Definition
A right of entry is a future interest in real property retained by a grantor (or the grantor's heirs) that gives the holder the power to reclaim possession of land upon the happening of a specified condition subsequent. Unlike a reversion or possibility of reverter, which operate automatically upon a triggering event, a right of entry does not transfer possession by itself — the holder must take affirmative action to exercise it.
The right of entry arises when a grantor conveys a fee simple subject to a condition subsequent. The grantee receives full possessory rights, but those rights may be cut short if the grantee violates a stated condition. When the condition is breached, the estate does not automatically revert; instead, the grantor acquires the power — the right of entry — to terminate the grantee's estate and reclaim possession.
The term also carries a secondary, older meaning in procedural law: the right of a person to enter upon land that is being withheld from them, or to bring a real action to recover seisin of land. This procedural usage was the dominant meaning in early common law and is the sense most often encountered in historical sources.
---
Common Confusion
Right of entry is most often confused with possibility of reverter, and the two are frequently treated as interchangeable in older sources. They are not. A possibility of reverter follows a fee simple determinable — when the triggering event occurs, the estate ends automatically and possession reverts without any act by the grantor. A right of entry follows a fee simple subject to a condition subsequent — the estate continues until the holder of the right affirmatively elects to terminate it. The practical difference is meaningful: under a possibility of reverter, a holdover grantee is a trespasser from the moment of breach; under a right of entry, the grantee's possession remains lawful until the grantor acts. The two interests also receive different treatment under statutes of limitations, marketable title acts, and recording acts, which makes accurate identification essential in title research.
---
Core Elements
To establish that a right of entry exists (as opposed to some other future interest), researchers and courts look for:
1. A present conveyance of a fee simple estate to a grantee.
2. A condition subsequent — language imposing an ongoing obligation or restriction, typically signaled by phrases such as "but if," "provided that," "on condition that," or "upon condition."
3. Retention by the grantor of the power to terminate — express or implied language reserving the right to re-enter if the condition is breached.
4. The requirement of affirmative election — no automatic divestiture; the grantor must act to reclaim possession.
The language of creation matters enormously in historical documents. Courts have long disagreed about whether particular words of condition create a fee simple determinable (and a possibility of reverter) or a fee simple subject to a condition subsequent (and a right of entry). Research into historical deeds and grants should not assume uniform drafting standards.
---
Recognized Forms
/SUBTYPES
Right of Entry for Condition Broken (RECB): The classical common law label, and the form most frequently encountered in Rapalje & Lawrence and other historical dictionaries. The "for condition broken" language signals that the right is contingent — it ripens only upon breach.
Right of Entry as a Remedial/Procedural Right: In older common law practice, a distinct use of the term referred to the right asserted in a real action to recover possession of land wrongfully withheld. This usage predates the modern property-law classification of future interests and is the primary sense in pre-19th-century sources.
---
Why It Matters in Research
The term does significant work in two very different contexts within the Law Mind corpus, and conflating them will produce research errors.
First, in the future-interests context, right of entry is part of a three-part taxonomy — reversion, possibility of reverter, right of entry — that took its modern form gradually through the 19th and 20th centuries. Researchers working with pre-20th-century sources will find the terminology unstable. Rapalje & Lawrence treat the right of entry primarily through its procedural and remedial dimensions, reflecting the period's greater preoccupation with real actions than with future-interest classification. The modern Restatement-influenced vocabulary (fee simple subject to a condition subsequent, power of termination) was not yet standardized.
Second, in the procedural context, right of entry was the predicate for an entire category of real actions that have been abolished in most American jurisdictions. Sources discussing writs of entry, actions in ejectment, and forcible entry and detainer all intersect with this concept. Researchers tracing the abolition of real actions will encounter right of entry language that is purely remedial and carries no future-interest meaning.
Statutes of limitations present a particular research trap. Some jurisdictions have enacted statutes that extinguish rights of entry not exercised within a set period after breach. These statutes often appear in marketable title legislation. A right of entry that appears valid on the face of a historical deed may have been extinguished by operation of statute. The Law Mind Property Law Encyclopedia entry on future interests addresses this directly and should be consulted alongside any deed research.
Jurisdictional variation in the label is also a documented issue. Some American courts and statutes use "power of termination" as the preferred term for what this entry calls right of entry. Researchers using term-specific searches in historical databases should run both.
---
Historical Dictionary Support
Rapalje & Lawrence define the right of entry primarily in its older procedural sense — the right of a person to enter land of which they have been wrongfully dispossessed — and treat it as the foundational remedy in real property disputes before the ascendancy of ejectment. Their treatment reflects the English common law heritage, where the right to enter was a prerequisite to bringing certain real actions and where "entry" was a legally significant act carrying formal consequences.
What Rapalje & Lawrence do not provide is the modern future-interest framing. The tripartite classification of future interests retained in a grantor — reversion, possibility of reverter, right of entry for condition broken — is present in embryonic form in the 19th-century sources but is not systematically articulated in the way the American Law Institute's Restatement of Property (1936) would later present it. Researchers using Rapalje & Lawrence as their primary guide to right of entry will receive accurate information about the term's historical procedural meaning but will need to supplement that source with later authorities to understand the term's modern property-law function.
The historical sources are largely in agreement that the right of entry is personal to the grantor and heirs and was, at common law, not freely alienable — a limitation that distinguished it from reversions and remainders. This alienability restriction has been relaxed or abolished by statute in many American jurisdictions, but its residue appears in older title documents and chain-of-title research.
---
Jurisdictional Note
American jurisdictions vary on whether rights of entry are freely alienable inter vivos, whether they must be exercised within a statutory period after breach, and whether they are subject to marketable title acts that cut off ancient conditions. Some states prefer the label "power of termination." Researchers should identify the applicable jurisdiction's statutory scheme before drawing conclusions from the face of a historical instrument.
---
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
Property Law — Future Interests: Reversion, Possibility of Reverter, Right of Entry
---