Lis pendens

In United States law, a lis pendens is a written notice that a lawsuit has been filed concerning real estate, involving either the title to the property or a claimed ownership interest in it. The notice is usually filed in the county land records office. Recording a lis pendens against a piece of property alerts a potential purchaser or lender that the property’s title is in question, which makes the property less attractive to a buyer or lender. Once the notice is filed, anyone who nevertheless purchases the land or property described in the notice takes possession of it is subject to the ultimate decision of the lawsuit.

Lis pendens is Latin for "suit pending". This may refer to any pending lawsuit or to a specific situation with a public notice of litigation that has been recorded in the same location where the title of real property has been recorded. This notice secures a plaintiff's claim on the property so that a sale, mortgage, or encumbrance of the property will not diminish plaintiff's rights to the property, should the plaintiff prevail in its case. In some jurisdictions, when the notice is properly recorded, lis pendens is considered constructive notice to other litigants or other unrecorded or subordinate lienholders.

The recording office will record a lis pendens upon request of anyone who claims to be entitled to do so (e.g. because he has filed a lawsuit). If someone else with an interest in the property (e.g. the owner) believes the lis pendens is not proper, he can then file suit to have it expunged.

Some states' lis pendens statutes require the filer of the notice, in the event of a challenge to the notice, to establish that it has probable cause or a reasonable likelihood of success on the merits of its case in the underlying lawsuit. Other states do not have such a requirement.

Under the common law, the mere existence of a lawsuit potentially affecting the title to real property had the legal effect of putting the entire world on constructive notice of the suit; anyone acquiring an interest in real property which was the subject of a pending suit took that interest subject to the litigants' rights as they might be eventually determined, no matter how much later. In effect, nothing relating to the ownership of the subject matter of the suit could be definitively changed while the suit was pending. Without publication of the existence of a lawsuit, innocent buyers might discover the existence of a lawsuit too late.

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