Real Estate Terms Glossary: E

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Earnest Money
Buyer's "good faith" deposit accompanying purchase offer.

Easement
A limited right to use the property of another for specific purpose such as passage. It includes the rights of ingress and egress. An easement does not include the right to possess.

Egress
The means by which a property is exited. The right to got out. Contrast with Ingress.

Emblements
Crops that require annual planting and result directly from the efforts of a tenant. Since they result from his efforts and not that of nature or the landlord, the tenant has the right to remove them upon expiration of the lease; e.g., wheat, corn, and garden vegetables.

Eminent Domain
The power of government to take private property for public use. Proper exercise of the power required the payment of just compensation to the persons whose property is taken. Condemnation is the court process of exercising eminent domain.

Encroachment
Any improvement which extends beyond a property boundary and intrudes upon an adjoining property belonging to another; a trespass. Setback requirements are also capable of being encroached.

Encumbrance
A claim, lien, charge, or liability attached to and binding upon real property that has a tendency to diminish its value.

Equitable Title
An interest in real estate such that a court will take notice and protect the owner's rights.

Equity
That interest or value remaining in property after payment of all liens or other charges on the property. A owner's equity is normally the monetary interest over and above the mortgage indebtedness.

Erosion
The gradual wearing away of land by action of wind or water.

Escheat
The government's right to unclaimed property which is abandoned or which is left by a decedent who leaves no will and no heirs to inherit the property.

Escrow
The process by which money and/or documents are held by a disinterested third person (a "stakeholder") until the satisfaction of the terms and conditions of the escrow instructions (as prepared by the parties to the escrow).

Estate
The degree or extent of an interest one has in real estate or personal property.

Estoppel
Preventing a person from making a statement contrary to a previous statement.

External Obsolescence
A form of depreciation resulting from factors entirely outside the boundaries of a subject property; e.g., neighborhood decay, proximity to a nuisance, etc. Frequently results from changes in surrounding use patters.

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