Court Opinion

ID: 9639060
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 16:03:26.27577+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:11.925930
License: Public Domain

Justice SAYLOR
concurring.
I join the majority opinion, except for portions of its discussion concerning the principle of relation back as applied in the circumstances of this case.
While the majority ultimately reaches the conclusion that relation back does not apply relative to the attempt to effect (retroactively) a de facto, legal subdivision, see Majority Opinion, at 1229, I respectfully differ with certain of its efforts to reconcile the relation-back principle with this conclusion. In particular, my thinking does not align with the majority’s indications that optioned property segments must be viewed as retrospectively divided in fact upon the exercise of an option. See, e.g., id. at 1226-27, 1229. To me, it is preferable merely to recognize from the outset that, while an optionee’s equitable title may in fact be deemed to relate back to the date of the execution of the option for certain purposes,1 *109relation back serves no meaningful role in determining whether and when a legal subdivision has been effected, at least where the parties to the option made no effort to comply with governing land-use regulation prescribing a procedure for lawful real estate subdivision that was in place at the time of their initial agreement.
I also reiterate the majority’s observation that application of general principles of law and equity to further address the parties’ respective interests arising out of the option agreement in the circumstances as they have unfolded is beyond the limited scope of this appeal.
Chief Justice CAPPY and Justice NIGRO join this concurring opinion.

. See, e.g., Baxter Dunaway, 1 L. Distressed Real Est. § 11:46 (2004) (observing that "in most jurisdictions a prior lease which contains an option to purchase must be subordinated to the mortgage or the mortgage will be extinguished by the exercise of the option[;] [a]l-though the option is exercised after the recording of the mortgage, the *109conveyance generally ‘relates back' to the recording of the lease and option to purchase and, consequently, wipes out the mortgage").