What is the name of your state? WA
I promise I'll try to keep this as short as possible.
We bought our house in 2003. Upon purchasing it we made it clear soon after to our neighbor that we would be putting up a fence (we have two young children, and hundreds of acres of forest behind our house) on the property line. We found out soon that becuase his house was improperly placed, that the line was only inches from the corner of his house, and actually cut through 3 steps to his garage. The rest is only grass and a small hill leading into our yard. We immediately tried to remedy the situation in a friendly way. We offered to sell him an agreed upon piece of the land for less than the cost we bought it for. He agreed, and we put up the posts. Upon asking for the money, he said he had changed his mind.
Instead he wanted to change the line so it went towards our house in the middle and his side on the ends so that while the line moved, no property or money would have to change hands. We agreed to this as well, and he even had a surveryor come out 3 times to set point choices. Again, at the last minute he changed his mind. My husband asked him what the hell we were supposed to do then and he said "Just put it on the line I guess." in an angry, irritated way. So we dug up all the posts, redug holes, and put them on the property line, fully intending to leave him access to his steps and garage door. He was outdoors as we did this, and was fully aware of what we were doing. Just before finishing the project he came out and said that we shouldn't finish putting the fence there or he would sue us for prescriptive easement. He now insists it be at least 5 feet from his house at any angle, and has no intention of paying us for it. He says he qualifies for prescriptive easement.
In the time he had lived there, with the previous owners of our house, he had done work clearing out two small trees (this is not evident now, of course) and had been maintaining (read:mowing) the strip of lawn for more than 10 years.
I contend several things:
We immediately made it clear we knew where the line was, and began to maintain it as ours. (read: mowed it whether he did or not).
The relationship he had with our previous owners was very friendly. In fact the landscaping of his yard is set around the obvious belief he would always have the visual spread of our property. We believe that this falls under the category of (if not verbal, we don't know) a strongly implied permission based on neighborly accommodation and that it became void when the home was sold to us as well as voiding out any possible prescriptive easement claim.
We have him on video saying that he had indeed told us to put the fence on the property line (but said it was only because he didn't know until he talked to a lawyer that the land could become his).
Since we don't see the easement as being necessary to him (aside from access to his garage and steps), and it is only a strip of grass, do we have a leg to stand on if he takes us to court?
Will our title insurance be required to deal with this, and if so what would they usually do?
I promise I'll try to keep this as short as possible.
We bought our house in 2003. Upon purchasing it we made it clear soon after to our neighbor that we would be putting up a fence (we have two young children, and hundreds of acres of forest behind our house) on the property line. We found out soon that becuase his house was improperly placed, that the line was only inches from the corner of his house, and actually cut through 3 steps to his garage. The rest is only grass and a small hill leading into our yard. We immediately tried to remedy the situation in a friendly way. We offered to sell him an agreed upon piece of the land for less than the cost we bought it for. He agreed, and we put up the posts. Upon asking for the money, he said he had changed his mind.
Instead he wanted to change the line so it went towards our house in the middle and his side on the ends so that while the line moved, no property or money would have to change hands. We agreed to this as well, and he even had a surveryor come out 3 times to set point choices. Again, at the last minute he changed his mind. My husband asked him what the hell we were supposed to do then and he said "Just put it on the line I guess." in an angry, irritated way. So we dug up all the posts, redug holes, and put them on the property line, fully intending to leave him access to his steps and garage door. He was outdoors as we did this, and was fully aware of what we were doing. Just before finishing the project he came out and said that we shouldn't finish putting the fence there or he would sue us for prescriptive easement. He now insists it be at least 5 feet from his house at any angle, and has no intention of paying us for it. He says he qualifies for prescriptive easement.
In the time he had lived there, with the previous owners of our house, he had done work clearing out two small trees (this is not evident now, of course) and had been maintaining (read:mowing) the strip of lawn for more than 10 years.
I contend several things:
We immediately made it clear we knew where the line was, and began to maintain it as ours. (read: mowed it whether he did or not).
The relationship he had with our previous owners was very friendly. In fact the landscaping of his yard is set around the obvious belief he would always have the visual spread of our property. We believe that this falls under the category of (if not verbal, we don't know) a strongly implied permission based on neighborly accommodation and that it became void when the home was sold to us as well as voiding out any possible prescriptive easement claim.
We have him on video saying that he had indeed told us to put the fence on the property line (but said it was only because he didn't know until he talked to a lawyer that the land could become his).
Since we don't see the easement as being necessary to him (aside from access to his garage and steps), and it is only a strip of grass, do we have a leg to stand on if he takes us to court?
Will our title insurance be required to deal with this, and if so what would they usually do?