Easment

[ChristinaKline]

Asotin County, Washington

I live in Asotin County Washington and I own 10 Acres. When I purchased my property I was told there is a easement road which consist of a dirt road that goes across my property to access the other 5 acres I now own above me on the hill. The road runs uphill and cuts across another 10 acre parcel. The same person sold all these parcels originally and made the easement for the purpose of access to the 5 acre parcel because there is NO other way to access the 5 acres. Recently the person that owned the 10 acres between my 2 properties sold half of that property and in the sale agreement it states that the Easement does exist, Yet the new owner is fencing across the road and told me that "Too Bad I bought a Landlocked property but I can not use that road anymore" I have offered and bought gates for him so that I can still get to my other 5 acres but he refuses to allow me to install them and cross on his property.
All of the property documents clearly state that the road is an Easement and it is for ingress and egress to the top property. Both owners of the divided 10 acres have access to their properties, but now with a fence I will not be able to get to mine. How should I go about enforcing my Easement?

 

[justalayman]

regardless of what he wants to claim, neither he nor the seller could have removed the easement without all dominant tenants approval (that would be you and any other property owner that was granted use of the easemnt).

If you have not had the property surveyed, now is the time to do so. If the guy has fenced across the easement without a gate to allow your use of the easement, you can go to court to request to have the fence removed or (although you had better be sure exactly where the easment is before doing this)

remove the section of fence that blocks your easment. Continue to do so until he threatens you (call the cops then) or sues you and you can defend your actions in court.

 

[djdebz]

Easement mess----

We bought a 2 family about 2 1/2 years ago. In order to make the deal work for us in terms of the price they wanted, we said we would only buy the property if we received: 1. 2 deeded boat slips (the selling property is a marina on a large pond) 2. deeded access for eternity. We also own the parking lot for the marina, and the marina owners received income, all in cash for the past 2 years, from the customers who parked in our lot. They put out a "For Sale By Owner" sign, and I, being a Realtor, tried to sell the property for them for 1 year. They never let me put out a sign since they said it would, "destroy business". When they put out their sign, my husband lost it, and told them they now had to sign a lease and pay for the parking lot they were receiving money for. A few days later, my husband went over, apologized, and they said he would have to take it up with their attorney. Needless to say, we are now being sued for $500,000 and they are trying to sue in order to get the property back. They have chains across the boat ramp that we have an easement for, and my tenants cannot get to the water by the boat ramp, which is necessary. My lawyer has done nothing---he said he was going to issue a restraining order, but he also told us that would not make the owners remove the chains. We know that our deeds are in black and white, and we also know we hired the wrong attorney. Any suggestions?

 

[justalayman]

Any suggestions?

yes. Start your own thread. Hijacking another's is considered rude and it confuses the hell out of everybody.

if you do not know how, go to this page:https://forum.freeadvice.com/forumdisplay.php?f=11

and click on the little blue "new message" button at the top of the list of threads. Then you can start your own thread. You cannot delete an entire post but you can delete what you wrote here and add a minimal amount of text so it will post whatever that is. It would be courteous of you to do so.

 

[efflandt]

You need to find out if an easement was ever recorded on that 10 acres you need to cross, and where that easement was located, before that property was subdivided. It does not matter what any of your deeds say, what matters is whether the easement was recorded on the property it crosses.

I ran into a problem with WI land where the easement represented by and guaranteed by the seller (which I was unaware was excluded from title insurance), was just a verbal easement, and the easement described on my deed was never recorded on the properties it crossed (which were originally all owned by seller acquired from an estate). Fortunately I sold it to an adjoining neighbor not involved in the easement dispute before my property was going to become landlocked.

PS: In some states it is illegal to create landlocked land when subdividing it.

 

[ChristinaKline]

Easement is Recorded

Hello again,

I did my research on my 10 Acres as well as all others around me and the 10 acres that has locked me out of the Easement. All have been recorded at the Courthouse. And it is clearly stated on all the Deeds and Sales Agreements that the Easement exists. I have copies off all the Courhouse records and I have tried to show them to this person and he still says too bad, now your Landlocked cause I say there is NO Easement. As of yesterday, I sent him a Certified letter, return reciept requested along with a copy of his DEED and Courthouse records showing the Easment and asked him to remove the Barricade he installed. Have I done the right thing? If he refuses after that what should I do?

 

[divgradcurl]

Hello again,

I did my research on my 10 Acres as well as all others around me and the 10 acres that has locked me out of the Easement. All have been recorded at the Courthouse. And it is clearly stated on all the Deeds and Sales Agreements that the Easement exists. I have copies off all the Courhouse records and I have tried to show them to this person and he still says too bad, now your Landlocked cause I say there is NO Easement. As of yesterday, I sent him a Certified letter, return reciept requested along with a copy of his DEED and Courthouse records showing the Easment and asked him to remove the Barricade he installed. Have I done the right thing? If he refuses after that what should I do?

If he refuses, you will need to file a lawsuit and obtain a court order that orders him to keep the easement open for you -- when you get a court order, then you can call the cops and get them involved if he tried to close the easement in the future.