Locate Connecticut Real Estate Lawyers

In Connecticut, real estate law is a very broad area of law governing anything that has to do with the ownership of land and buildings.

Real estate law can apply to many various facets of a personal and professional life. It can apply to anything from the purchase of a vacant lot, to renting prime downtown office space.

Connecticut real estate law can be very complicated, because it's really a collection of a lot of different areas of law. These areas of law include property rights, contracts, land use, and many others.

Having a good general knowledge of Connecticut real estate law can make a lot of transactions, such as purchasing a house or renting an apartment, much easier.

Common Real Estate Issues in Connecticut

Financing: Most people in Connecticut probably can't afford to buy a house or a piece of land up front. Thus, most individuals and business use some form of financing to purchase real estate, normally a mortgage. A mortgage is a loan used to buy a piece of real estate, with the purchased real estate simultaneously securing the loan.

Disclosure: When selling a house, the seller is under a specific legal duty to tell the buyer about any physical defects which the buyer might not be able to discover on his or her own. Sometimes, it isn't entirely clear if a given defect has to be disclosed. In such cases, it's ideal to disclose it anyway. It simply isn't worth the risk to fail to disclose it, and hope that a court agrees that it was the type of defect that you didn't have to disclose.

Warranty of Habitability: All residential property which is being rented must be fit for human habitation. This is normally not a difficult standard for a reasonably well-maintained unit to meet (or one would think), but violations of this rule still happen. When renting an apartment, the landlord is implicitly promising that the unit will be habitable, whether or not such a promise is actually written in the lease, or even if the lease disclaims it. There are many requirements for a dwelling to be habitable, and most of them are fairly obvious- they include heating, running water, electricity, and basic protection from the elements. There are many other requirements, however.

Zoning Laws: Before you begin any construction project, you need to make sure that it will not violate any zoning laws in Connecticut. This is because zoning laws decide what can and can't be done on a given piece of property. They can be pretty complex, but, in general, they are designed to ensure that people who use land in different ways can co-exist as harmoniously as possible. To that end, they work to keep industrial and residential uses separate, among other things.

Do I Need a Connecticut Real Estate Lawyer?

These issues, and the others that can affect real estate transactions, can be pretty difficult. Therefore, it's a good idea to contact a Connecticut real estate lawyer to advise you on the laws affecting your real estate transaction, or any other projects you may be planning.

Interesting Facts About Connecticut

Connecticut was one of the original colonies of America and played a pivotal role in the formation of the country's federal government. It is usually referred to as "the Constitution state", as many of Connecticut's early governance documents helped to shape the U.S. Constitution. Former President George W. Bush was the first president to be born in Connecticut.

Connecticut is often associated with some very major court decisions that have shaped American jurisprudence over the decades. One famous case is Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), which involved the right to privacy in the context of marriage and the use of contraceptives. Another landmark decision is Kerrigan v. Commissioner of Public Health (2008). In the Kerrigan case, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled that gay and lesbian couples may not be prohibited from marriage. This made Connecticut the third U.S. state to legalize marriage for same-sex couples.

The majority of lawsuits in Connecticut are filed in the Superior Court system, which is comparable to the trial courts of most other states. However, Connecticut laws can often be different from the major trends in the rest of the states. In some instances a lawyer may be necessary when applying Connecticut laws.

In order to meet the needs of state residents, lawyers in Connecticut deal with a very wide range of legal issues. Connecticut lawyers help continue the state's tradition of shaping the character of American law in general. Attorneys in Connecticut assist clients in court and can provide valuable legal advice.