Property line questions.

skyhighZJ

skyhighZJ

Gov retirement < needs to live
Joined
May 31, 2012
Location
Aberdeen, NC.
When the wife and I bought our property there was a pre-agreed easement. We met the neighbors and have allowed it to continue but they are getting ready to move and our personal plans have changed as well. We would like to run fence around the entirety of our property from marker to marker which I had surveyed when we purchased thanks to @kaiser715 who recommended a great guy. Am I allowed to put my fence up and not have to let a piece of my property be used by the adjacent lot any more if the neighbors sell and move? Please see attached documents as I don’t speak property terms. What are my options?

Edit: they may be out of order after uploading
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The first doc, it has the easement is permanent, perpetual and exclusive.

Means it extends forever “permanent and perpetual”
 
Is that tract otherwise accessible without crossing your property?
 
If the land is land locked without the easement, and they have a house on there, then I don’t think you can do that. That would also suck pretty bad for them, put yourself in their shoes.

I do believe that type of agreement is permanent though.

Edit: when I say “their shoes” I’m thinking of whoever your new neighbors would be.
 
Ron said:
Is that tract otherwise accessible without crossing your property?
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Without the easement on my property yes, there are other surrounding properties that could allow easement to the tract. My question is or complaint if anything, who in their right mind would allow such a thing to happen. When I had the property surveyed the corner irons are there at the outter edge of the easement and I was told it all my property. I guess I may have been misled and if so I’m not cool with that. I do know that my property as recorded in the books predates that sale of the adjacent property and this is the reason for the easement. At one point this was all owned by a single family and has been sliced up starting about 1987 when “my house” was built. I would like to figure out how to use all my property and not have to allow it to continue the way it is. With them selling out there is a back of my mind pipe dream this could force down the price so I could buy it and add their 2 acres- ish to my lot. (Probably not going to happen) but as I remember they are well past the 30’ out towards the road so one way or the other things are going to change.
 
The fact that there are other properties around it that they "could" use for access is irrelevant unless there is also already an easement on those. E.g. you can't cut off the only access that currently exists. A new one would have to be set up at the same time or prior.
A permanent easement is listed that way exactly to prevent the kind of thing you're trying to do, screw somebody out of access to their land.
 
A property easement like that is very, very common.

Allowing that easement is a small right of way in reality, not much to gain on your end by taking it away. Accept of course for killing the value of the land so you can buy it, which is kind of a dick move if I’m being honest.
 
77GreenMachine said:
A property easement like that is very, very common.

Allowing that easement is a small right of way in reality, not much to gain on your end by taking it away. Accept of course for killing the value of the land so you can buy it, which is kind of a dick move if I’m being honest.
Click to expand...

That of course depends on how big your yard is... 30' x the length of your yard isn't nothing.
 
I don't see the easement extending past the lot behind your property or serving any other lots. If you bought that property you could do whatever you want to, as nobody but you would need access to your new property. You would want to have a recombination of the lots and make it one lot again.
You could prolly rent it out and use the rent to pay some of the cost of buying it while doing whatever you want to your new lot.
Also their access should be in the easement, if it's not you can fence it off or tear it up if it's on your property.
 
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braxton357 said:
That of course depends on how big your yard is... 30' x the length of your yard isn't nothing.
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True, didn’t think about that. Was mostly just picturing a drive way on the edge of his land to get to the other land.
 
Easement is there forever unless the owner of the property it is there for nullifies it. If you restrict access you will more than likely be sued, and 100% lose if you are.
 
Now, if you really want to be a giant penis, and drive down the resale, there are other legal ways to do it. Like for instance you can't deny them access, but you aren't required to go out of your way to make it nice to drive through, either.
- Oh, I'm sorry, I dozed up the ground on either side of it, so rainwater funnels through there and makes it a giant swamp for you to drive through. Oops.
- Oh, I have these giant plywood panels I put up along both sides of the ROW as a fence so I don't have to see your cars. Oh, hey look, some neighborhood kids spray painted profanity all over them facing your ROW. Meh, I can't see it from my house, oh well.
- Oh you're not a trump fan? Then I'm sorry you may not like the row of 4'x6' MAGA signs lining the ROW.
etc etc

I don't recommend any of this, as that's just be a shitty human being, but it's an entertaining conversation.
 
All points taken and no, I’m not trying to be an out right dick. I guess I misunderstood what was explained at the point of purchase and by the surveyor who came and flagged the corners of my property. No, I’m not losing a lot of area but, the way the math works out and, as I understand it I bought that “slice” of property. Someone else gets to use it cause some other idiot at some point in the past cut up chunks of property when they had been pounding booze. It confuses me the way it all came to be as it was divided up in pieces from the original owners (many years ago) to different family members who then chunked it off to others and etc. oh well guess I need to figure out how to just buy the place and be done with the Shit show. If anything it gives me about 2.5 more acres and a nice flat spot for a barn and lots of parking for way too many projects to get drug home lol
 
skyhighZJ said:
All points taken and no, I’m not trying to be an out right dick. I guess I misunderstood what was explained at the point of purchase and by the surveyor who came and flagged the corners of my property. No, I’m not losing a lot of area but, the way the math works out and, as I understand it I bought that “slice” of property. Someone else gets to use it cause some other idiot at some point in the past cut up chunks of property when they had been pounding booze. It confuses me the way it all came to be as it was divided up in pieces from the original owners (many years ago) to different family members who then chunked it off to others and etc. oh well guess I need to figure out how to just buy the place and be done with the Shit show. If anything it gives me about 2.5 more acres and a nice flat spot for a barn and lots of parking for way too many projects to get drug home lol
Click to expand...

Not to discourage you....but there is a fair chance that even if you buy that piece you cant get rid of the ROW Easement.
 
shawn said:
Recombination plat
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Understood.
But zoning may come into play. The combo plat may require a rezone depending on total acreage/use class etc.

I mean anything is possible, but may not be economically feasible.
 
Ron said:
Not to discourage you....but there is a fair chance that even if you buy that piece you cant get rid of the ROW Easement.
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He might not be able to get rid of it unless he combines the two properties into one. Even if he cant tho, if he own's the landlocked property the easement is a moot point unless he sells the landlocked property or sells both.
 
I am in a similar situation with my land (not that I am TRYING to do anything about it). The first 300' or so of my driveway is shared with a 77-78 year old lady. The driveway is so steep she can't get up it if it is muddy, and even when it is dry she comes up in with her foot to the floor in her Pontiac Vibe, bouncing the whole way up. If she doesn't make it she parks and walks up, she isn't able to back up very well haha.

She says she is not going anywhere (to hear her say it she is going to live forever). My hope is her family tries to sell it (10 acres with a modular) and the steep and horribly maintained driveway runs the price so low I can buy it. I don't do much on the driveway as I don't live there currently. I plan to do a LOT to make it better but who knows when that will be.
 
If you put a gate up where easement enters your land, give them a key, ask them to please keep gate locked, you are not denying them access. If it is inconvenient enough for them then they may seek a ROW through someone else but that doesn't mean they would give up that one.
 
Junkyard Dog said:
If you put a gate up where easement enters your land, give them a key, ask them to please keep gate locked, you are not denying them access. If it is inconvenient enough for them then they may seek a ROW through someone else but that doesn't mean they would give up that one.
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Better yet, a gate on EACH END of the easement... both padlocked :flipoff2:
 
Lots of random unorganized thoughts here:

Full disclosure: I access my land over an easement. I don't have a problem with it, and get along fine with the up-front neighbors. That said, of course I'd much rather own the strip that is the easement, rather than having 'permission' to cross it, but it works fine as it is.

I looked at the google map of your place.

To help put this in perspective... The easement looks to be right at 300' long at 30' wide....only 9000sf, or about 2/10 th's of an acre....at $5,000 an acre, that's a thousand bucks worth of land.

From the google satellite, neighbor's driveway is a two track lane, and, going by the property line locations on google maps (which are always off some), about 1/3 of it veers off of your property anyway. At best, it looks like they are only using 8-12 feet of the 30' easement for 2/3rds the distance. 2000 sqft vs. 9000 sqft. $222 land value. Since it's for sale, I wouldn't do this now, until new buyer's surveyor and home inspector/etc are done and gone, but I'd just fence in your lot starting 4' off of the worn tracks and parallel to their worn in place driveway, and call it good. Hopefully the new buyers will be good folks...crack open a couple of beers with them after they move in, and just do it.

Worse case, if you poke and prod too much and stir the shit, the neighbor to your west could see that the driveway, as it appears of google, is partly on his land, and force it to be moved onto the legal easement. Be careful who you talk too, sometimes the status quo is better.

Otherwise, you could possibly facilitate buying a new easement to the property from one of the 3 landowners to your West. You don't know their financial situations but one may jump if you waved a thousand bucks under his nose to purchase access. Then 500-1000 to rewrite his deed showing the new easement, and 500-1000 to rewrite your deed to 'erase' the easement from your parcel, if that is even possible. So, now you've gotten $2-3000 bucks or more gone over a couple hundred dollars dirt.
 
On another note....looking at google maps, it looks like most of their fenced back yard is on your property (IIRC, you own that land behind your house and the house in question). Almost 3,000 square feet. Have you addressed that? If true, you might want to be sure that listing realtor knows that there is an encroachment there, and must be addressed, so new owners aren't blindsided that they don't own the beautiful fenced backyard they "bought".
 
Go ahead and put gates up. When the ambulance or firetruck cannot access property in a timely manner that should be fun. Hindering access or hindering there ability to maintain road will not end well.

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk
 
kaiser715 said:
On another note....looking at google maps, it looks like most of their fenced back yard is on your property (IIRC, you own that land behind your house and the house in question). Almost 3,000 square feet. Have you addressed that? If true, you might want to be sure that listing realtor knows that there is an encroachment there, and must be addressed, so new owners aren't blindsided that they don't own the beautiful fenced backyard they "bought".
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I own behind theirs but where their fence is located is a 30‘ wide piece that was sold to them when they bought the place and wanted to have a backyard( once again, no clue how they ever built that house where it is in the first place because the original house was WAY to close to the original property line). I have no control over that as it was done before I got there. At this point I’m waiting to see what they want for the whole place and property and just buy it all outright. Combine it and be done. As for the existing house I’m not sure what will be done with it but if anything it will be the vacation house for family and maybe look into doing an air B & B considering how close we are to Pinehurst/Southern Pines so golf and horse people. Got a lot of random thoughts bouncing around but as an endstate I am NOT going to stir any unnecessary shit pots if I don’t have to. I stirred and burnt shit pots while deployed and it never works out.
 
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