Hi All,
Thanks for taking the time to provide advice.
We’ve lived in our current property for about 3 years. It’s a battle axe rural block of 10 acres. Access to the property is by way of an easement over the property between us and the road. The access drive is of some length ?1/4km.
We didn’t realise until recently that the location of the drive way to access our property is different to the easement. The easement we assume was agreed before the property on our neighbours land was built, as it runs directly through the middle of their land. The access as is runs down the edge of their land. We assume an informal agreement was reached by previous owners of the two properties to route the driveway through a different part of their property.
The situation as is probably works better for both us. For them it mean see aren’t driving directly past their house and through the middle of their land. For us it creates a private tidy entrance, since they don’t really maintain their land. The upkeep of the driveway has been a constant challenge for us due to the fall of the drive from the road requiring recurrent expenditure due to it being washed away.
The other challenge has been our neighbours, who clearly didn’t realise about the easement when we purchased the property (some years before us) and feel somewhat aggrieved that it exists.
Advice please -
If the ongoing upkeep of the informal easement continues to be challenging, would we have any right to enforce the original easement?
They want to reduce the amount of land currently allocated to the informal easement. This wouldn’t bother us per se as it wouldn’t affect access, but if they choose to re-fence this would we be required to contribute? Their dog keeps getting out over the insufficient and broken fencing currently partitioning their land from the informal easement. Can we ask for the fencing to be repaired to prevent this happening?
Since it is an informal easement ie part of their land, could we expect them to contribute to maintenance? For instance there is a fair amount of bank erosion that will potentially affect access at some point?
Thanks all.
Thanks for taking the time to provide advice.
We’ve lived in our current property for about 3 years. It’s a battle axe rural block of 10 acres. Access to the property is by way of an easement over the property between us and the road. The access drive is of some length ?1/4km.
We didn’t realise until recently that the location of the drive way to access our property is different to the easement. The easement we assume was agreed before the property on our neighbours land was built, as it runs directly through the middle of their land. The access as is runs down the edge of their land. We assume an informal agreement was reached by previous owners of the two properties to route the driveway through a different part of their property.
The situation as is probably works better for both us. For them it mean see aren’t driving directly past their house and through the middle of their land. For us it creates a private tidy entrance, since they don’t really maintain their land. The upkeep of the driveway has been a constant challenge for us due to the fall of the drive from the road requiring recurrent expenditure due to it being washed away.
The other challenge has been our neighbours, who clearly didn’t realise about the easement when we purchased the property (some years before us) and feel somewhat aggrieved that it exists.
Advice please -
If the ongoing upkeep of the informal easement continues to be challenging, would we have any right to enforce the original easement?
They want to reduce the amount of land currently allocated to the informal easement. This wouldn’t bother us per se as it wouldn’t affect access, but if they choose to re-fence this would we be required to contribute? Their dog keeps getting out over the insufficient and broken fencing currently partitioning their land from the informal easement. Can we ask for the fencing to be repaired to prevent this happening?
Since it is an informal easement ie part of their land, could we expect them to contribute to maintenance? For instance there is a fair amount of bank erosion that will potentially affect access at some point?
Thanks all.
