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About Baltimore, MD Ground Leases

As many of us know too well, Baltimore is one of the rare areas in the country that still has residential ground rents ( St. Louis is another ), also known as ground leases. As a refresher, if you have a ground rent, it means that you own your house ( you have a leasehold interest ), while someone else owns the land on which the house is built ( they have the fee interest ). If you own your property subject to a ground rent, you typically would be required to pay an annual or semi-annual rent payment to the owner of the land. If the annual ground rent payments go unpaid, the ground rent holder can go to court and have a lien placed against the home for the value of the ground rent. The value of a ground rent is typically determined by capitalizing the annual ground rent payment by 6%. For example a $60/year ground rent divided by 6% = a value of $1,000.

Under Maryland law, the owner of a leasehold residential property has the right to redeem the ground rent for a one-time payment and obtain full title (including land) to the property. Unless the tenant already knows who your ground rent owner is, redeeming the ground rent can sometimes be next to impossible.

In an effort to make this information more readily available, a law enacted by the ‘07 session of the MD General Assembly requires all ground lease owners to register certain information with the State Department of Assessment and Taxation.

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