Florida Property Easements Can Cause Land Disputes

laniganpl.com/2014/07/24/flori... (Winter Park Florida) Real estate lawyer Eric Lanigan talks about easements and how they can affect property rights and become a matter of a property dispute.
An easement is a right to use the land of another person for a specific purpose. So, it’s not ownership of the land, but it is an ownership interest in land in that it is the right to use the property for a specific purpose.
Probably for the most common easement that we see is a driveway easement where someone uses sort of the edge of their neighbors property to come into their property. That’s a typical type of easement that we see.
Now the most disputed type of easement is what we call a prescriptive easement, this is a situation where there has been no written agreement as to a easement, and sometimes it might be called an implied easement.
Basically, what happens here is the law imputes an easement when certain conditions are met. When one party is actually using the property of another for a specific purpose. And that the use is continuous. It doesn’t go on for a year or two and then it stops and then maybe it picks up after three or four years. It’s a continuous ongoing thing. Now that doesn’t mean every day but it does mean regular and ongoing without any significant breaks in the pattern.
If you’re buying a piece of land either out in the country or a commercial property in the city you can’t rely solely on the public records to determine if there are easements because obviously prescriptive easements are not going to be there.
You can ask the seller to disclose in writing any prescriptive easements that he knows of or which might be claimed which might meet that general criteria. If you’re uncertain sometimes what you want to do is just ask the adjoining landowners.
If you have questions that you need to get answers to, contact real estate attorney Eric Lanigan of Lanigan and Lanigan by calling 407-740-7379 for a meeting in the offices located in (Winter Park, Florida).
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[@collegeluv]

The process sounds similar to the California prescriptive easement, yet I believe the law school has books on easement cases in United States. I view them from time to time just to get a good sound of mind on the title.

[@LaniganPLFlorida]

Eric G Keeping up with the law and its changes is a non-stop process. Thanks for the comment. Agreed.