Lawyers are trained to help clients rather than hurt others, so lawyers are best used to help. The legal profession began to help people navigate society’s laws, and lawyers are poorly equipped to exact revenge.
Yearly Archives: 2017
Legal-Ease: Where exactly is my property line?
While it would seem that real estate should be objective, sometimes it can be subjective or inconsistent. Boundary lines should be easy to measure, but as recently as even a century ago, property descriptions used trees and other items to explain where a property line was.
Legal-Ease: Saving money and natural resources
Over the last few decades, conservation of our natural resources has become more popular. Even the most cynical people are beginning to accept that human activity is having at least some impact on the planet.
The government program over the last few decades that most encouraged natural resource conservation in rural areas has been the Conservation Reserve Program. The CRP is administered by the USDA.
Land enrolled in CRP or similar government programs results in government payments in exchange for landowners agreeing to not commercial farm or develop specific land.
Legal-Ease: Ownership, liability are not the same
It may seem difficult to decide what a business should own versus what should be owned personally. Ownership and liability can be confusing at times. For instance, if a truck is used by a contractor while doing construction work but also used to pick up children from daycare, should that truck be owned by the business or the individual?
Legal-Ease: Good buy-sell agreements address four questions
While some may assume planning for a business’ end means that the business owners are expecting the business to fail, it really means that the business is prepared. One of the most important tools to have in place when entering business ownership is a good buy-sell agreement.
A good buy-sell agreement is effective when it answers these four questions:
Legal-Ease: Estate planning can be an amazing gift to others
Estate planning can be one of the best gifts you leave behind for friends and family. Not only can you decide what gifts you will leave your loved ones through estate planning, but having an estate plan in place usually saves family or friends time and money.
From a practical standpoint, here are the four estate planning documents that should be prepared before death: Last Will and Testament, a power of attorney for finances, a power of attorney for healthcare, and a living will.
Generally, the best estate plans are prepared by local attorneys. Documents that are prepared based upon information found online often cause more difficulties for friends and family post-death.
Legal-Ease: Married, with property
Married people may be surprised to find out that when selling property their spouses must sign the deeds, even if the spouse’s name was never on the property. This is required as part of “dower” law. Dower is a collection of rights possessed by a married person.
Dower’s purpose is sometimes explained through two sexist, historical situations. First, historically women couldn’t own property, so when a couple married, all property belonged to the husband. Second, in the past some men didn’t want their wives to inherit property from them. Today, dower applies to all married people in Ohio.
Legal-Ease: Leaves, trees and branches
Every fall we can look forward to raking leaves, and often you might find that once you’ve finished cleaning up your own leaves, a neighbor’s leaves have blown into your yard. While some communities may have rules on leaf collection, most leaf and tree law is governed by Ohio law.
Generally, leaves, acorns, small twigs and other items that naturally fall from trees do not need to be raked or removed. If the items blow over to a neighbor’s house, the neighbor may not force the tree owner to remove the leaves.
What may cause issues, though, is if a tree falls on a neighbor’s property. Ohio has a handful of laws that sort out liability when a tree causes damage to a neighbor’s property.
Legal-Ease: Basics of house and apartment leases
Residential leasing is typically the term used to describe the renting of houses and apartments between landlords and tenants. Residential leases in Ohio are governed by a large number of detailed requirements. The list of requirements is extensive, especially for landlords.
Even if all requirements of a rental agreement are satisfied, the law allows judges to declare almost any part of a lease invalid if the Judge decides that the decision in question was unconscionable.
Legal-Ease: Farmland came with my new house, now what?
When you purchase a house or building lot that’s not connected to a public septic/sanitary sewer system, you must own additional acreage beyond the building footprint so that sewage can be treated onsite. So when someone purchases a new home, they may find themselves with additional acres of farmland or woods.