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Oregon | IN555 - 5/9/2021 21:20
There is no legal easement that I am aware of. Nothing on the deed. Great advice. I was planning on contacting my lawyer in the morning anyways but thanks.
Obviously, the law is different by jurisdiction. But I'd ask these questions during your conversation with legal counsel.
1. In order for my predecessor to have granted a valid easement to my neighbor, does the law require that grant to be a written instrument?
2. If the grant was not recorded, is the right held by the neighbor (whatever right that is) valid after I took legal possession (i.e. was it extinguished upon recording of warranty deed to me)? There was no recording, so I had no legal notice. What if I had no actual notice (i.e., I didn't know the tile was there)?
3. If the neighbor does not hold a valid easement by grant, how long must he use that easement before he can claim an easement by prescription?
4. Assuming my neighbor has a valid right to use my land for drainage / buried tile, am I liable to him for damages to his property or crop if I plug or otherwise take action to interfere with his drainage right?
5. If my neighbor has a valid right and if he refuses to repair his tile after I provide him with written notice (via certified mail with return receipt), can I force him to reimburse me for repairs I perform myself? Will it cost me more to have a lawyer collect the cost of repairs than the cost of repairs?
6. Do I have a claim against the predecessor-in-interest (the guy I bought the farm from) for the diminution in value of the farm I bought because of the unrecorded easement (assuming you took the property by warranty deed).
I'm sure there are more- but those are the questions off the top of my mind.
Keep in mind, the easement held by the neighbor may not be on the deed. And title companies miss things all the time- so they may have missed something if you had a title search performed at the time of purchase. If you want to save some money on legal services, head on down the county records office yourself and see what you find. Sometimes, county staff are super helpful and this way you'll see everything recorded on that piece of ground.
After all of this- you may very well find that the fastest / cheapest / lowest risk option is to just go after it, fix the damn thing yourself, and forget about it. I know that is not very satisfying, but your time is money and legal process is always slow and expensive.
-Mike | |
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Neighbors won’t fix their tile, what would you do?
