Nah, we had our own agent. I’ve been talking with them, as well.
Just curious, what are they saying about it all? Seen it before? Concerned? Indifferent?
Kind of indifferent.
I’m supposed to hear from the title insurance company tomorrow or Monday… what they say will likely influence what else I’ll be doing.
Bump. Any word on this, Lightnin’?
No development yet, I’m afraid. The title insurance company called me to clarify things, and her response after I told her everything I knew was, “Huh. I’ve never seen this sort of thing before.” That was a week ago, nothing new since then.
I have to wonder- if the city refuses to acknowledge the easement (and pay me for it), I wonder what their response would be if I were to say, “Well, I’ll just block that pipe off, then, shall I?”
I’d worry about something like one of those cartoons where the blocked hose swells up to become really huge, and then explodes. :eek:
If the easement is enforceable, your remedy is probably going to be against the seller and/or the title insurer.
Just a wild-assed guess, but: you’d move the matter from Civil to Criminal Court. :rolleyes:
If I recall your story correctly, there were nasty results when your neighbor accidentally blocked the pipe. Why would it go any better if you deliberately blocked it?
So no one has either come forward with a valid easement document or declared there is no valid easment?
Here’s what Lightnin’ said about that:
I’d expect that if Lightnin’ got someone to professionally block the end of the pipe in a way that would handle the water pressure from the golf course drainage, that would hold up a lot better than however much dirt was covering the open pipe earlier.
If the city ends up stating (in writing) that they don’t claim any easement for the golf course pipe, I’d say the next step is to have a lawyer send a copy to the golf course management, and give them 60 days to either produce a recorded private easement for the pipe, or begin arrangements to remove it from the OP’s property, in order to avoid a lawsuit to compel the golf course to pay for both the removal and the OP’s legal costs.
So far, that’s the case. There’s a pipe running through the yard, but there’s no record of it anywhere, hence no easement. Previous owners (and their agent/mother) clearly knew about it, but didn’t disclose it.
In other words, a whole bunch of “Not my problem”. Well, for everyone but me.
OT: You are one dedicated golfer. That’s 20,000+ rounds, which at the rate of one per day every day of the year is 54+ years.
See: Douglas Adams and “SEP fields” (Someone Else’s Problem).
I’m not sure I follow all the exchange here, but a decent RE/civil lawyer would seem to be your only path forward.
I’m waiting to see how our title insurance company responds, but a lawyer does seem likely.
I’m not an attorney either. So this is just my opinion. This is a situation really no different than if someone had water in the basement of a house and concealed it from the buyer. Unless the house was purchased under some sort of condition such as “as-is”, I’d think your attorney would contact the seller of the company. It might be the seller and the real estate listing agent if the listing agent had knowledge of the problem. I’ve bought two homes and sold one, and in every situation there is a disclosure document where it gives the seller the opportunity to disclose problems and history of the property. It might not have said “Is there a big pipe…” but there was a process in place to formally disclose a problem with the property.
I’d think you could get a letter from the golf course of why this is in your property, and someone there likely will say they dealt with the previous owner. Then you’d have your proof to show the previous owner had knowledge and gave approval. The golf course likely would give that information up to show they didn’t do anything wrong. After all, if someone comes over to a home owner and says “Can I run a pipe through your yard…” and they said “Sure, go ahead”, if I were the Golf Course I would tell that story since I felt I was operating with approval. Now it is up to the seller to have disclosed this to the buyer, not the Golf Course. But you do have a situation where unless there is real documentation that shows it’s legit to have this big pipe on your property, you should be able to force them to remove it or do something else.
I don’t know much about the liability of a title company in any of this, but a good attorney will know to go after who has the deeper pockets in all of this. The lawsuit might name the seller, real estate listing agent, golf course and the title company. Seems like the bigger in this situation would be the title company, but I am guessing they have themselves protected well in fine-print somewhere.
I wish you success with this.
I think an attorney who specializes in Real Estate Law would be the attorney to start with.
Thanks for the correction. Math is not my strong suit, and I was making a quick estimate on the fly. Thousands of rounds at perhaps 100 courses would be more accurate.
I think part of the OP’s issue is that he wants the title company to pay appropriate costs for resolving this issue. That’s exactly what title companies/title insurance are for, but they have to pay off so infrequently and the potential settlements can be so costly, it can be hard to get them moving.
For many title insurance policies, an easement that isn’t a matter of public record isn’t the title insurance company’s problem. It depends on exactly what kind of policy you bought, but the standard policy commonly used specifically excludes easements not on file at the courthouse or otherwise reasonably discoverable by the title company’s staff.