Terms Used In Virginia Code > Title 34 > Chapter 2 - Homestead Exemption of Householder

• Affidavit: A written statement of facts confirmed by the oath of the party making it, before a notary or officer having authority to administer oaths.
• Amendment: A proposal to alter the text of a pending bill or other measure by striking out some of it, by inserting new language, or both. Before an amendment becomes part of the measure, thelegislature must agree to it.
• Appeal: A request made after a trial, asking another court (usually the court of appeals) to decide whether the trial was conducted properly. To make such a request is "to appeal" or "to take an appeal." One who appeals is called the appellant.
• Appraisal: A determination of property value.
• Articles of incorporation: means all documents constituting, at any particular time, the charter of a corporation. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Assets: (1) The property comprising the estate of a deceased person, or (2) the property in a trust account.
• Bankruptcy: Refers to statutes and judicial proceedings involving persons or businesses that cannot pay their debts and seek the assistance of the court in getting a fresh start. Under the protection of the bankruptcy court, debtors may discharge their debts, perhaps by paying a portion of each debt. Bankruptcy judges preside over these proceedings.
• Board of supervisors: means the governing body of a county. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• Commission: means the State Corporation Commission of Virginia. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• Corporation: A legal entity owned by the holders of shares of stock that have been issued, and that can own, receive, and transfer property, and carry on business in its own name.
• Corporation: means the domestic corporation that is the issuer of the shares held by a shareholder demanding appraisal and, for matters covered by §§ 13. See Virginia Code 13.1-729
• Council: means the governing body of a city or town. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• County: means any existing county or such unit hereafter created. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• Creditor process: means all methods used by creditors to collect unsecured debts. See Virginia Code 34-1
• Damages: Money paid by defendants to successful plaintiffs in civil cases to compensate the plaintiffs for their injuries.
• Debt: means a legally enforceable monetary obligation or liability of any individual whether arising out of a contract or otherwise, but not an obligation resulting from an intentional tort. See Virginia Code 34-1
• Deed: The legal instrument used to transfer title in real property from one person to another.
• delivery: means any method of delivery used in conventional commercial practice, including delivery by hand, mail, commercial delivery, and, if authorized in accordance with § 13. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Dependent: A person dependent for support upon another.
• Development: means a tract of land developed or to be developed as a unit under single ownership or unified control which is to be used for any business or industrial purpose or is to contain three or more residential dwelling units. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Discovery: Lawyers' examination, before trial, of facts and documents in possession of the opponents to help the lawyers prepare for trial.
• Distribution: means a direct or indirect transfer of cash or other property, except the corporation's own shares, or incurrence of indebtedness by a corporation to or for the benefit of its shareholders in respect of any of its shares. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• domestic corporation: means a corporation authorized by law to issue shares, irrespective of the nature of the business to be transacted, organized under this chapter or existing pursuant to the laws of the Commonwealth on January 1, 1986, or which, by virtue of articles of incorporation, amendment, or merger, has become a domestic corporation of the Commonwealth, even though also being a corporation organized under laws other than the laws of the Commonwealth, or that has become a domestic corporation of the Commonwealth pursuant to Article 12. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Eligible entity: means a domestic or foreign unincorporated entity or a domestic or foreign nonstock corporation. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Entity: includes any domestic or foreign corporation; any domestic or foreign nonstock corporation; any domestic or foreign unincorporated entity; any estate or trust; and any state, the United States and any foreign government. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Equitable: Pertaining to civil suits in "equity" rather than in "law." In English legal history, the courts of "law" could order the payment of damages and could afford no other remedy. See damages. A separate court of "equity" could order someone to do something or to cease to do something. See, e.g., injunction. In American jurisprudence, the federal courts have both legal and equitable power, but the distinction is still an important one. For example, a trial by jury is normally available in "law" cases but not in "equity" cases. ^{Source: U.S. Courts}
• Exempt: means protected from all forms of creditor process. See Virginia Code 34-1
• Exemption: means protection from all forms of creditor process. See Virginia Code 34-1
• Expenses: means reasonable expenses of any kind that are incurred in connection with a matter. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Fair value: means the value of the corporation's shares determined:

  1. See Virginia Code 13.1-729

• Fee simple: Absolute title to property with no limitations or restrictions regarding the person who may inherit it.
• Foreign corporation: means a corporation authorized by law to issue shares, organized under laws other than the laws of the Commonwealth. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Garnishment: Generally, garnishment is a court proceeding in which a creditor asks a court to order a third party who owes money to the debtor or otherwise holds assets belonging to the debtor to turn over to the creditor any of the debtor
• Governing body: means the board of supervisors of a county, council of a city, or council of a town, as the context may require. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• Grantor: The person who establishes a trust and places property into it.
• Guardian: A person legally empowered and charged with the duty of taking care of and managing the property of another person who because of age, intellect, or health, is incapable of managing his (her) own affairs.
• Homestead exemption: means that exemption created by § 34-4. See Virginia Code 34-1
• Householder: means any resident of Virginia. See Virginia Code 34-1
• Individual: means a natural person. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• inhabitants: means with reference to any county, city, town, political subdivision of the Commonwealth or any combination thereof, the natural persons in such county, city, town, political subdivision or combination as shown by the unadjusted United States decennial census last preceding the time at which any provision dependent upon population is being applied or the time as of which it is being construed. See Virginia Code 1-235
• Interest: means interest from the date the corporate action becomes effective until the date of payment, at the average rate currently paid by the corporation on its principal bank loans or, if none, at a rate that is fair and equitable under all the circumstances. See Virginia Code 13.1-729
• Interest: means either or both of the following rights under the organic law governing an unincorporated entity:

  1. See Virginia Code 13.1-603

• Interested transaction: means a corporate action described in subsection A of § 13. See Virginia Code 13.1-729
• Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
• Liabilities: The aggregate of all debts and other legal obligations of a particular person or legal entity.
• Lien: A claim against real or personal property in satisfaction of a debt.
• Locality: means a county, city, or town as the context may require. See Virginia Code 1-221
• Month: means a calendar month and "year" means a calendar year. See Virginia Code 1-223
• Mortgage: The written agreement pledging property to a creditor as collateral for a loan.
• Notary: means notary public. See Virginia Code 1-226
• Obligation: An order placed, contract awarded, service received, or similar transaction during a given period that will require payments during the same or a future period.
• Person: includes an individual and an entity. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Personal estate: includes chattels real and such other estate as, upon the death of the owner intestate, would devolve upon his personal representative. See Virginia Code 1-233
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Plaintiff: The person who files the complaint in a civil lawsuit.
• plat of subdivision: means the schematic representation of land divided or to be divided and information in accordance with the provisions of §§ 15. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Pleadings: Written statements of the parties in a civil case of their positions. In the federal courts, the principal pleadings are the complaint and the answer.
• Principal office: means the office, in or out of the Commonwealth, where the principal executive offices of a domestic or foreign corporation are located, or, if there are no such offices, the office, in or out of the Commonwealth, so designated by the board of directors. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Proceeding: includes civil suit and criminal, administrative, and investigatory action. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Process: includes subpoenas, the summons and complaint in a civil action, and process in statutory actions. See Virginia Code 1-237
• Public corporation: means a corporation that has shares listed on a national securities exchange or regularly traded in a market maintained by one or more members of a national or affiliated securities association. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• real estate: includes lands, tenements and hereditaments, and all rights and appurtenances thereto and interests therein, other than a chattel interest. See Virginia Code 1-219
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Record date: means the date fixed for determining the identity of the corporation's shareholders and their shareholdings for purposes of this chapter. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Remainder: An interest in property that takes effect in the future at a specified time or after the occurrence of some event, such as the death of a life tenant.
• Secretary: means the corporate officer or other individual to whom the board of directors has delegated responsibility under subsection C of § 13. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Settlement: Parties to a lawsuit resolve their difference without having a trial. Settlements often involve the payment of compensation by one party in satisfaction of the other party's claims.
• Shareholder: means a record shareholder, a beneficial shareholder, and a voting trust beneficial owner. See Virginia Code 13.1-729
• Shareholder: means a record shareholder. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Shares: means the units into which the proprietary interests in a corporation are divided. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Site plan: means the proposal for a development or a subdivision including all covenants, grants or easements and other conditions relating to use, location and bulk of buildings, density of development, common open space, public facilities and such other information as required by the subdivision ordinance to which the proposed development or subdivision is subject. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Street: means highway, street, avenue, boulevard, road, lane, alley, or any public way. See Virginia Code 15.2-2201
• Summons: Another word for subpoena used by the criminal justice system.
• sworn: means "affirm" or "affirmed. See Virginia Code 1-250
• Tort: A civil wrong or breach of a duty to another person, as outlined by law. A very common tort is negligent operation of a motor vehicle that results in property damage and personal injury in an automobile accident.
• Town: means any existing town or an incorporated community within one or more counties which became a town before noon, July one, nineteen hundred seventy-one, as provided by law or which has within defined boundaries a population of 1,000 or more and which has become a town as provided by law. See Virginia Code 15.2-102
• Trial: A hearing that takes place when the defendant pleads "not guilty" and witnesses are required to come to court to give evidence.
• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• Venue: The geographical location in which a case is tried.
• Voting group: means all shares of one or more classes or series that under the articles of incorporation or this chapter are entitled to vote and be counted together collectively on a matter at a meeting of shareholders. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• Voting power: means the current power to vote in the election of directors. See Virginia Code 13.1-603
• written: means any information in the form of a document. See Virginia Code 13.1-603