Understanding Landowner Liability in Texas 

In Texas, when someone is injured on your property, you could be held liable for the injuries. If you intend to use your land for profit by leasing it for recreational, hunting, or other purposes, it’s important to understand the levels of liability and ways to protect yourself as a landowner.  

Your liability depends on several factors including whether or not you warned the injured individual of the dangers on your land and their classification.  The four classifications of individuals entering private land are: invitees, licensees, trespassers, and children (for attractive nuisance doctrine), which are explained below: 

Invitees 

Invitees are those individuals you invite to enter your property. These include guests for business or public purpose that you benefit financially from their use of your land. You owe them the highest duty to warn about unsafe conditions. 

Examples of invitees include customers or individuals leasing or paying to use land for recreational purposes such as hunters. Under common law, landowners must warn invitees of dangerous natural and artificial conditions on the land that they know of or should know of after a reasonable inspection.  

Licensees 

Licensees are your social guests and repairpersons. While licensees also have permission to enter the land, their presence does not benefit you financially as does an invitee. However, as a landowner, you still have a duty to warn licensees of concealed dangerous natural and artificial conditions that you are aware of. You must also make safe all known dangerous conditions, but you are not obligated to conduct regular inspections.  

Trespassers 

Trespassers are individuals who are not invited or do not have permission to enter your land. Generally, you owe no duty to warn trespassers of dangerous conditions. However, in certain circumstances, a duty may arise if the trespasser’s presence is known or if the trespasser is a child. Under the Attractive Nuisance Doctrine, as a landowner, you must take reasonable care under the circumstances to prevent harm caused by dangerous artificial conditions on the property for child trespassers. These artificial conditions may include swimming pools and should be more carefully considered if your property is near locations that children frequent like schools.  

If you directly or indirectly know there are trespassers entering upon your land, you have a duty to warn them of concealed dangerous artificial conditions that you know about, or which are likely to cause death or serious physical injury. 

Recreational Invitees in Texas 

Back in 1965, Texas adopted legislation, called the Recreational Use Statute (RUS) to alter the liability of landowners who give permission to individuals to use their property for recreational purposes. RUS was adopted to encourage private landowners to allow recreational activities on their land such as hunting, fishing, camping, water sports, and cave exploration.  

Under this statute, you do not have to assure that the premises are safe for the recreational purpose, and you owe the same duty to the recreational invitees as you would a trespasser. If someone’s actions result in injury to themselves or their property, you will not incur or assume liability for those injuries.   

The recreational use statute does not relieve landowners of liability for deliberate, willful, or malicious injury to a person or their property (“gross negligence”). It also does not affect the applicability of the doctrine of attractive nuisance imposes a duty on property owners to treat trespassing children the same as an invitee for persons under the age of sixteen.  

Recreational Invitees on Agricultural Land 

Similar rules apply to landowners of agricultural land. However, if you own agricultural land, you have more liability protection for individuals that you invite, not merely give permission, to use the land. For example, if you own agricultural land and invite individuals on your land for recreational purposes, you are afforded the full protection of the statute described above.  

On the other hand, if you own non-agricultural property and invite individuals to use your property for recreational purposes, you may be subject to liability for any resulting injuries. A property qualifies as “agricultural land” under the statute if it is suitable for the production of plants, forestry, or raising farm or ranch animals.  

Recreational Use Statute and Liability Insurance 

The Recreational Use Statute’s protections are only afforded if your earnings from the recreational fees you charge are not more than 20 times the property taxes in the past tax year. For any act or omission that results in injury to a recreational invitee, the maximum amount you can be held liable for as an agricultural landowner is $500,000 for each person, $1 million for each single occurrence of bodily injury or death, and $100,000 for each single occurrence of property injury or destruction.  

You must have liability insurance on the land in the amounts just mentioned. There is no cap on damages for uninsured landowners of non-agricultural land. Landowners may use liability waivers to protect themselves, but you should consult with an attorney to ensure the language of the waiver is valid.  

At Texas Land Brokers, we walk you through the entire process of buying property. On top of being a real estate broker, Tony Malley has extensive legal experience and qualifications. We offer you personalized attention and a turnkey purchasing experience. .