over immovable property.