A Texas court has held that an option to purchase an interest in land for a fixed price of $50,000 that would last for 100 years was an invalid and unreasonable restraint on alienation of land. Tiner v. Johnson, 2022 WL 2062478 (Tex. Ct. App. 2022). The court could have held it to be void under the traditional rule against perpetuities. Although Texas statutes have reformed the rule against perpetuities, the court found that none of those reforms applied in this case.

The case is a useful reminder that the common law rule against unreasonable restraints on alienation is an independent limit on interests that may vest too far into the future and which might have the effect of inhibiting sale of land. The way to avoid the rule is to place a reasonable time limit on them and/or make the sale price equal to fair market value at the time the option is exercised.