Property Dispute Leaves 3 Dead, 1 Injured and 2 In Prison, Maybe For Life

[paulsharvey]

Looks like our county requires access Easements to be min 30 ft width

 

[Alan W.]

Buddy is in the process of selling some acreage that he bought about 6 years ago.
The neighbors that he purchased the acreage from are also selling their adjoining land.
One day he finds his gate opened and a real estate agent with a client coming out his drive. They have been looking at the adjacent property and used his drive. He informed them they were trespassing to which the agent said the drive was a shared one. He told them that his deed was free of any encumbrances.
Neighbor calls him saying she is going to sue him for lying about the drive.
He then tells her its not on his deed that she signed when she sold it to him. Not a word from her since.
The neighbor has hundreds of feet of road frontage for their property.

 

[paulsharvey]

So, sometimes, Easements don't show on a deed, especially if property has been divided or combined over the years, or originally easement docs weren't recorded at court. Still can 100% be enforceable, it's just a real challenge to track down some of this stuff 70+ years later.

 

[dodge man]

That’s correct. If I give an easement to someone they don’t record my deed again showing the easement burdening my property. If I sell the property it should be added to the deed then but it doesn’t always happen.

 

[riptides]

Read this entire thread if anyone thinks they shouldn't involve a lawyer when dealing with easements. Regardless of if you're the landowner that the easement runs across, or the person that needs the easement across someone else's land to access your own property.

Help! I need legal advice re: easements

My neighbor has an easement thru my property " for ingress and egress, 20' in width upon the existing roadway" The existing roadway is a gravel road about 10' wide. He is now trying to widen the existing road and also take more of my land at the end of this road by adverse possession or...

www.tractorbynet.com

What was the real outcome of that?

I recall reading somewhere that it was not quite like the OP presented. I also believe someone tracked down the court case, but never posted that link or info either.

Do you know what the real story was?

 

[MattB4]

I find this all very interesting because, we have an individual that owns 22.5 acres behind us and including us there are 4 neighbors that gave him a 20 foot easement right down the property line. it is my understanding that the power company requires 30 feet to run power and he has decided to sell the property but is telling everyone that it has an easement big enough for power or that the 4 neighbors will be forced to give up 10 more feet, now my driveway is 3/4 of a mile long and his easement goes beyond that so 10 feet for about a mile long. I've lived here for 20 years and this has been this way for 40 or more years. we have 11 acres here but one of the neighbors only owns 4 acres so it would not be right to force anyone to give up land.

Depends on your local laws but utility line easements are a bit different than road access easements. Overhead electrical corridors have minimum vegetation clear back requirements such as 15ft either side of line. The corridor however does not mean that it grants access to anyone but the landowner and the utility company. The landowner is perfectly in their right to fence off his land that the power line runs over.

Because utility easements are not always road easements the previous 20ft road easement that the 22.5 acre land owner has would not grant utility easement. Especially one that falls outside the boundaries. None of the adjacent property owners have to agree to allowing it. Where I live I have watched several large properties be sold over and over since the ability to get electrical is not there. The adjacent property owners refuse to provide access even when offered good money.

He can tell potential buyers anything he likes and be held accountable if it is false. Not your problem.

 

[paulsharvey]

Got to read the easement carefully. Some grant access, some are access and utility, there are aerial Easements for just the wires crossing a corner clip of the property, temporary construction Easements, ect. They should also define the use of the propery by the owner. Most won't allow a permanent structure, others might allow live stock grazing, but not crop farming, ect. Some could potentially limit the height of a structure below an aerial easement; others might simply be a drainage easement with either the right of access for maintenance or could convey maintenance responsibly to the propety owner. There is a reason for surveyor, real estate attorneys, title insurance, ROW acquisition folks, ect.

I think a lot of the problem is all this research takes money... It could get pretty expensive.

Dealt with a contractor/homeowner (new construction), she had legal easement from the back of her property to a county road, but the neighboring propety had a garage blocking the easement. The new owner of the back propety with the garage purchased it, unaware of the easement encroachment. He obviously isn't going to simply say Fine, I'll spend $5k ripping down my $50k garage. Luckily, she did have highway frontage, although that was only granted as a 'non conforming access' and if she ever got 'reasonable access' off the easement, she would be obligated to remove the access on the main road, at her expense.

In Florida, a lot of these probelms stem from 1970s developers/developments, that where never built, and now 50+ years later, you buy a 2.5 acre parcel on an easement or plat'd road, that doesn't exist

 

[paulsharvey]

There are also Public Utility Easements vs an easement acquired for 1 specific utility, that very well might be exclusive (ie, power company, but not phone/gas/water)

 

[paulsharvey]

To add to confusion, let's say you have a property on a river/creek/lake, with road frontage. You very well might have to allow the historic water flow to continue from road to waterway, regardless of easement or not, which could very well prevent your intended land use.

By the same token, your on a hill, with water flowing down and across a neighboring property or road, they may have to continue taking that historic water flow, might you would likely not be able to increase flow (ie add impervious surface, over a certain amount or sq ft)

 

[MossRoad]

What was the real outcome of that?

I recall reading somewhere that it was not quite like the OP presented. I also believe someone tracked down the court case, but never posted that link or info either.

Do you know what the real story was?

I only know what I read, and that doesn't mean any of it is true. It is the internet, after all. Regardless of who was right or wrong, etc., it was a painful read. We looked at several pieces of landlocked property many years ago. We'd have had to ask people to grant us access in some cases. Purchase access. Stuff like that. I knew one guy that bought all of the properties surrounding 40 acres and refusing to grant an easement to the owner of the locked property. His intention was to purchase the locked property at greatly reduced value. Not sure how that one turned out. In others, the sellers owned the property in front, so said they'd put in an easement along the edge of the property. One already had an easement... road access was blocked by a highway guardrail at the bottom of a steep dip in a highway. The state said they would not allow a driveway down in that dip.

Anyhow, getting on bad terms with a neighbor, easement or not, is no fun. You may have to spend a lifetime dealing with them.