As many of you already know, in November we bought a house to allow us to move in 85yo grandma. The house came with 10+ acres that runs down the hill to an old county road. Mostly too steep and wooded to be of any use other than keeping neighbors at a distance. The mystery driveway is located off the old county road at the bottom of our property. Following the driveway up it appears to be a fire road that travels across others’ properties.
A few weeks ago, we received an email from Richard Cranium, an attorney for the previous owners. I’ll call him Dick for short. Dick was sorry for “bugging” us (six months after close of escrow) but “due to an error in process” some paperwork was “done out of order.” Apparently his clients were to record an easement grant deed for the neighbor before the purchase.
According to Dick “there is a valid easement” but it was important for remembrance and me to have this all cleared up. He would just need us to drive (2 hours) to his office to wet-sign the document. Thank you for your concern, Dick.
Easements up here are fairly common. We have a short easement across another neighbor’s property to access our home. As well as others going across ours for water, power, and stuff related the county road. The title company gathers the different easements and puts them on a color-coded map during the sale. The one which Dick spoke of was not on the map.
Being the curious one, I decided to google the parties listed in the draft grant Dick provided. Well look at that…right at the top… a lawsuit “previous owner vs neighbor” was filed at the county court. Not having a Pacer account I was unable to open the documents but could see when everything was filled.
A few days later I responded back to Dick that this easement appeared to be connected to a lawsuit that was not disclosed to us. Asking him to provide us with the original complaint and final settlement agreement so we could better understand what he was asking us to sign.
Within a couple hours Dick replied with the requested documents. Pointing out we should have documentation regarding the easement in the paperwork from the purchase of the house. He also claimed it was their “position” that the easement was recordable and enforceable with or without us. Dick was just trying to help us avoid any dispute with our new neighbor, somebody he described as a “neighbor with a history of conflict.” Keep digging Dick.
While Dick was grabbing his shovel, I was reading the complaint and settlement. It appears our neighbor bought the property next to us a few years ago. Likely not understanding the exact property line he proceeded to clear a flat area of trees, brought up a shipping container and a couple cars, and built a small slab which he hoped to turn into a garage. His mistake was some of this was on the previous owners’ (now ours) property. None of the documents claimed his mistake was intentional, even pointed out intent wouldn’t matter.
The included cease and desist letter had a page and a half of scary legal stuff that would be forgiven if the neighbor would just sell his property to Dick’s client for less than one-third the assessed value. With a p.s. that the previous owners would not sell the neighbor an easement “under any circumstances.” Getting a bit ahead, but that does appear to have come true, Dick’s client will not be selling the neighbor an easement.
The neighbor resisted Dick’s shakedown. The previous owner sued the neighbor for $140,000 in damages. The damages mostly appear to be overinflated.
::cut to the final settlement::
Both parties signed into an agreement that would allow the neighbor one year to come up with $75,000 at which time the previous owner would grant him an easement. Within two weeks of signing the one-year agreement the previous owner completed the disclosure forms and put the house on the market.
We explained to Dick since none of the damage was not disclosed to us we felt like we were falsely induced into purchasing the property next to a “neighbor with a history of conflict.” I pointed to some answers on the disclosure forms that weren’t accurate. Careful not call them lies because that implies intent, can’t be sure of the previous owner’s intent, but it does appear the previous owner made a willful effort to conceal the lawsuit. Using language from his cease and desist letter, we offered to settle the entire affair “informally” to “avoid future litigation.” We asked for half the settlement money.
Dick quickly replied that his client would never accept our offer and countered with $5000. While continuing the narrative that this is saving us future issues with our neighbor. Something we don’t fear because we are more than willing to provide the easement to our neighbor.
We countered by upping our request to $45,000 or we, as the legal owners, could just negotiate the easement with the neighbor ourselves. Dick was not happy, accusing us of attempting to “shakedown” his client (something I learned from him). He also threatened to sue us if we should contact the neighbor with the “intent to sabotage” the settlement. And claimed, “this easement is currently enforceable and [the neighbor] could record it tomorrow and you would be bound by it.”
Our response was brief, “if you believe that to be true, then leave us out of it.” And requested he refrain from contacting us further unless he included all the parties involved.
A few days later the neighbor’s attorney contacted us with Dick cc’d. We explained that the lawsuit/settlement was not properly disclosed during the purchase. And because Dick implied both parties felt the easement was enforceable and recordable without us, please proceed without us.
By this time Dick was getting upset, he claimed he never described the position of the other attorney. So, I quoted him making that claim and suggested that if he could refrain from contacting us further we would be less inclined to sue his client.
At this point Dick is enraged, you could feel the spittle just reading his email. He called me a liar despite my quoting him directly. Threatened to share my emails with the other lawyer (I told him he was free to that as long as he shared the entire thread, both sides …he never did). He said I was bluffing about suing his client. Luckily for him he was not in the room as I read it to remembrance, both of us laughing our asses off. He did suck it up at the end to ask us to make a reasonable offer “not more than half.” We already had… he turned it down. Then asked us to “please respond” on a Friday night after 5:30. LOL… get a life Dick.
To be honest, I couldn’t believe it would be so easy to get Dick excited ...but Dicks are easy that way.
As it stands now, Dick has been removed from the case, the senior partner now represents the previous owner. My neighbor’s attorney is working to get his client the easement while also having the lawsuit settled as easily as possible. He could make a motion to dismiss but there is still the issue of trespass and the physical damages. I pointed out the previous owner has no standing as we assumed any damages when we purchased the property. But they could try to gum it up even if it is a lost cause for them.
This will likely end with the previous owner getting $5000 and then dismissing the lawsuit with prejudice. Then we and the neighbor will negotiate the easement amongst ourselves…as legal owners. And the previous owner wondering for the next two years when or if the other shoe drops.
Sorta feel bad for Dick, a jr associate at an estate/trust firm, probably thought litigating a big real estate dispute would be exciting. I’m mean, it was, I had fun …just not sure how much fun Dick had.