Texas Property Code 81.002 – Definitions
Terms Used In Texas Property Code 81.002
- Deed: The legal instrument used to transfer title in real property from one person to another.
- Lease: A contract transferring the use of property or occupancy of land, space, structures, or equipment in consideration of a payment (e.g., rent). Source: OCC
- Property: means real and personal property. See Texas Government Code 311.005
- Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
In this chapter:
(1) “Apartment” means an enclosed space, regardless of whether it is designed for residential or other use, that consists of one or more rooms in a building and that has a direct exit to a thoroughfare or to a common space that leads to a thoroughfare.
(2) “Building” includes each principal structure on or to be erected on real property dedicated in a declaration to a condominium regime.
(3) “Condominium” means a form of real property ownership that combines separate ownership of individual apartments or units with common ownership of other elements.
(4) “Council of owners” means all the apartment owners in a condominium project.
(5) “Declaration” means the instrument that establishes property under a condominium regime.
(6) “General common elements” means the property that is part of a condominium regime other than property that is part of or belongs to an apartment in the regime, including:
(A) land on which the building is erected;
(B) foundations, bearing walls and columns, roofs, halls, lobbies, stairways, and entrance, exit, and communication ways;
(C) basements, flat roofs, yards, and gardens, except as otherwise provided;
(D) premises for the lodging of janitors or persons in charge of the building, except as otherwise provided;
(E) compartments or installation of central services such as power, light, gas, water, refrigeration, central heat and air, reservoirs, water tanks and pumps, and swimming pools; and
(F) elevators and elevator shafts, garbage incinerators, and all other devices and installations generally existing for common use.
(7) “Limited common elements” means a portion of the common elements allocated by unanimous agreement of a council of owners for the use of one or more but less than all of the apartments, such as special corridors, stairways and elevators, sanitary services common to the apartments of a particular floor, and similar areas or facilities.
(8) “Master deed” means a deed that establishes property under a condominium regime.
(9) “Master lease” means a lease that establishes property under a condominium regime.
(10) “Project” means a plan to offer for sale or to sell real property consisting of four or more apartments, rooms, office spaces, or other units in an existing or proposed building as a condominium.
(11) “Property” means real property, whether leased or owned, the improvements on the property, and the incorporeal rights that are appurtenant to the property.