Chapter 36, Chapter 36

No estate of inheritance or freehold, or for a term of more than five years, in lands, or any other interest or term therein of any duration under which the whole or any part of the corpus of the estate may be taken, destroyed, or consumed, except for domestic use, shall be creat…

(a) Except as provided in subsection (e) of this section, a nonvested property interest is invalid unless: (1) When the interest is created, it is certain to vest or terminate no later than 21 years after the death of an individual then alive; or (2) The interest either vests or …

A deed which purports to convey a greater right or interest in real property than the person making it may lawfully convey shall operate as an alienation of such right or interest in such real property as such person might lawfully convey. The application of the doctrine of estop…

When any real property is conveyed or devised to any person, and no words of limitation are used in the conveyance or devise, such conveyance or devise shall be construed to pass the fee simple, or the whole estate or interest, legal or equitable, which the testator or grantor ha…

Every estate in lands so limited that, as the law was on October 7, in the year seventeen hundred and seventy- six, in the state of Virginia, such estate would have been an estate tail, shall, except as provided in section fourteen of this article, be deemed an estate in fee simp…

Every limitation in any conveyance or will disposing of real or personal property, contingent upon the dying of any person without heirs, or heirs of the body, or issue of the body, or children, or offspring, or descendant, or other relative shall be construed as a limitation, to…

Wherever any person, by conveyance inter vivos or by will, takes an estate of freehold in land, or takes such an estate in personal property as would be an estate of freehold, if it were an estate in land, and in the same conveyance or will an estate is afterward limited by way o…

Wherever a person, by conveyance inter vivos or by will, purports to create any present or future interest in real or personal property in a class of persons described as his own heirs, next of kin, distributees, or by other words of like import, such heirs, next of kin or other …

A contingent remainder shall in no case fail for want of a particular estate to support it, nor because of the termination of a preceding particular estate by merger, forfeiture, or in any other manner, before the contingent remainder shall have been vested. It is the intent and …

If any interest in or claim to real or personal property be given by sale or gift inter vivos or by will to one, with a limitation over either by way of remainder or of executory devise or any other limitation, and by the same conveyance or will there be conferred, expressly or b…

When any joint tenant or tenant by the entireties of an interest in real or personal property, whether such interest be a present interest, or by way of reversion or remainder or other future interest, shall die, his share shall descend or be disposed of as if he had been a tenan…

No power of attorney to execute a deed of land for another person shall be valid, unless it be in writing signed by the person on whose behalf such deed is to be made.

(a) Except as provided in subsections (b) and (c) of this section and in subsection (a), section five of this article, the time of creation of a nonvested property interest or a power of appointment is determined under general principles of property law. (b) For purposes of this …

(a) Section nineteen of this article does not apply to any estate which joint tenants have as executors or trustees, nor to an estate conveyed or devised to persons in their own right, when it manifestly appears from the tenor of the instrument that it was intended that the part …

Any conveyance or transfer of property, or any interest therein, creating a joint tenancy with right of survivorship together with the person or persons conveying or transferring such property, executed by such person or persons to or in favor of another shall be valid to the sam…

Any alien may take by devise, inheritance, gift or purchase, and hold, convey, devise or otherwise dispose of land within this state as if he were a citizen, and if an alien owner of land within this state shall die, his land shall descend in the same manner as if he were a citiz…

Pension, profit sharing, stock bonus, annuity or other employee trusts heretofore or hereafter established by employers for the purpose of distributing the income and principal thereof to some or all of their employees, or the beneficiaries of such employees, shall not be invalid…

An option contained in any lease to purchase the whole or any part of the leased premises, exercisable either during the term of the lease or immediately upon its termination, shall, if otherwise valid, be enforceable in accordance with its terms, irrespective of the rule against…

Upon the petition of an interested person, a court shall reform a disposition in the manner that most closely approximates the transferor's manifested plan of distribution and is within the ninety years allowed by the provisions of subdivision (2), subsection (a), or subdivision …

No contract for the sale of land, or the lease thereof for more than one year, shall be enforceable unless the contract or some note or memorandum thereof be in writing and signed by the party to be charged thereby, or by his agent. But the consideration need not be set forth or …

The provisions of section one of this article do not apply to: (1) A nonvested property interest or a power of appointment arising out of a nondonative transfer, except a nonvested property interest or a power of appointment arising out of: (A) A premarital or postmarital agreeme…

(a) A memorandum of trust that satisfies both of the following requirements may be presented for recordation in the office of the clerk of the county commission of any county in which real property that is subject to the trust is located: (1) The memorandum shall be executed by t…

(a) Except as extended by subsection (c) of this section, this article applies to a nonvested property interest or a power of appointment that is created on or after July 1, 2025. For purposes of this section, a nonvested property interest or a power of appointment created by the…

No gift of any goods or chattels shall be valid unless made by writing, signed by the donor or his agent, or by will, or unless actual possession shall have come to and remained with the donee or some person holding for or under him If the donor and donee reside together at the t…

This article may be cited as the "West Virginia Uniform Statutory Rule Against Perpetuities."

(a) With respect to any matter relating to the validity of an interest within the rule against perpetuities, unless a contrary intent appears in the instrument, as a rule of construction it shall be presumed that the transferor of the interest intended that the interest be valid.…

An immediate estate or interest in, or the benefit of a condition respecting any estate in, property may be taken by a person under an instrument, although he be not a party thereto.

If, in a deed of land, or a conveyance by writing of personal property, made by one as attorney in fact for another, the words of conveyance or the signature be in the name of the attorney, it shall be as much the principal's deed or conveyance as if the words of conveyance or th…

The provisions of this article supersede the rule of the common law known as the rule against perpetuities.

Any interest in or claim to real estate or personal property may be lawfully conveyed or devised. Any estate in such property may be made to commence in futuro, by conveyance inter vivos, in like manner as by will, and any estate which would be good as an executory devise or bequ…

Whenever there is, either at law or in equity, in any personal property, or in any land, timber, oil, gas, coal, or other minerals, any contingent remainder, or any vested remainder, which is liable to open and let in afterborn children or to open and let in members of any class,…

If such sale, lease, mining lease or other conveyance shall be decreed, the court shall appoint a special commissioner or special commissioners to make the same. The special commissioner or commissioners before making any such sale, lease, mining lease or other conveyance, shall …

Where a sale, lease, mining lease or other conveyance is decreed under the provisions of this article, the title of the purchaser to such interest as was decreed to be conveyed to him shall be indefeasible by any party to the suit, or by any person who was virtually represented a…

The proceeds of sale, and the reversion subject to any such lease or mining lease, together with the proceeds, rents, and royalties accruing from any such lease or mining lease, shall, in all respects, be substituted for and stand in the place of the property sold or leased as re…

In addition to the proceedings authorized by the first section of this article, any person having any interest mentioned in section two of this article in the personal property, land, timber, oil, gas, coal or other minerals sought to be sold, leased or otherwise conveyed, may ap…

This article and the rights and remedies herein provided for shall be cumulative and in addition to other existing rights.

Such bill may be filed by any person having any interest hereinafter mentioned in this section, in the personal property, land, timber, oil, gas, coal, or other minerals sought to be sold, leased or otherwise conveyed: (a) Any person who alone or with others has, either at law or…

All persons in being who have any vested, contingent, or executory estate or interest, either at law or in equity, in such personal property, land, timber, oil, gas, coal, or other minerals to be sold, leased, or otherwise conveyed, shall be made parties even though any of such p…

An order of publication may be entered and summons may be served against nonresident defendants in like manner and with like force and effect as in other cases, and where it is stated in the bill and affidavit is made of the fact that there are interested persons whose names are …

When a defendant in any suit brought under the provisions of this article is an infant or insane person, a guardian ad litem shall be appointed as provided by section ten, article four, chapter fifty-six of this code, and shall be governed by the provisions of said section, and w…

The bill shall describe the property sought to be sold or leased with reasonable certainty, and set forth the names of all persons interested in such property, together with their respective estates or interests, either vested, contingent or executory, so far as is known by the p…

Evidence may be taken as in other suits in chancery, or the court may hear the evidence in open court. If heard in open court, the court may, and on the motion of any party shall, require the evidence to be taken down in shorthand by a stenographer, and transcribed, and certify s…

If it be clearly shown by the pleadings and proof that the interest of the person filing such bill will be promoted by the sale, lease or other conveyance of the property, and the court shall be of the opinion that the interests of no other person or persons in the property will …

If the property sought to be sold or leased under the provisions of this article is gas, oil, or other volatile or fugitive substance, and it shall clearly appear that such substance is being, or in danger of being, withdrawn or drained away through other lands and so wasted and …

The affixing of a seal, or any symbol or word intended to have the effect of a seal, shall not be necessary to give validity to any deed, trust deed, mortgage, or other conveyance of an estate of inheritance or freehold in land, or any estate of any duration therein.

Every deed conveying land shall, unless an exception be made therein, be construed to include all buildings, privileges, and appurtenances of every kind belonging to the lands therein embraced.

(a) Definitions. As used in this section, unless the context requires a different meaning: (1) “Attorney” means any person licensed as an attorney in West Virginia by the West Virginia State Bar. (2) “Corrective affidavit” means an affidavit of an attorney correcting an obvious d…

An action of covenant may be maintained on any written conveyance or lease which, under the provisions of section one, article one of this chapter, must be by deed, and which has been executed since the twenty-sixth day of July, nineteen hundred and twenty-one, for the breach of …

The affixing of a seal, or any symbol or word intended to have the effect of a seal, to any instrument conveying or agreeing to convey land, or any interest whatever in land, shall not give to such instrument any additional force or effect, either by way of importing a considerat…

All distinctions in legal effect between deeds of grant, deeds of bargain and sale, deeds of lease and release, and deeds of covenant to stand seized, are hereby abolished. Any instrument which shows on its face a present intent to pass the title to, or any interest, present or f…