In litigation underlying Satcher v. Columbia County, 2024 WL 3802370 (Ga. Aug. 13, 2024), property owners sued the County related to damage caused by their privately-owned 48-inch pipe that had been used as part of the...more
Yesterday, the Court of Appeals of Virginia addressed key requirements to prove, and rebut, the existence of an easement by prescription in Boxley v. Crouse, Record No. 0183-23-3. ...more
Here is what we cover in this issue of The Title Reporter: A Legal Update for the Title Insurance Industry: •An appellate court in Arkansas, affirming a trial court’s decision, has ruled that a title insurer had properly...more
The Michigan Court of Appeals (“Court”) addressed in a February 1st opinion the scope of a prescriptive easement in a riparian context. See Astemborski v. Manetta, 2022 WL 301296 (Mich. Ct. App. Feb. 1, 2022). The...more
Last year, I posted regarding the Colorado Court of Appeals’ decision in Woodbridge II, which concluded that the “adverse use” element for prescriptive easement claims only requires the claimant to “show a nonpermissive or...more
McFarland Land & Cattle, Inc. v. Caprock Solar I, LLC considered what is the required under New Mexico law to establish a public prescriptive easement, and brings to life the full meaning of “100 feet of bad road”....more
Feeling entitled, or deserving or just plain covetous? You have discovered that you are encroaching on your neighbor's property. In California, two inconsistent doctrines can apply to allow you to continue using your...more
A California Court of Appeal held that longstanding use of a landowner’s property for access and parking by residents of the adjacent lot had established a prescriptive easement. Husain v. California Pacific Bank, 61...more
Owning a piece of land without any means of accessing it is akin to owning a car without the keys. While the absence of access to land, like the absence of keys to a car, does not have any impact on the fact of ownership, it...more
Earlier this year, the Colorado Court of Appeals issued an opinion addressing at length “whether the requirement that the use be ‘adverse’ in the adverse possession context is coextensive with adverse use in the prescriptive...more
In a rescript opinion issued yesterday in Gentili v. Town of Sturbridge (pdf), the Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) ruled that a municipality’s acquisition of a prescriptive easement over private property is not an eminent domain...more
In the second half of this year the Massachusetts Appeals Court decided three cases in which a party claimed adverse possession or prescriptive rights in real estate. In each case the focus was on one particular element of...more
In my last post, “Real Estate Alphabet Soup: D is for Deed” I continued my primer on the “alphabet soup” of real estate. This post continues to stir the “alphabet soup” with the letter “E.”...more
The Michigan Court of Appeals addressed in a January 16th opinion an action in which the Plaintiff sought to limit the rights of non-riparian lot owners to maintain a dock at the end of a dedicated private road abutting a...more
In an important decision for owners of waterfront property, a divided Appeals Court panel has ruled in a case of first impression that where registered land expands by accretion, the owner need not return to court to...more
Justices Rule on Prescriptive Easements - 2016 Case Notes: Real Estate- Introduction - The South Carolina Supreme Court clarified the law of prescriptive easements in its decision in Simmons v. Berkeley Elec....more
Adverse possession is the acquisition of title to another’s real property by continuous possession and use of the property for the prescribed period of five years. A party seeking title to real property by adverse possession...more
In Windsor Pacific LLC v. Samwood Co. Inc., 2013 DJDAR 1292 (2013), the California Court of Appeal for the Second Appellate District decided a novel attorney fee issue arising out of hotly contested litigation, pertaining to...more
Every so often, that ancient and seemingly out-dated distinction between legal and equitable claims (and defenses) derived in the English Chancery Courts hundreds of years ago rears its head and reminds all attorneys that...more