RES exam Paper 1: what you need to know

Paper 1 is the legal foundation of the RES exam. It tests the real estate agency industry, basic land law, and how interests in land are dealt with — the rules and concepts that underpin every property transaction.

What Paper 1 focuses on

Paper 1 is the “why and how land works” paper. It builds the vocabulary and legal concepts — estates, titles, encumbrances, contracts, tenancies, mortgages — that you will then apply to real-world scenarios in Paper 2. If Paper 2 is the application, Paper 1 is the machinery underneath.

Competency Unit 1: industry overview & basic land law

1A. Real estate agency industry overview

• 1.1 Real estate market and submarkets
• 1.2 Real estate market players and government intervention

1B. Basic land law concepts

• 1.3 Introduction to land law
• 1.4 Land
• 1.5 Estates in land
• 1.6 State Lands Act
• 1.7 Rights in another’s land
• 1.8 Registration of titles

Competency Unit 2: dealings with interests in land

• 2.1 Law of contract
• 2.2 Law of agency
• 2.3 Landlord and tenant law
• 2.4 Negligence
• 2.5 Conveyance inter vivos
• 2.6 Mortgage
• 2.7 Gift
• 2.8 Trust
• 2.9 Succession
• 2.10 Future interests
• 2.11 Co-ownership
• 2.12 Restrictions on capacity to hold land
• 2.13 Planning and development of land

How these topics are tested

Paper 1 leans on concepts and definitions more than calculations. Expect questions that ask you to identify the correct estate, distinguish co-ownership forms (joint tenancy vs tenancy-in-common), recognise an encumbrance or a right in another’s land, and apply contract or agency principles to a short scenario. The Section B case studies in Paper 1 typically chain a few legal concepts together — for example, a tenancy, a mortgage, and a dispute over ownership.

Where candidates lose marks is not on the obvious definitions but on application: knowing the rule is not enough if you cannot tell which rule applies in a given factual situation.

Paper 1 study priorities

1. Nail the classifications first — freehold vs leasehold, joint tenancy vs tenancy-in-common, legal vs equitable interests. These distinctions come up constantly.
2. Learn the law, then test with scenarios. For contract, agency, and tenancy, drill case-study questions so you move from recall to application.
3. Don’t skip the “dry” topics. State Lands Act, succession, gift, and trust are individually small but frequently appear as a single MCQ.
4. Treat planning and development law seriously — it bridges into Paper 2’s property transactions and is easy to under-prepare.