Rhode Island General Laws

R.I. Gen. Laws § 34-16-4 (2026)

Action brought by person claiming through conveyance, devise, or inheritance

✓ current as of July 2026
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Any person or persons claiming title to real estate, or any interest or estate, legal or equitable, in real estate, including any warrantor in any deed or other instrument in the chain of title to the real estate, which title, interest, or estate is based upon, or has come through, a deed, grant, conveyance, devise, or inheritance, purporting to vest in the person or persons or his, her, or their predecessors in title the whole title to such real estate, or any fractional part thereof or any interest or estate therein, may bring a civil action against all persons claiming, or who may claim, and against all persons appearing to have of record any adverse interest therein, to determine the validity of his, her, or their title or estate therein, to remove any cloud thereon, and to affirm and quiet his, her, or their title to the real estate. The action may be brought under the provisions of this section whether the plaintiff may be in or out of possession and whether or not the action might be brought under the provisions of § 34-16-1 or under the provisions of any other statute.

Notes of Decisions
Cited in 6 cases (1 in the last 5 years), 1992–2022 · leading case: Locke v. O'BRIEN, 610 A.2d 552 (R.I. 1992).
Locke v. O'BRIEN, 610 A.2d 552 (R.I. 1992). · cites it 3× “1956 (1969 Reenactment) §§ 34-16-4 and 34-16-7. 1 In their answer defendants raised as a defense the purported defect in the original deed in plaintiffs’ chain of title (the discrepancy between the monument and the quantity description) and alleged in their counterclaim that…”
Lister v. Bank of Am., N.A., 790 F.3d 20 (1st Cir. 2015). · cites it 2× “R.I. Gen. Laws § 34-16-4 (1956). 4 By its own terms, the Rhode Island statute requires defendants in a quiet title action to have “an adverse interest” to that of the plaintiff.”
Lister v. Bank of Am., N.A., 8 F. Supp. 3d 74 (D.R.I. 2014). · cites it 4× “Citing R.I. Gen. Laws § 34-16-4, Plaintiffs aver that Rhode Island statutory law allows a person, who has or is claiming title to real estate, to initiate a lawsuit to determine the validity of their title, to remove a cloud from the title, and to affirm or quiet title to real…”
Twenty Eleven, LLC v. Michael J. Botelho, 127 A.3d 897 (R.I. 2015). · cites it 2× ““General Laws 1956 § 34-16-4 provides that any person claiming ‘any interest or estate, legal or equitable, in real estate, including any warrantor in any deed or other instrument in the chain of title to the real estate’ may bring a civil action against other people claiming…”
Arnold Road Realty Assocs., LLC v. Tiogue Fire Dist., 873 A.2d 119 (R.I. 2005). “General Laws 1956 § 34-16-4 provides that any person claiming “any interest or estate, legal or equitable, in real estate, including any warrantor in any deed or other instrument in the chain of title to the real estate” may bring a civil action against other people claiming any…”
Sanchez v. Mortg. Elec. Reg. Sys., Inc. (D.R.I. 2022). “Laws § 34-16-4 (1956). Adverse possession requires that the claimant “shall have been for the space of ten (10) years in the uninterrupted, quiet, peaceful and actual seisin and possession of any lands[.”
Annotations are extracted automatically from the opinions in the Syfert caselaw corpus and ranked by authority, recency, and treatment. Dots show Syfertize treatment of the citing case itself.