§ 1501. Who may maintain an action. 1. Where a person claims an estate
or interest in real property; or where he claims such estate or interest
as executor or administrator of a deceased person; or where a municipal
corporation has purchased an estate or interest in real property at a
sale conducted by it for unpaid taxes against the property and the time
within which redemption from such sale may be made has expired and such
municipal corporation claims it; such person or municipal corporation,
as the case may be, may maintain an action against any other person,
known or unknown, including one under disability as hereinafter
specified, to compel the determination of any claim adverse to that of
the plaintiff which the defendant makes, or which it appears from the
public records, or from the allegations of the complaint, the defendant
might make; provided, however, that where the estate or interest claimed
by the plaintiff is for a term of years, the action may not be
maintained unless the balance remaining of such term of years is not
less than five.

2. Such action may be maintained, even though the defendant's claim
appears to be invalid on its face, or the court may have to determine
the death of a person, or any statutory limitation of time, or any other
question of fact or law upon which an adjudication of the adverse claims
of the parties may depend.

3. An action against a woman who claims a right of dower in the whole
or a part of the property cannot be commenced until the expiration of
four months after the death of defendant's husband.

4. Where the period allowed by the applicable statute of limitation
for the commencement of an action to foreclose a mortgage, or to enforce
a vendor's lien, has expired, any person having an estate or interest in
the real property subject to such encumbrance may maintain an action
against any other person or persons, known or unknown, including one
under disability as hereinafter specified, to secure the cancellation
and discharge of record of such encumbrance, and to adjudge the estate
or interest of the plaintiff in such real property to be free therefrom;
provided, however, that no such action shall be maintainable in any case
where the mortgagee, holder of the vendor's lien, or the successor of
either of them shall be in possession of the affected real property at
the time of the commencement of the action. In any action brought under
this section it shall be immaterial whether the debt upon which the
mortgage or lien was based has, or has not, been paid; and also whether
the mortgage in question was, or was not, given to secure a part of the
purchase price.

5. The interest had by any mortgagee or contract vendee of real
property or by any successor in interest of either of them, is an
"interest in real property" as that phrase is used in this article of
the real property actions and proceedings law.

6. Where a person, as defined in subdivision seven of section 10.00 of
the penal law, has been convicted of a criminal offense in connection
with a deed theft or fraudulent transaction involving real property, the
conviction creates a rebuttable presumption that such deed transfer was
fraudulent. This section also applies where a grantee of a fraudulent
deed is an entity that is beneficially owned by such convicted person. A
defendant may in such action produce proof to establish by a
preponderance of the evidence that such deed was not procured through
fraud.