“Does that mean they don’t have a legal right to use it?”
“Not necessarily. Unrecorded rights and prescriptive claims can complicate things. I need you to understand that before you close.”
“Explain.”
“Ownership of the underlying land and the right to use it are separate questions. The road can be yours while someone else holds an easement. But I haven’t found an instrument establishing one.”
“How long has the subdivision been using it?”
“According to what I’ve found, approximately 31 years.”
“And nobody thought to put the arrangement in writing?”
“That’s what concerns me.”
He paused.
“I don’t want you purchasing a lawsuit without knowing it.”
I looked across the parking lot at the highway.
“Can you investigate further?”
“Already am.”
For the next several days, David went through additional records.
County plats.
Recorded deeds.
Surveys.
Tax records.
Historical road files.
Nothing showed a formal easement granting the HOA perpetual access.
We discussed the possibility of rights arising from long use, the importance of state-specific requirements, and the uncertainty that would remain until the history of that use was fully understood.
David advised caution.
I accepted it.
But the problem didn’t make the rest of the farm disappear.
I closed on the property.
Eleven months later, I was still glad I had.
By then I’d repaired miles of fence, cleared drainage channels, mapped problem areas in the northern fields, and started planning improvements to an old service track.
The road through the southwest corner had remained exactly as I found it.
No gate.
No obstacle.
No warning.
Every morning, Cedarwood Ridge residents drove across it toward the highway.
Every evening, they drove home.
I never stopped a single one.
And until Margaret arrived with her lawsuit, I hadn’t had a conversation with anyone on the board about it.
That was what made her accusations so absurd.
She wasn’t responding to something I had done.
She was responding to the fact that somebody outside her authority owned land she wanted to control.
Two weeks after the lawsuit, another envelope arrived.
This time it was a cease-and-desist letter.
Four pages on expensive letterhead.
The HOA demanded that I immediately acknowledge its claimed perpetual access rights and refrain from any conduct that might interfere with the road.
