Property enchroachment question 1.

[slydog]

Dear Ms XXXXXX,

We recently met with a surveyor to go over the boundary lines on our property in XXXXXXX. During that process we noticed that you had cleared a portion of our property outside of the allowed easement (25 feet from centerline of the existing gravel road) without our consent. It also appears you have started developing a gravel driveway, well into our property. We aren’t sure if your plans are to make this graveled area a permanent driveway or if it was a temporary solution for purposes of setting up your mobile home. We believe it to be mutually beneficial to contact you about this matter before you incur any additional expenses in building a driveway on our property.

If your plans are to use the newly graveled area as your driveway, we must regretfully inform you that we cannot allow this development to occur on our property and you will need to move it over onto your property. The easement allows for ingress and egress to your property to a point where your property line intersects the road easement, 25 feet from the centerline of the pre-existing gravel road. With approximately 175 feet of usable easement to your property, we do not feel it was necessary for you to have cleared any of our property to install your mobile home or establish a parking area. We request in the future that prior to cutting or clearing anything on our property, you obtain our express written approval.

We would appreciate your response to this letter to let us know your intentions in this matter. Please contact us as soon as possible by writing or calling us through the information in the heading of this letter.

Thanking you in advance for your prompt and careful attention to this matter, I remain,

Sincerely,

 

[LBrown59]

<font color="purple">1*When the pipe was laid, probably about 5 or 6 years ago, the Health department didn't approve it crossing the line, because there was no line there at that time.
2* The line was drawn well after the line was installed.
3*There is no existing easement for it .
4*. They encroached, The drive/parking was just done in the last month or two
SLY </font>
<font color="green">---------------------
1* Ok on that.
2*Which just may have caused the sewer to now be out of compliance requiring removal of the dog leg from your property.
I don't think any health department would permit a septic system to occupy 2 different parcels owned by 2 different parties; at least my county won't.
3*Most likely true. For one thing I doubt such an easement would be enforceable because it would probably violate septic regs.
4*Who is they? Are you tackling about the lady you bought the land from or someone she sold that parcel to?
</font>

 

[slydog]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( 2*Which just may have caused the sewer to now be out of compliance requiring removal of the dog leg from your property.
I don't think any health department would permit a septic system to occupy 2 different parcels owned by 2 different parties; at least my county won't. )</font>

Good point. I will have to check that out.

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( 4*Who is they? Are you tackling about the lady you bought the land from or someone she sold that parcel to?)</font>

The people who bought the two acre plot from the woman who sold us the land. They are the ones who moved the home in and built the drive across our property.

Thanks again for everyones advice and help!

 

[LBrown59]

SLY; how ya comming on this?
Got things worked out yet?

 

[slydog]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( SLY; how ya comming on this?
Got things worked out yet? )</font>

Per your suggestion, I called the Health Department septic guy back again. He said as far as their regs go, there was really nothing they could do about it as it wasn't a "new"installation that they would hence approve. I asked him about any pre installation drawings or plans, and he didn't have any locally so he put me in touch with the Regional guy in Little Rock, who also didn't have any copies of the plans. While talking with him I sort of came to the conclusion that those drawings really wouldnt be of much value to me anyway, as I'm sure they wouldn't be "plotted to the grid" so to speak, just probably at the most a line drawing showing approximate placement on the total land.

There is another issue which the surveyor found that I talked to him about. There "lagoon" at the bottom end of their land where this sewer line eventually ends up. The base of the levee for their lagoon extends 5 feet onto our property. That is something I don't see any possible solution to other than granting easement for it, or selling/leasing them that 5 feet of my land. He did say however, that this might be an issue for the.....sheet...can't remembert the State department that regulates septic lagoons. I have it written down on my other computer. It is some type of environmental department, but he did say they might have a problem with it being that close to our property.

He also said I needed to talk to my attorney about this. I think I will do that, before attempting to contact this other agency as I don't want to open a Pandora's box untill I get a few more ducks in a row. Either way, with this, I don't see how whatever decision that agency makes about it, it will be a financial problem for me.

I have held up contacting either the old or the new park owners untill I clarified a very important issue that was still uncertain untill I researched it on Monday. I needed to make sure there was an easement filed on the parks property for us to connect to an underground transformer about 10 feet on their side of the line.
(I know what some may think...well why should I not just swap easements in this case as I need to go 15 feet onto their property, and they are only 15 feet on my side. The problem I have here lies in that my electric will run underground directly across the line to the transformer 15 feet away. Their sewer line is 15 on my side of the line, but it runs possibly the full lenght of the land, approx 1000 feet. I see that as a big difference)

I am quite relieved to have found that at least the previous owner did file a certified copy of that easement with the power company; as I had gotten copies of all the deeds on all the property surrounding ours, and there was no easement included within the deed the new park owners recieved. The previous owner has no idea I got all these deeds, so I even know what she paid for all of this land. Not that it is really any of my business, nor that it's relevant, but she was totally deceptive about those figures too...SURPRISE!

Im slowly unravelling what appears to be a picture of slight deception on the previous owners partl; either that or what has to amount to total blind ingnorance. As the district guy in Little Rock stated, perhaps both or either of us new owners may have grounds for a lawsuit against the previous owner. But I am still in the fact finding, document gathering process, and being very methodical and thorough. I plan on putting together any possible proposals, solutions, etc. before I talk to my attorney again, and then plan on contacting the new owners with all the info, and discussing with them about us mutually contacting the previous owner as a team. I think it will come across much better if I can present it as an "Us" against her scenario, as I would have them as allies instead of enemies.

Btolle was correct in that I should have checked this out before I bought it, but in my defense I will have to say that I did get more than I thought I was getting. Unfortunately, I got a whole lot more, that I now have to get sorted out. I'll keep you posted. Thanks for asking!