Alley Fight Neighbors Who Have Used The Land For Years Without The Owner’s Permission Are Now Demanding Permanent Easement For Access To Their Own Back Yards

Say you own a plot of land. You don’t do much with it, and it is untended for years.

Unknown to you, your neighbors drive across your property to access their back yards.

Does that give your neighbors the legal right to use that property forever?

That’s the dispute several Spokane Valley residents are enmeshed in over a strip of land north of Millwood.

And it looks as if the answer to the question is yes.

The trouble spot, off Garland Avenue near Farr Road, is a strip of land marked by two long wheel ruts. The plaintiffs say the ruts are an alley that has existed for almost 40 years. Defendants counter that they don’t see the alley.

That’s the arguing point, because to gain a prescriptive easement - and the right to continue driving over the property - the plaintiffs have to prove that their use has been continuous, uninterrupted and hostile for at least 10 years. Hostile in this case means they never asked permission to drive over the land.

Along Farr Road live three families, two of whom have owned their property since the early 1960s. Old wooden gates open from the backs of their deep, skinny lots. In those back yards are a shed, a barn housing two horses, pickup trucks, collectible cars and even a windmill.

These residents can’t drive into their back yards from the front of the property because of the lots are too narrow. They’ve been accessing their back yards by driving across the property on the other side of their fences.

Beyond their back gates, sit four brand-new houses - some occupied, some empty.

The newly developed lots used to be a big, grassy field. The three residents say they’ve used part of that field - the strip of land adjacent to their properties - to drive into their back yards for years. They even put in gates for access.

The contractor who built the houses and two former owners of the property, including a woman who owned the land for more than 30 years, say they’ve never seen an alley and the residents have no right to use land they have never owned or paid taxes on.

“It’s something that could happen to anyone,” said Hazelle Hofseth, 79, who bought the two- to three-acre parcel of land with her husband, now deceased, in the 1950s. “The mere fact that they used my land (means) they can take it away from me.”

The three residents who live on Farr Road are suing Hofseth, Jensen Construction, which built the houses, and Kathryn Taylor, whose late husband bought the land from Hofseth and then sold it to Jensen.

Jensen Construction also is suing Taylor and Hofseth because the land was sold with a guarantee that there were no adverse claims to it, said the company’s attorney, Joseph Esposito.

“They wouldn’t have bought into a lawsuit, obviously,” Esposito said of his client. “My people were totally unaware.”

Hofseth and her husband platted the land into 10 lots in 1955, according to court documents. They named it the Hofseth Subdivision. They left it untended, unfenced and uncultivated.

Carl Hofseth died in 1989, and in January of 1991, Hazelle Hofseth sold the land to Wallace Taylor. He and Kathryn Taylor were married in November of 1991. The Taylors sold nine of the lots to Jensen Construction in May of 1993, court documents say. Wallace Taylor died a month later.

About eight months ago, Jensen started building houses.

When dirt from construction piled up behind the plaintiffs’ gates, they came out in force, complaining that Jensen was blocking their access. They asked for a 30-foot easement.

“That’s like a freeway,” said Bruce Gore, Hazelle Hofseth’s attorney.

The Farr Road residents said they’d been using the land for access since they moved in. In their affidavit, Gene and Carol Kicha, 3910 N. Farr, said the fact that the property had rear access attracted them when they bought the house in 1962.

In one sworn testimony after another, the residents, with support from other neighbors, friends and family, said they’d used the alley continuously over the years to access their properties.

Indeed, most of the fences encompassing the properties have gates in back leading to the two worn wheel ruts. They kept up the trail, plowing in the winter and mowing in the summer, the plaintiffs said in affidavits.

“We’re amazed that anyone would seriously assert that there is no alley behind our house and that we and our neighbors do not have absolute right to use the alley,” the Kicha affidavit said.

Earl Jensen, of Jensen Construction, is equally dumbfounded that the residents are claiming legal right to use the land he now owns.

“I don’t know how they can claim property that somebody else has paid taxes on as their right of way,” he said.

Hazelle Hofseth, Kathryn Taylor and real estate agents who arranged Hofseth’s sale all say in affidavits that they’d never seen any sign of a trail or alley along that strip of land despite numerous inspections.

After arguing back and forth about how much of an easement the residents should be granted, it appears the parties will settle on 12 feet, Esposito said. “I think we’ve got it settled.”

Negotiations do look hopeful, said John Riley, attorney for the plaintiffs. But, he said, “the formal papers haven’t been signed.”

Doug Jayne, Hazelle Hofseth’s son-in-law, said this suit should serve as a wake-up call to all property owners.

The law, he said, “assumes you have knowledge and can identify who’s on your property. It doesn’t seem just. I’m sure there’s a lot of people out there who aren’t even aware of it.”