Neighbor and I are both deeded the same land

What is the name of your state? New Hampshire

We purchased a 12.79 acre piece of land in Sept of '03. Within that 12.79 acres are two 1.5 acre building lots accessed via a deeded road/right of way through the rest of the property. We have just started to develop it by having a logger go in and clear trees for a driveway/road and house site.

A dispute has arisen in that both my neighbor and I claim to own the same land, a .15 acre trianglular shaped portion of ground by the road. Her deed says that she owns it and my deed says that I own it. The issue came up because a logger I hired started to clear an area on that .15 acre section of land for a landing for the cut trees. Once the dispute arose, he ceased work on that area and moved to another part of the property.

In talking with the surveyor that did the work, he said that a lot line adjustment was done to the neighboring property back in '86 in order to give the property that I purchased 200' of road frontage. This was necessary to provide the frontage needed to take the road for the house sites off of the existing road. Without the lot line adjustment, I would only own 40' of road frontage, which would affect the accessibility of the house lots. It would seem that I could build a driveway for one lot but a "road" necessary to access both lots would likely be rejected. This would thereby decrease the value of our property substantially.

It appears that the error lies in that the lot line adjustment was registered but the change was never made to the deed of the neighboring lot.

The problem for me, as far as I understand, is that if the lot line adjustment was recorded but the change never made to the neighboring property's deed, my neighbor would own the property because her property was deeded first as part of the Phase 1 section of this subdivision, whereas our property is part of the Phase 2 section done sometime after Phase 1.

If this is the case, the following issues come up:

We own 12.64 acres, not the 12.79 that we purchased. The sale would have been misrepresented to us as buyers.

We have 40' of road frontage, not 200', which would greatly decrease the value of our property due to the fact that only one house can be built and not two. A variance can be applied for but it could be rejected and the neighbors can fight it.

It would appear, based on the response to this point, that my neighbor would not agree to have a lot line adjustment done at this point so that's out of the question. In talking with the surveyor who did the subdivision, it seems as though he really wants to keep this out of the courts. Putting 2 and 2 together, it would seem that he is responsible for the oversight.

I would be inclined to pursue this legally but we intend at this point to only build one residence so the issue isn't pressing. However, if we ever sell the property with the hopes that we maximize it's value, it would appear that if we can't get a variance, damages have been done due the mistake/oversight.

Any thoughts on how I should proceed?

Do what you SHOULD have done prior to purchasing and developing any of this land. Contact a title company and get a title report done showing the chain of title on the land in question (if you had purchased using title insurance, the title company would have searched this and insured the conveyance, and you would KNOW whether those sellers had good title). You need to establish not only who was deeded this land first, but also who was legally entitled to convey the land when that deed was done. Note that a deed done by a party with no legal right to sell is just as meaningless as no deed at all.

You will need a RE attorney. Were you working off a recent survey so that you actually KNOW that that piece of land IS the land in that legal description?

nextwife said:

Do what you SHOULD have done prior to purchasing and developing any of this land. Contact a title company and get a title report done showing the chain of title on the land in question (if you had purchased using title insurance, the title company would have searched this and insured the conveyance, and you would KNOW whether those sellers had good title). You need to establish not only who was deeded this land first, but also who was legally entitled to convey the land when that deed was done. Note that a deed done by a party with no legal right to sell is just as meaningless as no deed at all.

You will need a RE attorney. Were you working off a recent survey so that you actually KNOW that that piece of land IS the land in that legal description?

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....I agree....

Now that's what I call real close neighbors.

nextwife said:

Do what you SHOULD have done prior to purchasing and developing any of this land. Contact a title company and get a title report done showing the chain of title on the land in question (if you had purchased using title insurance, the title company would have searched this and insured the conveyance, and you would KNOW whether those sellers had good title). You need to establish not only who was deeded this land first, but also who was legally entitled to convey the land when that deed was done. Note that a deed done by a party with no legal right to sell is just as meaningless as no deed at all.

You will need a RE attorney. Were you working off a recent survey so that you actually KNOW that that piece of land IS the land in that legal description?

Click to expand...

We DID use title insurance. I thought that thy were responsible for checking things like this. Our deed checks out but our neighbor deed would have needed to be checked and verified as well. If this was done, the discrepency would have been caught. Did the title company fail in this situation?

gcz said:

We DID use title insurance. I thought that thy were responsible for checking things like this. Our deed checks out but our neighbor deed would have needed to be checked and verified as well. If this was done, the discrepency would have been caught. Did the title company fail in this situation?

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**A: who knows. And since we can't actually review the legal description on your title report and the neighbors, we will never know. Check with the real property tax office to see what their records indicate. Are they double billing for the same property?

HomeGuru said:

**A: who knows. And since we can't actually review the legal description on your title report and the neighbors, we will never know. Check with the real property tax office to see what their records indicate. Are they double billing for the same property?

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Yes, they are double billing. According to my deed, I have 12.79 acres and am taxed accordingly. My neighbor is being taxed on 1.33 acres, not the 1.18 that should be the case after the lot line adjustment. So we are both being billed for that .15 acres.

gcz said:

Yes, they are double billing. According to my deed, I have 12.79 acres and am taxed accordingly. My neighbor is being taxed on 1.33 acres, not the 1.18 that should be the case after the lot line adjustment. So we are both being billed for that .15 acres.

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Not necessarily.

You need to check the legal descriptions that are being billed. Granted, often the taxing authorities have lousy legal descriptions so it may be hard to tell.

Since you have an owner's policy of title insurance, contact them and tell them you want to file a claim.

seniorjudge said:

Not necessarily.

You need to check the legal descriptions that are being billed. Granted, often the taxing authorities have lousy legal descriptions so it may be hard to tell.

Since you have an owner's policy of title insurance, contact them and tell them you want to file a claim.

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Well the tax map states that they are being billed for 1.33 and 12.79 for myself. That could be wrong.

Under exceptions of coverage on the title insurance policy, it lists "encroachments, overlaps, boundary line disputes" as exceptions. Would this cause them to reject my claim?

Q: Under exceptions of coverage on the title insurance policy, it lists "encroachments, overlaps, boundary line disputes" as exceptions. Would this cause them to reject my claim?

A: You will never know till you file a claim.