The Bundle of Rights

Ownership is a BUNDLE of separable rights: possession, control, enjoyment, exclusion, and disposition. Each stick can be given away without losing the others — a lease transfers possession, an easement gives a neighbor limited use, a mortgage pledges the property as security, mineral rights can be severed and sold separately. Real property includes the surface, subsurface, air rights, and everything permanently attached; personal property (chattel) is everything movable. Items convert between the two: severance turns a growing tree (real) into lumber (personal); annexation turns lumber into a built-in bookshelf (real).