Real Estate Litigation

Overview

If you own, buy, sell, lease, or share real property, a dispute over it is a civil lawsuit — one tried in the state court where the land sits, or in federal court when diversity of citizenship or a federal question puts it there. Michael handles those disputes for the people on either side of them: owners and investors, landlords and tenants, buyers and sellers, co-owners and heirs, and contractors. He is admitted in Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama and practices across all three, which matters here because the law of land is state law, and a boundary, title, or disclosure rule that controls in one of these states does not always control in the next.

Start with what usually happens, because it is not a trial. Most property disputes end in a negotiated result — a demand answered, a settlement reached, a mediated agreement — well short of a courtroom. What produces a good result at that table is a case built as if it will be tried: the facts pinned down, the survey or the contract or the chain of title in hand, the demand credible because the other side can see it is backed by a lawyer able to carry the matter the distance. Trial-readiness is the leverage. It is the reason a reasonable resolution becomes available, not a promise that you are headed to one. Michael has taken a civil case to a $1.1 million jury verdict at trial (a 2021 injured-contractor matter), which is the kind of credential the other side weighs when it decides whether to deal seriously. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Real estate litigation is one of seven areas the firm handles. The sections below sort by the problem you actually have — a broken deal, a tenant, a co-owner, a property line — rather than by the legal remedy, because most people know their problem long before they know its name in the code.

Contract and purchase-and-sale disputes

When a real-estate deal breaks — a seller who won’t close, a buyer who walked, a deposit both sides claim — the fight is a breach of contract dispute, and the first question is usually which remedy you actually want. Because the law treats each parcel of real estate as unique, a court can order the breaching party to complete the sale rather than merely pay for the loss; that remedy is specific performance (“force the sale” / “make them close”), and it generally requires an enforceable written contract and a buyer who was ready, willing, and able to perform. The alternative is money damages — the benefit of the bargain plus foreseeable consequential loss. A threshold point decides some of these cases before the merits: a contract to sell an interest in land generally must be in a signed writing to be enforceable (the statute of frauds), with narrow, state-specific escape hatches like part performance.

“He backed out and I want my deposit” is an earnest-money dispute, and it usually turns on the contract’s default, forfeiture, and liquidated-damages clauses and on the escrow agent’s duties — including the recurring, fact-specific question of whether a forfeiture clause is an enforceable estimate of damages or an unenforceable penalty. “The seller lied” or “the seller hid the problem” is misrepresentation, failure to disclose, or fraud, and here the three states diverge sharply. Tennessee runs on a statutory residential-disclosure regime; Georgia and Alabama start from caveat emptor — buyer beware — subject to important exceptions for active concealment, latent defects that threaten health or safety, and the duty to answer a direct question honestly. One point worth stating plainly because it comes up constantly: an “as-is” clause does not shield a seller who actively concealed a known defect or committed fraud. And when the complaint is “the builder did shoddy work,” a construction defect claim sits at the intersection of contract, warranty, and the disclosure rules above.

Landlord-tenant and lease disputes

The organizing line here is residential versus commercial. Residential tenancies are heavily regulated by statute — the rules protect the tenant and constrain the landlord in ways the parties cannot fully contract around. Commercial tenancies run largely on the lease itself plus general contract law, with far less statutory protection; for a business, the lease is the rulebook, and most disputes — rent default, CAM (common-area maintenance) reconciliations, holdover after the term ends, assignment and subletting, a landlord’s reentry rights — are resolved by reading it closely.

“My tenant won’t leave” points to eviction — called a detainer action, a dispossessory, or an unlawful detainer depending on the state. It is a fast, separate track with short deadlines and a narrow question in front of the court: who is entitled to possession, not every collateral grievance between the parties. Related money claims and lease-breach claims often travel on their own, slower track. Because the deadlines are short and the procedure is unforgiving, moving early and on the correct track matters more here than in most civil disputes.

Co-ownership and partition

“I’m stuck owning this with someone” and “I want to force a co-owner to sell” describe the same legal right: a co-owner can generally end an unwanted co-ownership through a partition action. A court can divide the property physically — partition in kind, historically the law’s preference — or, when a physical split would cause great prejudice or is impractical, order it sold and the proceeds divided (partition by sale), with an accounting of who paid the taxes, the mortgage, and the upkeep.

Inherited property carries an extra layer. The Uniform Partition of Heirs Property Act — adopted across the footprint, with Tennessee’s enactment recent — adds protections before any forced sale of qualifying family-derived “heirs property”: notice to the co-tenants, a court-ordered appraisal at fair market value, a right for the other co-owners to buy out the one seeking to sell, and a strengthened preference for dividing in kind rather than selling. If your dispute involves land that passed down through a family, that framework often changes the strategy from the first filing.

Boundary, title and easement disputes

A property line dispute — a fence in the wrong place, a neighbor’s shed or driveway across the line, a survey that doesn’t match the deed — is at law a boundary dispute, and when a structure crosses the line it is an encroachment. The remedy is not automatic. A court weighs the equities: it can order the structure removed (a mandatory injunction), award damages for the intrusion, or fashion an easement or a compelled purchase of the disputed strip. An owner who built over the line knowing where it ran gets far less sympathy than one who did so by honest mistake. A current survey and an early, documented demand usually come before anything is filed.

When the problem is the record itself — an old lien that was never released, a defective or forged deed, an unknown heir’s interest, a boundary that clouds what you can sell — the action is quiet title: you ask a court to declare who owns the property and to cancel the competing claim so the title is clean enough to sell or refinance against. It is an equitable action, decided by a judge, though Georgia has an in-rem “against all the world” variant in which a jury can be available.

Adverse possession is the doctrine behind “they’ve used it for years” and “a squatter took my land”: under strict conditions, someone who possesses land openly, continuously, and adversely for a long enough period can acquire title to it. The popular shorthand — a set number of years with a deed, more without — is materially incomplete, and Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama genuinely differ on the periods, on whether recording a deed or paying the taxes shortens the clock, and on how a strip between two neighbors is treated. The specific rule that governs your facts is worth confirming with counsel before you rely on it.

Easements — the law behind “I’ve always used that driveway” and “he’s blocking my access” — come in three kinds: express (written and recorded), implied (from prior use, or by necessity when a parcel is landlocked), and prescriptive (earned by long, open, adverse use, on periods and conditions that vary by state). The evidence that decides these cases is usually documentary and physical: the deed and its legal description, the recorded plat, the survey, the title commitment, photographs, and the history of who used and maintained what.

Remedies: title, damages or forcing a sale

Most parties come to this page with an outcome in mind rather than a remedy’s name. The map is short. To force a sale of co-owned property → partition. To clear the record and settle ownership → quiet title. To make a signed deal close → specific performance. To make someone stop, undo a transaction, or get paid → an injunction, rescission, or damages. To put the world on notice while the suit is pending → a lis pendens.

A lis pendens (“put a hold on the property so they can’t sell it clean”) is a recorded notice that a lawsuit directly affecting a specific parcel is pending, so that anyone who buys or lends against it takes subject to the outcome. Two honest cautions travel with it: it has to actually be recorded to bind third parties, and it has to concern a suit about that property — a lis pendens filed to back a mere money claim can be expunged and can expose the filer to a slander-of-title claim. An injunction or temporary restraining order preserves the status quo — to stop a sale, halt construction, or prevent removal of fixtures — on the usual equitable showings of likely success, irreparable harm, and the balance of hardships.

One structural point shapes how these cases are tried. Equitable remedies — quiet title, specific performance, partition, injunctions, cancellation and reformation — are decided by a judge; money-damages claims such as breach, trespass, and fraud can carry a right to a jury; and many real-estate suits blend the two, which affects how the case is pleaded, whether a jury is demanded, and how trial is structured. On fees, the American Rule is the baseline — each side pays its own — unless a contract clause shifts them (common in purchase agreements, leases, notes, and deeds of trust) or a fee-shifting statute applies. Whether your case carries a fee-shifting hook is worth checking early, because it can change the economics of pressing or settling.

How a property case actually moves

The arc is consistent even though the facts never are: a demand and negotiation first; then, if that fails, filing suit (and recording a lis pendens where the suit affects title); then discovery — documents, depositions, and often an expert such as a surveyor or an appraiser; then mediation; and only then, for the small share that gets there, trial. Realistically, a matter that settles resolves in months, while one litigated to a verdict tends to run one to two years. Roughly nineteen in twenty civil matters resolve before trial. Cost tracks the same drivers — the amount of discovery, the number of experts, the complexity of the record — and mediation compresses both time and expense. The goal is a resolution you can live with; being genuinely prepared to try the case is simply what tends to produce one.

Across Tennessee, Georgia and Alabama

The forum is fixed by geography: a suit over land is generally brought where the land sits. What is not fixed is the clock. The statute of limitations — the deadline to file — varies by state and by the type of claim, so that a contract dispute, a fraud or disclosure claim, and a boundary or title claim can each run on a different period, and some of those periods start only when you reasonably discovered the problem. Delay can forfeit an otherwise valid claim outright. The practical consequence is that the single most useful early step is to have the specific deadline for your specific claim confirmed before it runs. Practicing across all three states — sitting down with counsel admitted where the land is — is the point of the tri-state footprint: the rule that governs your parcel is the rule of the state it’s in.

Michael’s civil-litigation record includes the 2021 jury verdict noted above and an appellate win in McLendon v. Hepburn (Ala. Civ. App. 2003), a civil-procedure matter he prevailed on at the appellate level. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Related

Deeper guides on the questions above are planned as part of this section: getting a tenant out — how eviction actually works, quiet-title actions explained, and forcing a court-ordered sale of co-owned property. When a property matter also turns on a permit, a licensing decision, or another agency question, that fight belongs on the administrative law page; this page owns the private property dispute. Case results are collected under case results.

Where to start

If you’re facing a property dispute in Tennessee, Georgia, or Alabama, the useful first move is to get the facts and the deadline in front of a lawyer while your options are still open. Reach out and tell Michael what’s happening with your property; he’ll tell you plainly what kind of matter it is and what the paths forward look like.

This is general information, not legal advice.

Common questions

How do I resolve a real estate dispute without going to court?

Most property disputes settle — through a demand letter, negotiation, or mediation — long before trial. The value of building the case thoroughly and being ready to try it is that a credible, well-documented position is what moves the other side to a fair resolution. Trial is the leverage, not usually the destination.

How long do I have to sue over a property dispute in Tennessee, Georgia, or Alabama?

It depends on the state and the kind of claim. A contract dispute, a fraud or disclosure claim, and a boundary or title claim each run on a different deadline, and some run only from when you reasonably discovered the problem. The periods differ across Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama, and missing one can end a valid claim, so the specific deadline for your situation is worth confirming early.

Can I force a co-owner to sell the property?

Often, yes. When co-owners can't agree, the law provides a partition action: a court can divide the property physically or order it sold and split the proceeds, with an accounting of what each owner contributed. Family-inherited "heirs" property carries extra protections — notice, an appraisal, and a chance for a co-owner to buy the others out — before any forced sale.

What is a quiet title action?

A quiet title action asks a court to declare who actually owns a property and to cancel a competing claim — an old lien, a defective or forged deed, a boundary cloud, or an unknown heir's interest — that is clouding the title. It is how an owner clears the record so the property can be sold or refinanced.

Can I make a seller go through with the sale?

Sometimes, yes. Because each piece of real estate is treated by law as unique, a court can order a party to complete a signed contract instead of only paying damages — a remedy called specific performance. It generally requires an enforceable written contract and a buyer who was ready, willing, and able to close. When that order isn't available, the alternative is money damages.

What can I do if my neighbor builds on or crosses my property line?

This is a boundary and encroachment matter. A court can order the structure removed, award damages for the intrusion, or fashion an easement or a compelled purchase of the disputed strip — but courts balance the hardship, and an owner who crossed the line by honest mistake is treated differently from one who did it knowingly. A current survey and an early, documented demand usually come before anything is filed.

Wherever your matter stands, the next step is a conversation. Call (615) 378-8942 or email mfb@braun-law.com.