Property Insights

Analysis and practical guides on property.

20 articles, checklists, and guides on property law, written by the attorneys at MC Law. Every piece is general information, not legal advice — for a specific matter, contact the firm.

PropertyNeighbor Law

Neighbor Dispute Toolkit: Demand Letters, Surveys, Nuisance Logs, and Boundary Agreements

This toolkit contains the documents that resolve neighbor disputes, ordered by when you will need them and annotated with the outcome each one produces. It opens with the friendly confirming email that turns a conversation into a record, then the first written notice and the escalation letter that follows it. It includes the written revocable license — one paragraph that defeats adverse possession and prescriptive easement — a nuisance and noise log built to satisfy ordinance elements, a survey scope request that specifies what to order and what to refuse, an arborist engagement letter, a tree damage demand citing timber trespass multipliers, a hazardous tree notice, a drainage demand built around an engineer's report, a code enforcement complaint, and the three recorded agreements that end disputes permanently.

Casey Scott McKaySeptember 2, 202617 min read

PropertyNeighbor Law

Neighbor Dispute and Boundary Problem Checklist: A Practical Checklist

This checklist runs a neighbor dispute from the first conversation to the recorded agreement that ends it. It sets out the three questions to answer before acting, how to document a recurring problem so enforcement agencies will act on it, and what a boundary survey must include to be useful. It covers the tree rules that people most often get expensively wrong, the fence and drainage obligations that vary by state, and the free enforcement machinery that resolves most disputes without a lawyer. It ends with the documents that end things permanently — the written license that defeats adverse possession, the recorded boundary line agreement, and the maintenance agreement that most easements omit.

Casey Scott McKayAugust 29, 20269 min read

PropertyNeighbor Law

Resolving a Dispute with Your Neighbor: A Practical Guide

This guide is about the sequence — what to do first, second, and third when something a neighbor is doing has become a problem, and why skipping steps costs money and goodwill. It covers the conversation that resolves most disputes and how to have it, the written notice that resolves many of the rest and what it must contain, and the documentation that makes everything afterward possible: dated photographs, a log with times and durations, a survey, an arborist's report. It then walks the free enforcement machinery most people never use — code enforcement, animal control, noise enforcement, zoning, and the HOA — followed by community mediation, and finally the choice between small claims for money and superior court for an order. It closes with the agreements that end disputes permanently: the written license, the boundary line agreement, and the recorded maintenance agreement.

Casey Scott McKayAugust 24, 202628 min read

PropertyNeighbor Law

Neighbor Disputes: Boundaries, Trees, Fences, Noise, and the Law of Nuisance

Neighbor law is where property doctrine meets human beings who have to see each other every morning, and the legal answer is frequently not the useful one. This article explains what a boundary actually is and why the fence is almost never it, how adverse possession and acquiescence can move a line that a deed says is somewhere else, and what an encroachment costs to fix. It covers the law of trees — the right to trim to the line, the liability for cutting past it, and the timber trespass statutes that multiply damages — along with fence obligations, spite fence statutes, and the surprisingly consequential law of surface water drainage. It then works through private nuisance, the balancing that decides it, and the remedies courts actually grant, before turning to the practical machinery of noise ordinances, code enforcement, mediation, and small claims.

Casey Scott McKayAugust 16, 202630 min read

PropertyShort-Term Rentals

Short-Term Rental Toolkit: Permits, House Rules, Agreements, and Neighbor Response

This toolkit contains the worksheets, letters, and operating documents a short-term rental host needs, ordered from the research that should precede a purchase through the notices that arrive when something goes wrong. It includes a four-question feasibility worksheet covering the city, the association, the lease or mortgage, and the insurer; an insurance disclosure letter written to produce a coverage answer in writing; a tax authority inquiry that exposes the levies platforms do not remit; an HOA document request; a dated safety inspection log that becomes a premises liability defense; house rules and rental agreement terms drafted to be enforceable; the notices that must be posted; a neighbor introduction letter; scripts for a rules violation and a neighbor complaint; responses to a city notice and an HOA violation; an injury incident report; and a personal use log.

Casey Scott McKayApril 20, 202618 min read

PropertyShort-Term Rentals

Short-Term Rental Compliance Checklist: A Practical Checklist

This checklist covers a short-term rental from the research that should precede a purchase through daily operation, complaints, and renewal. It sets out the five documents to read and five calls to make before listing, and why answering the city does not answer the HOA, the lender, or the insurer. It covers the permit conditions that get violated, the insurance conversation that prevents the largest exposure in the field, the tax registration that survives platform collection, and the hour-long safety walkthrough that becomes a premises liability defense. It ends with the operational disciplines — the local contact who actually answers, the neighbors who have your number, the occupancy limits enforced, and the long-stay threshold that can accidentally create a tenancy.

Casey Scott McKayApril 12, 20269 min read

PropertyShort-Term Rentals

Running a Short-Term Rental Legally: A Practical Guide

This guide takes a short-term rental from the research a prospective host should do before buying or listing through the daily operation and the problems that end permits. It sets out the five documents to read and the five calls to make first, and why answering the city's question does not answer the HOA's, the lender's, or the insurer's. It covers the permit application and the conditions attached to it, the insurance conversation that prevents the single largest exposure in this field, and the tax registration that survives platform collection. It then covers operation: the safety inspection that is a defense, the house rules that are enforceable, the local contact requirement that revokes more permits than anything else, and the long-stay threshold that can accidentally create a tenancy. It closes on complaints, claims, and renewal.

Casey Scott McKayApril 4, 202628 min read

PropertyShort-Term Rentals

Short-Term Rentals: Local Regulation, HOA Restrictions, Taxes, and Liability

Short-term rentals sit at the intersection of four bodies of law that were not written with them in mind, and the operator who understands only one of them is exposed on the other three. This article explains the local regulatory layer — permits, primary residence requirements, density caps, occupancy limits, and the enforcement mechanisms cities actually use — and then the private restrictions that frequently matter more, including HOA covenants, lease prohibitions, mortgage occupancy clauses, and the homeowner's policy exclusion that leaves many hosts effectively uninsured. It covers the tax layer, from transient occupancy taxes collected at the local level to the federal treatment of rental income including the fourteen-day rule and the passive activity limits. It closes with liability: guest injuries, neighbor nuisance claims, fair housing obligations, and the platform immunity that determines who a wronged guest or neighbor can actually sue.

Casey Scott McKayMarch 26, 202628 min read

PropertyAnimal Law

Handling a Pet Legal Problem: A Practical Guide

This guide walks through the pet legal problems people actually have, in the order the work happens. It starts with the first forty-eight hours after a bite — for both the owner and the injured person — including the insurance notice that must not be late. It then covers the dangerous dog hearing as a case to be prepared and, better, negotiated before it happens. It covers housing disputes and the difference between a pet and an assistance animal, veterinary problems and the records and second opinion that decide them, buying disputes and the short lemon law windows, boarding and daycare injuries, and the animal seizure bond deadline that forfeits animals more often than any trial does.

Casey Scott McKayMarch 12, 202628 min read

PropertyAnimal Law

Animal Law: Pet Ownership, Dangerous Dog Proceedings, and Veterinary Claims

Animal law sits on an uncomfortable premise: the law classifies animals as property, while most owners experience them as family, and nearly every dispute in this area turns on that gap. This article explains dog bite liability in both its strict liability and negligence forms, and what a dangerous dog proceeding actually is — an administrative hearing with real due process rights and a possible destruction order, which owners routinely walk into without counsel. It covers landlord pet policies and how assistance animals differ from pets, homeowners insurance exclusions that leave owners personally exposed, veterinary malpractice and the damages problem that makes those cases hard, and what happens to animals in a divorce, an estate, and a cruelty seizure.

Casey Scott McKayMarch 12, 202629 min read

PropertyAnimal Law

Animal Law Toolkit: Incident Records, Hearing Defense, and Veterinary Claims

Working templates for animal legal problems. It includes a bite incident report and witness statement format, the prompt insurance notice that preserves coverage, and an ordinance review worksheet that extracts the two deadlines that decide a dangerous dog case. It provides a records request, a hearing presentation outline, a temperament evaluation request that tells the behaviorist what the hearing needs, a remediation package index, and a negotiation script for the conversation before the hearing. It also includes a housing accommodation request with provider documentation language, veterinary records and second opinion requests, a licensing board complaint, a footage preservation demand, a lemon law notice, and a pet trust and emergency caregiver plan.

Casey Scott McKayMarch 12, 202624 min read

PropertyAnimal Law

Animal Law Checklist

A working checklist for animal legal problems, organized by the situation you are actually in. It opens with the first forty-eight hours after a bite for both the owner and the injured person, including the insurance notice that must not be late. It covers the dangerous dog hearing as a case to prepare and negotiate before it happens, housing disputes and the accommodation request most people never submit in writing, veterinary problems and the necropsy decision measured in hours, purchase disputes with their short statutory windows, boarding injuries and the footage preservation demand, and the seizure bond deadline that forfeits animals. It closes with the planning that makes all of it easier.

Casey Scott McKayMarch 12, 202612 min read