POSSIBILITY - The Law Mind Legal Dictionary

POSSIBILITYAuthored

The Law Mind • 1231 words

Definition

In property law, a *possibility* is a future interest that depends entirely on the occurrence of a contingent event that may never happen. It is the most attenuated form of future interest — less than a contingent remainder, less than a vested interest, and often so speculative that courts historically refused to treat it as property that could be alienated, devised, or reached by creditors.

The term carries two principal senses in legal usage:

1. POSSIBILITY OF REVERTER. The interest retained by a grantor (or the grantor's heirs) when a fee simple determinable is conveyed. If the limiting condition occurs, the property automatically reverts to the grantor by operation of law — no affirmative act required. The "possibility" lies in the fact that the condition may never occur, and the grantor may never recover the land.

2. BARE POSSIBILITY (also: naked possibility, possibility coupled with an interest). A more general category describing any expectancy so uncertain that it cannot be transmitted, assigned, or released at common law. The classic example is the expectation of an heir apparent that a relative will die leaving property — a person has no property right in what they merely hope to inherit.

These two senses are related but distinct. A possibility of reverter is a recognized future interest with defined legal consequences. A bare possibility is not an interest at all in the traditional sense — it is an expectancy the law declines to protect until the contingency resolves.

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Common Language

Modern common usage (Wiktionary): A possibility is something that may happen or exist; a thing that is feasible or conceivable.

Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): "The condition or fact of being possible; the power of happening, being, or existing; that which is possible; a contingency."

The legal meaning tracks the ordinary meaning in one respect — contingency and uncertainty are central to both. But in law, *possibility* is a term of art marking a specific point on the spectrum of future interests, below which no transferable property right is recognized. When a non-lawyer says something is a "possibility," they mean it might happen. When a property lawyer says a grantor holds a "possibility of reverter," they mean a recognized (if contingent) legal interest with consequences for title, taxation, and transfer. The casual sense and the technical sense occupy very different legal terrain.

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Common Confusion

POSSIBILITY OF REVERTER vs. RIGHT OF ENTRY (Power of Termination). These two future interests are frequently conflated because both arise from grants with conditions or limitations. The distinction is operational: a possibility of reverter triggers *automatic* reversion when the limiting condition occurs (accompanying a fee simple determinable), while a right of entry requires the holder to take affirmative action to reclaim the property (accompanying a fee simple subject to condition subsequent). The difference matters enormously in practice — in a possibility of reverter, title has already shifted back before any lawsuit is filed; in a right of entry, the grantee's title persists until the holder acts.

BARE POSSIBILITY vs. CONTINGENT REMAINDER. A contingent remainder is a recognized future interest subject to a condition precedent. A bare possibility is not a remainder at all — it lacks a transferor's intentional creation of a future interest and rests entirely on speculative expectancy. Courts apply fundamentally different rules to each.

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Why It Matters in Research

The word "possibility" appears throughout historical property law sources in ways that require careful disambiguation. Pre-20th century treatises and deeds often use "possibility" loosely to describe anything from a mere expectancy to a fully operative possibility of reverter without specifying which sense is intended. Researchers working with historical instruments must read surrounding language carefully to determine whether the drafter meant an interest with legal teeth or a naked hope.

The durational treatment of possibilities of reverter varies significantly across American jurisdictions and has changed over time. Many states enacted statutes in the 20th century limiting the duration of possibilities of reverter and rights of entry — some imposing 30-year cutoffs, others requiring re-recording. A corpus researcher examining title disputes or property litigation from the mid-20th century forward should check whether a relevant jurisdiction had enacted such a statute, because the applicable law may not be the common law rule the historical dictionaries describe.

The alienability of a possibility of reverter — once denied at common law — is now generally accepted in most American jurisdictions, either by statute or judicial decision. Historical sources that flatly deny alienability may accurately describe the common law baseline but not current doctrine. This is one of the most significant gaps between the historical dictionaries and modern practice for this term.

Researchers tracing the possibility of reverter in connection with racial covenants, urban renewal, and mid-century land use restrictions will find this interest at the center of contested title chains. The automatic-reversion feature made possibilities of reverter a tool in defeasible fee arrangements that conditioned land use on racial exclusion; subsequent civil rights legislation and judicial decisions complicate how those reversions are treated today.

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Historical Dictionary Support

Rapalje & Lawrence treat "possibility" under property law with the expected classical framework, distinguishing the bare or naked possibility (a mere hope of succession, as in the heir apparent's expectation) from the possibility coupled with an interest (closer to what modern doctrine would call a contingent future interest). Their treatment reflects the English common law inheritance of these categories, drawn substantially from Blackstone and the old learning on future uses.

What Rapalje & Lawrence capture well is the common law hostility to treating bare possibilities as transmissible property — the rule that an heir apparent cannot assign their expectancy is clearly stated and grounded in the logic that no one can transfer what they do not yet have. What the entry underweights, predictably for its era, is the possibility of reverter as a distinct, operative future interest in the American property law sense — the terminology and doctrine around fee simple determinable had not yet fully crystallized into the form familiar to modern students.

Researchers should note that 19th-century dictionary treatment of "possibility" often conflates or elides distinctions that 20th-century Restatement analysis (particularly the First Restatement of Property) worked hard to separate. The Rapalje & Lawrence entry is useful for understanding historical pleading and conveyancing language but should not be treated as a reliable guide to the modern taxonomy of future interests.

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Jurisdictional Note

American jurisdictions diverge on whether a possibility of reverter is freely alienable inter vivos, whether it can be devised by will, and whether durational limits apply. Some states (notably Illinois, by statute) have treated possibilities of reverter and rights of entry as subject to the same duration rules. The Restatement (Third) of Property takes positions that not all jurisdictions have adopted. Researchers should not assume common law rules on inalienability control in any particular state without checking local statutes and case law.

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Encyclopedia Cross-Reference

Property Law — Future Interests: Reversion, Possibility of Reverter, Right of Entry

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POSSIBILITYmain

Black's Law Dictionary • 1891

An uncertain thing which may happen. A contingent interest in real or personal estate. It is either near, (or ordinary,) as where an estate is limited to one after the death of another, or remote, (or extraordinary,) as where it is limited to a man, provided he marries a certain woman, and that she shall die and he shall marry another. A possibility "coupled with an interest" is an expectation recognized in law as an es- tate or interest, such as occurs in executory devises or shifting or springing uses. Such a possibility may be sold or assigned. A bare possibility is the expectation or hope of succeeding entertained by an heir apparent.

POSSIBILITYmain

Black's Law Dictionary (2nd Ed.) • 1910

ed a “possessory” action, because It lies only for a plaintiff who, at the moment of the injury complained of, was in actual or constructive, immediate, and exclusive possession. 1 Chit. Pl. 168, 169. : In admiralty practice. A possessory suit is one which is brought to recover the possession of a vessel, had under a claim of The Tilton, 5 Mason, 465, Fed. Cas. No, 14,054; 1 Kent, Contm. 371. In old English law. A real action which had for its object the regaining possession of the freehold, of which the demandant or his ancestors had been unjustly deprived by the present tenant or possessor thereof. In Scotch law. An action for the vindication and recovery of the possession of heritable or movable goods; e. g., the action of molestation. Paters. Comp. In Lonisiana. An action by which one claims to be maintained in the possession of ‘an immovable property, or of a right upon or -growing out of it, when he has been djsturbed, or to be reinstated to that possession, when he has been divested or evicted. Code i Possibility; a possibility. Posstbilitas post dissolutionem executionis nunquam reviviscatur, a possibility will never be revived after the dissolution of its execution. 1 Rolle, 321. Post erccutionem status, ler non patitur posstbilitatem, after the execution of an estate -the law does not suffer a possibllity. 3 ‘Bulst. 108. An uncertain thing A contingent interest Kinzle v. WinBodenhamer ‘ y. Welch, 89 N. C. 78; Needles v. Needles, 7 Ohio St. 442, 70 Am. Dec. 85. It is either near, (or ordinary,) as where an estate is limited to one after the death of another, or remote, (or extraordinary.) as where it is limited to a man, provided he marries a certain woman, and that she shall die and he shall marry another. : —Bare possibility. The same as a “naked” possibility. See infra.—Naked possibility. A bare chance or expectation of acquiring a property or succeeding to an estate in the future, but without any present right in or to it which the law would recognize as an estate or interest. See Rogers v. Felton, 98 Ky. 148, 32 S. W. 406.—Possibility coupled with an interest. An expectation recognized in law as an estate or interest, such as occurs in executory devises and shifting or springing uses ; such a possibility may be sold or assigned. —Possiof rewerter. This term denotes no esut only a possibility to have the estate at Of such possibilities there are several kinds, of which two are usually denoted ae the term under consideration, {1) the posbility that a common-law fee may return to which may happen. tate. the grantor by breach of a condition subject to which it was granted, (2) the possibility that a common-law fee other than a fee simple may _fevert ta the grantor by the natural determina- tion of the fee. Carney v. Kain. 40 W. Va. 758, 23 8. E. 650.—Possibility on a possibility. A remote possibility, as if a remainder be limited in particular to A.’s son John, or Edward, it is bad if he have no son of that name, for it is too remote a possibility that he should not only have a son, but a son of that particular name. 2 Coke,

POSSIBILITYn.

Websters Unabridged Dictionary (1913) • 1913

The quality or state of being possible; the power of happening, being, or existing. "All possibility of error." Hooker. "Latent possibilities of excellence." Johnson. That which is possible; a contingency; a thing or event that may not happen; a contingent interest, as in real or personal estate. South. Burrill.

possibilitynoun

Wiktionary (English) • 2026

Wiktionary contributors • CC BY-SA 4.0 • via Kaikki
Extracted and formatted for display by Law Mind. Source link opens the current Wiktionary page and its contributor history; it is not a frozen copy of this extract.

The quality of being possible. | A thing possible; that which may take place or come into being. | An option or choice, usually used in context with future events. | Capability, power or capacity to act.

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