Opinion ID: 2615097
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 10

Heading: Vested Versus Contingent

Text: If Williams' interest is properly identified as a remainder, the next question is: What kind of a remainder did Williams possess over and above the interest excepted by the Land Bank? As discussed above, the event upon which Williams will take is certain to occur. The only unknown is when the event will occur. In 28 Am.Jur.2d Estates § 242, p. 396, it is said: The broad distinction between vested and contingent remainders is this: In the first, there is some person in esse known and ascertained, who, by the will or deed creating the estate, is to take and enjoy the estate, and whose right to such remainder no contingency can defeat. In the second, it depends upon the happening of a contingent event, whether the estate limited as a remainder shall ever take effect at all. The event may either never happen, or it may not happen until after the particular estate upon which it depended shall have been determined, so that the estate in remainder will never take effect. A remainder is not rendered contingent merely because the time at which the estate will become possessory is uncertain. Section 243 of 28 Am.Jur.2d Estates provides: There is a definite distinction between the uncertainty which makes a remainder contingent and the uncertainty of the estate's ever taking effect in possession, which is incident to even a vested remainder. In a contingent remainder, the right to the estate is uncertain, while in a vested remainder, the time of possession and enjoyment being deferred, there is an uncertainty as to whether the estate will ever be enjoyed in possession. It is in this respect only that a vested remainder is contingent and expectant; for, unlike a contingent remainder, it is vested in right, and the remainderman has an immediate right of future enjoyment. Although it may be uncertain whether a remainder will ever take effect in possession, it will nevertheless be a vested remainder if the interest is fixed. It is the uncertainty of the right of enjoyment, and not the uncertainty of its actual enjoyment, which renders a remainder contingent and distinguishes it from a vested remainder. See also Jones, supra at 266-267. Bergin and Haskell, Preface to Estates in Land and Future Interests, supra at 71, identify two requirements for a vested remainder: (1) that there is no condition precedent to the future interest becoming a present estate other than the natural expiration of the prior life estate [or fee tail] and (2) that it is theoretically possible to identify who would get the right to possession if the prior estate should end at any time. Since the condition upon which Williams will take a present estate is certain to occur, and since the condition is the natural expiration or demise of the prior mineral estate, then Williams' estate is vested rather than contingent. Since Williams' estate was vested at the time of its creation, it is valid under the rule against perpetuities.