Run With the Land

Right or Restriction that affects all current and future owners of a property. It is contrasted to an agreement, between a current owner and other parties, that is not passed on to future owners in a deed. See also Restrictive Covenant.

An expression indicating a right or Restriction that affects all current and future owners of a property. Contrasted to an agreement, between a current owner and other parties, that is not passed on to future owners in a Deed.
Example: A Covenant written into the Deed prohibits the property from being used as a liquor store. The restriction runs with the land, and all future owners are restrained from violating the covenant.

A phrase used with respect to covenants in the law of real property to mean that the burdens, benefits, or both, of the covenant, pass to the persons who succeed to the interests of the original contracting parties, the idea being that the covenant "runs" because it is attached to the estate in the land as it is conveyed from one to another in the chain of title. Boyer, The Law of Property: An Introductory Survey 320 (4th ed. 1991). Covenants so characterized, therefore, bind the owners of the property to which they attach (with which they "run"), no matter who those owners are; such covenants therefore represent a more-or-less permanent limitation upon the estate held by the owner of the "burdened" property, and an enhancement of the estate held by the owner of the "benefited" property.

In order for a covenant to run with the land at law, the necessary formalities for creation of such a covenant must be met: the covenant must "touch and concern the land" [meaning that it must increase the use or value of the land benefited, or it must decrease the use or value of the land burdened]; the parties must intend that the covenant will run with the land; and there must be privity of estate. See id.; Cribbet & Johnson, Principles of the Law of Property 380 (3rd ed. 1989). In some jurisdictions such a covenant can only be created at the time a conveyance of land takes place.