My neighbor has decided to sell his house and in the process he has had his property surveyed and he tells me that he finds that where I park in my yard is actually part of his lot. What can I do about this?

In the city it is not unusual to find discrepancies in the physical use of property and the actual survey boundaries of properties. It is for that reason that the concept of adverse possession came into being, which basically means if you have used the property in an open, adverse and continuous way for 20 years then you have the right to keep the property. So the question is how long have you been parking in that spot in your yard and how long did your predecessors in title do the same thing? If it was for a period of more than 20 years, and you can prove that, then you have a claim against the title to the property by a right of adverse possession. However in order to establish that right you have to bring an action in court, usually the Land Court in Boston, and you would have to engage the services of a surveyor and an attorney to bring the lawsuit and then try the case. That, as you can imagine, could be very expensive. On the other hand your neighbor has a problem in selling his lot because of the fact that you are using part of it. A middle ground that might be that your neighbor could continue to own the property but grant you an exclusive right to use that portion of that property on which your parking area is located for the purposes of parking automobiles and otherwise using the land consistent with the way the yards and driveways are used in the city of Boston. Another possibility would be that he could actually transfer title to that part of his lot to you but that may involve subdivision issues including setbacks and the like which may create more problems than it will solve. So if you and your predecessors have been using the parking area or more than 20 years you may want to notify your neighbor that you intend to continue to use the area because you believe you own it now by adverse possession but that you are willing to work with him to straighten it out by an easement. If you have not owned the property for more than 20 years, before you have your discussion with neighbor, you may well want to have an affidavit signed by the prior owners of your property that they used that area for parking as well. That will make your position more persuasive.

If you have questions about this or any other real estate matter, please contact Tom Bennett at (617) 531-6574 or tvb@barronstad.com.