§35-4-75. Time for delivery of deed; when recorded contract presumed abandoned.

(a) Where any contract or extension thereof for the sale of any interest in land fails to state the time within which, or the circumstances under which, a deed is to be delivered, the time for the delivery of the deed shall be a reasonable time after the date on which the contract was entered into, and in no case more than one year subsequent to such date.

(b) Where any contract for the sale of any interest in land or any extension of such contract has been recorded or rerecorded and five years have elapsed since the time provided by the parties or by subsection (a) of this section for the delivery of the deed, whichever period shall be the longer, and no action has been brought for the specific performance of such contract or for the foreclosure of the vendee's interest or for the enforcement of an equitable lien arising from the contract and no lis pendens has been properly filed, a lienholder or a purchaser for value or mortgagee may conclusively presume that such contract has been abandoned by the parties thereto and that the vendee named in the contract and his successors in interest have no equitable claim against the land made the subject of the contract; provided, that this section shall not apply so long as the vendee named in the contract or his successors in interest shall be in actual possession of the land made the subject of the contract.

(c) This section shall apply to contracts and extensions thereof recorded before or after January 31, 1972; except, that the period of five years provided for in subsection (b) of this section shall not be deemed to have expired in any case until January 31, 1974.

(Acts 1971, 3rd Ex. Sess., No. 179, p. 4439.)