Question for the CA legal eagles

Started by PatrickH • 2 replies • 1064 views

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PatrickH (California)
Posts: 204

Posted:

Hi folks, A friend of mine inherited a parcel of vacant land just outside Los Angeles. He located it on a map and drove out to see it. As he was driving up the road that goes to his land, he came to a guard house that blocks the road for an HOA that has been built along this road. The guard wouldn't let him past since he's not a member of this HOA.

This road is the only access way to his land and he has a recorded easement allowing him to connect his land to this road.

He wrote to the HOA through their management company about being granted access past the guardhouse to access his land. He received a reply saying that the Board had decided to refuse him access through their HOA to access his land.

I've done searching on the Internet to see if I could find out how an HOA could build a guard house on a road that's been there for over 75 years and use it to block access to the lands behind their HOA that have easements to this road. Haven't found anything yet.

Of course he's now talking to his lawyer about some type of lawsuit to force the HOA to allow him access to his land, but I thought I'd post here to see if anyone has any insight either way in this matter.

Thanks.

JaneK (California)
Posts: 175

Posted:

If he has a recorded easement through the HOA property there should be no problem. (I assume the road is private) The board of Directors of that HOA is in trouble for not honoring the easement.

We have a similar situation in our HOA. There is one ‘landlocked’ property next to ours. Someone is looking at purchasing the landlocked property and an adjacent parcel with access to the public road. This person would build apartments. Since there would be access to the main road, we tried to stop them from going through our property, during construction and the residents once the building is complete. We were told by all, lawyers, city, county, etc. We could not stop them since they have a recorded easement.

Hopefully one letter from a lawyer should end the problem. It doesn’t seem it should have to go as far as litigation. Perhaps the city, county or whatever government agency has the record can help also. Even if he didn't have a recorded easement, since it's been used to assess this property for 75 years, there is something that will allow him to continue using that road, but darned it I can remember what it's called. I'll wake up at 2 AM rembering.
Jane

SusanW1 (Michigan)
Posts: 5,202

Posted:

On the other hand, if there were hearings before the HOA land development, and no one showed up from his side (as property owner) it may have been considered "abandoned".

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