comply with the "Banking Directive on financing lease rights" of the Dutch Banking Association. Fixed-term contracts, for example 30 or 49 years, are excluded, while existing fixed-term contracts issued before 1 January 2013 are eligible for mortgage financing, provided the conditions meet the eligibility criteria of the Dutch Banking Association. Banks have decided to do this because they fear that the landowner will implement substantial increases, which will lead to payment problems for the leaseholder. Owners of leasehold properties wishing to sell their house are increasingly confronted with this restriction. The house appears to be unsaleable in many cases because new prospective buyers cannot get the financing. United States The term 'ground rent' is applied in many U.S. states to a kind of tenure created by a grant in fee simple, the grantor reserving to himself and his heirs a certain rent, which is the interest in the money value of the land. Maryland The State of Maryland maintains provisions for ground rents, primarily in the Baltimore area. The practice dates back to the seventeenth century, when lesser lords and serfs paid crops and livestock to feudal lords to rent the lord's land. With ground rent, homeowners only own the building itself, but they must pay a small amount to rent the land itself from its owner. Under Maryland law, if ground rent is not paid on time, the ground owner can go to court and have a lien placed against the house, effectively seizing the home from the homeowner over a relatively small amount due, sometimes as little as $24. This occurred almost 4,000 times in Baltimore City from 2000 to 2005. In addition, properties with ground rent are usually valued about $10,000 less than comparable properties without ground rent. In 2007, an emergency bill was presented by Democratic Governor of Maryland Martin O'Malley to completely ban new ground rents and prevent ground owners from seizing houses from delinquent homeowners. The bill was passed by the legislature. Maryland state law required all ground owners to register the ownership of the land with the state by September 2008 or else the ground ownership is automatically extinguished. As of 2008, there were about 85,000 in Maryland. The new laws were contested in court for some ground owners, who called it an unconstitutional taking of property without fair compensation. In 2011, the law was ruled unconstitutional by the Maryland Court of Appeals,