Essay playbook
The Beach House Battle
Work through The Beach House Battle as a public essay playbook with a fresh Florida-focused fact pattern, scored issues, and a model answer.
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Fact pattern
Husband and Wife purchased a beachfront home in Miami Beach (0.4 acres) in 2015 and occupied it as their permanent residence continuously until Husband died; Wife lives there still. The deed stated they took title as "husband and wife." In 2018, Husband, without Wife's knowledge, signed a deed conveying the property to his Brother. Brother recorded the deed immediately. In 2020, Husband lost a $2 million lawsuit on an unsecured business debt that was his sole obligation and was unrelated to the purchase, improvement, repair, taxes, or assessments on the home and to any labor performed on the property. The creditor seeks to force sale of the beach house. Meanwhile, Neighbor has used a 20-foot strip of the property as a driveway since 2016 — paving it that year, maintaining and repaving it since, and parking there daily. Neighbor never asked permission and none was ever given, and no one else has used the strip. Beginning in 2016, Neighbor openly claimed the strip as Neighbor's. Neighbor's possession is not founded on any written instrument purporting to convey the strip or on any judgment or decree, and Neighbor does not claim under anyone whose possession was so founded. In 2019 Neighbor began paying amounts claimed to represent property taxes attributable to the strip, but never filed an adverse-possession return with the county property appraiser. Husband died in 2025, leaving a will that devises "all my real property to my children from my first marriage." Wife survives. The property is now worth $3 million.
Scored issues to spot
"Husband and wife" creates TBE presumption. Neither can unilaterally convey.
Subject: Property | Points: 10
Husband cannot unilaterally convey TBE property. Brother takes nothing despite recording. INDEPENDENTLY, because this was marital homestead, Husband could not alienate it without JOINDER BY Wife under Art. X, s. 4(c) - two separate grounds, and a complete answer gives both.
Subject: Property | Points: 15
TBE property protected from creditors of only ONE spouse.
Subject: Property | Points: 15
Also protected as homestead—no value cap, under ½ acre.
Subject: Property | Points: 10
FL has two adverse-possession paths, each requiring 7 years of continuous possession: WITH color of title (§ 95.16 — a recorded written instrument, judgment, or decree purporting to establish title; NO tax requirement) or WITHOUT color of title (§ 95.18 — qualifying occupation by substantial enclosure or by cultivation/maintenance/improvement in a usual manner, PLUS statutory requirements the claimant bears the burden of proving: a return filed with the county property appraiser AND payment of outstanding taxes and matured installments of special improvement liens, each within the time the statute sets). § 95.16 asks whether the possession is FOUNDED ON a qualifying instrument, judgment or decree, including one held by a predecessor under whom the occupant claims. Neighbor has none and claims through no one who does - the 2018 deed to Brother described the whole property, but Neighbor neither entered under it nor claims through Brother - so the only potentially available path is § 95.18. The traditional possessory elements ARE met here — paving, repaving, daily parking and an open ownership claim from 2016, with no permission and no other user — and the period running from 2016 exceeds 7 years. The claim STILL FAILS, and you do not need to parse the statutory deadlines to see why: Neighbor NEVER filed a return, so the statutory route fails outright, and paying taxes from 2019 does not substitute for it. That is the lesson — in Florida the possessory elements are not enough on their own; § 95.18 adds requirements that defeat an otherwise textbook possessor. (The dispositive statutory defect is analyzed in the model answer.)
Subject: Property | Points: 15
NOT REACHED: because title was tenancy by the entireties and the unilateral deed was void, Wife took the entire fee by RIGHT OF SURVIVORSHIP when Husband died. On his death his TBE interest was EXTINGUISHED and Wife became sole owner by right of survivorship, so no interest in the house entered his probate estate or was subject to disposition by his will - the devise restriction (Art. X, s. 4(c) and F.S. 732.4015) and the s. 732.401 descent rules therefore do not determine ownership of this property. Wife takes 100% fee simple, not a life estate or a 50% tenancy in common - the s. 732.401 election applies only where the homestead DESCENDS from the decedent and there is a surviving spouse together with descendants; the constitutional devise restriction (spouse OR minor child) is a distinct rule.
Subject: Property | Points: 15