Opinion ID: 1057874
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Contiguous Properties and the Statutory Bar

Text: Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-2-110(a) was enacted to facilitate the collection of property taxes by requiring persons claiming an interest in real property to have that interest assessed and to pay the taxes thereon. Burress v. Woodward, 665 S.W.2d 707, 709 (Tenn.1984). The statute, made a part of the chapter pertaining to limitations on real actions, provides as follows: Action barred by non payment of taxes. (a) Any person having any claim to real estate or land of any kind, or to any legal or equitable interest therein, the same having been subject to assessment for state and county taxes, who and those through whom such person claims have failed to have the same assessed and to pay any state and county taxes thereon for a period of more than twenty (20) years, shall be forever barred from bringing any action in law or in equity to recover the same, or to recover any rents or profits therefrom in any of the courts of this state. Tenn.Code Ann. § 28-2-110(a) (2000). Freddie Stroup, Supervisor of the Mapping Division of the Metro Planning Agency in Davidson County, provided an affidavit for the Defendant. After reading the deed descriptions and comparing them with the tax maps, he concluded that the area of overlap . . . has always been assessed as a part of the Shim tract. Because the Plaintiff had not paid taxes on the slight overlap between the earlier deed description from the Johnsons to Hendersonville Broadcasting and the fence line, the Court of Appeals sided with the Defendant, ruling that this statute was a bar to the claim. While ordering dismissal of the suit and acknowledging harsh results by the application of the statute, the Court of Appeals relied upon Burress, 665 S.W.2d at 709, for its decision but also observed that the statute merely barred the suit by the Plaintiff and did not affect title or destroy rights, require ejection of the occupier or possessor of the property, or prevent the owner or occupier of the property from defending . . . title and possession. In Burress, 665 S.W.2d at 708, the representative of an estate attempted to exercise a reservation of mineral rights by the decedent after a grant to the purchaser some thirty-six years earlier. The decedent had not paid taxes on the mineral rights for over twenty years. This Court ruled that Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-2-110 placed the burden on the property owner to have it assessed. In Burress , this Court cited with approval the holding in Alexander v. Patrick, 656 S.W.2d 376, 377 (Tenn.Ct.App.1983): T.C.A. § 28-2-110 acts as an absolute bar to any suit `where one claiming an interest in real property or his predecessor in title has failed to have assessed and to pay taxes on the claimed property for at least twenty continuous years.' Burress, 665 S.W.2d at 709. In Alexander, the claimant asserted ownership of a fifty acre tract based upon a 1902 deed to her father, E. Mulry, but never paid real estate taxes. Patrick claimed the same property, having acquired a deed from the clerk and master whose predecessors in title, in 1911, also received a deed from Mulry. Patrick's predecessors in title paid taxes beginning in 1912. While these two cases accurately apply the statutory bar, they are distinguishable on the facts. They do not involve adjacent properties with a common boundary, the specific location of which was unknown to the respective owners until ascertained by survey. In its ruling in the instant case, the Court of Appeals specifically disapproved of the chancellor's interpretation of Winborn v. Alexander, 39 Tenn.App. 1, 279 S.W.2d 718 (Tenn.Ct.App.1954), and determined that a failure to pay taxes is a bar even when the area of dispute has been considered as a part of a larger parcel in which the taxes have been paid. In Winborn , having facts more closely aligned with those at issue, the owners of adjacent properties disputed the location of their common boundary, calling into question the ownership of a relatively small area in the context of the properties in each tract. The court ruled that Winborn was the rightful owner of the property and concluded that Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-2-110 [7] did not bar the claim: In our opinion, this [statutory defense] does not apply to the case . . . because it does not appear that complainants failed to pay any taxes on their property, and they were claiming the disputed strip as a portion of their homeplace and not as a separate lot or parcel of land. Further, we do not think this Section would bar complainants' action because it does not appear that complainants or those through whom they claimed, failed to pay taxes for the prescribed twenty-year period. Id. at 729 (emphasis added). The first sentence of the quotation has caused conflicting interpretations. One view is that the ruling created a contiguous property exception or homeplace exemption to the statute, wherein the failure to pay real estate taxes is not a bar if the area of dispute is believed to be a part of the main parcel on which the claimant has paid taxes and the dispute does not pertain to a separate tract. The second interpretation, that approved by the Court of Appeals in this instance, has been that Winborn did not establish a contiguous property exception and that the defense in Winborn had simply failed to meet its burden of proving that the adverse holder had not paid the taxes on the disputed area. Recently, the issue was addressed in Jack v. Dillehay, 194 S.W.3d 441 (Tenn.Ct. App.2005). In Jack , a different section of the Court of Appeals, also concluding that Winborn had not established a contiguous property or homestead exemption, applied the following standard: [T]he consideration as to whether disputed property constitutes a portion of a litigant's homestead is merely a factor courts may consider in determining the payment of taxes when other evidence, such as tax records, fail[s] to preponderate upon such issue. Id. at 454. The court concluded that when there was no way to determine from the record the actual property included in the assessment, it was unlikely that the defendant could meet the burden of proof to invoke the statutory bar. Id. Of importance is the fact that the area of dispute in Jack consisted of a larger, identifiable area some thirty-two acres. In that case, therefore, the Court of Appeals concluded that the defendant had clearly met his burden of proving that the claimant had not paid taxes on the disputed tract for a period of twenty years. The decision in Jack is also distinguishable from this case on its facts. Winborn is more applicable to the circumstances of this case and, in our view, represents a better rule where the area of dispute upon a claim of adverse possession is relatively minor. Our interpretation of Winborn differs from that of the Court of Appeals. Initially, a boundary line between parties is established by the intent of the parties, either expressed or implied. George Chamberlin, Cause of Action to Enforce Agreement Between Adjoining Landowners as to Location of Boundary Line, 27 Causes of Action 615, § 6 (1992 & Supp.2006). A tax map is permissible in a boundary dispute to confirm the payment of taxes but is not particularly helpful for the purpose of establishing a boundary line. Whitworth v. Hutchison, 731 S.W.2d 915, 917 (Tenn.Ct.App.1986). Courts of other states generally subscribe to the same rule. See, e.g., Bull v. Pinkham Eng'g Assocs., Inc., 170 Vt. 450, 752 A.2d 26, 32 (Vt.2000). Thus, plats from a county assessor's office are admissible [only] for the purposes of determining who paid taxes on a particular piece of real property. Jack, 194 S.W.3d at 450. As the testimony in Jack established, the particular number of acres in a particular tax parcel as shown on the tax maps, do not control the question of exactly what real property is being assessed, since those acreage figures are taken directly from instruments of conveyance containing legal descriptions of real property which can be, and frequently are in rural counties such as Hickman County, materially inaccurate. Id. at 451. Because tax maps are for the purpose of showing the plats upon which parties have paid taxes rather than establishing boundaries, Whitworth, 731 S.W.2d at 917, a slight overlap would rarely have any effect on an evaluation for tax purposes. Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-2-110 [8] was enacted in order to facilitate the collection of property taxes based upon property evaluations. The burden of proof requires any party who relies upon the invocation of Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-2-110 to clearly establish the failure to pay taxes by the other party. See Bone v. Loggins, 652 S.W.2d 758, 761 (Tenn.Ct.App.1982). Because tax maps do not identify precise boundaries and actual boundaries are established by intent, the Defendant Shim cannot prevail. Tennessee Code Annotated section 28-2-110 should not serve as a bar to a claim of adverse possession when the tracts are contiguous, a relatively small area is at issue, and the adjacent owners making claims of ownership have paid their respective real estate taxes. To hold otherwise would effectively eliminate the adverse possession of any part of an adjoining tract. As a matter of policy, possession of property for twenty or more years, accompanied by all other elements of the doctrine, is a basis for ownership. Boundary disputes, or claims of adverse possession or prescriptive easement in association with a boundary dispute, are rarely appropriate for summary judgment. Typically, there are genuine factual issues. In this unusual instance, however, the material facts are not in dispute. Both the chancellor and the Court of Appeals have so determined. The single question is the applicability of the statutory bar. Hendersonville Broadcasting and its successors, including the Plaintiff, have exercised exclusive, actual, adverse, continuous, and open and notorious possession, by the legal definitions of those terms, of the actual area making up the service road for more than twenty years. By all appearances, both the Plaintiff and the Defendant paid taxes on their separate tracts throughout their intervals of ownership. That the Plaintiff and the Defendant, and their predecessors in title, were mistaken as to the true boundary is of no consequence. The judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore reversed, and the judgment of the Chancery Court of Davidson County is reinstated. Costs of this appeal are adjudged one half against the Appellant Cumulus and one half against the Appellee Shim and the sureties for the parties, for which execution may issue if necessary.