I think that they probably could have filed suit way earlier (maybe even as early as 10 years), but more than likely, if the Kirlin's didn't protest this in the courts all along, in the eyes of the court, they did nothing and as such tacitly allowed this to go on where McClean and Stevens (sounds like a lawfirm, right?) could reasonably say they used this without official protest to the owner. I'm pretty sure the judges ruling will likely be upheld. Just goes to show ya. It pays to take em to court sometimes.

So are the new owners on the hook for the past taxes?

Gee, the plaintiff is a former judge and won the case. Imagine that. This is really rubbing me the wrong way.

Our system is royally screwed. Private property rights don't exist any more.

there's nothing arcane about adverse possession and it's there for a good reason.... if you just lay down and let someone take over your property, you're clearly not putting it to its highest and best use. the law seeks to reward the party that will.

So where were the Kirlins the whole time Richard and Edith were using the yard?

This happened to my boss - a neighbor he had for a couple of years asked to buy some of his property when he was putting up a fence to enclose a pool he was installing. When he declined the offer, the neighbor took him to court claiming the property had been used in common prior to either of the parties purchasing the land. I think title insurance helped him fight (and win) the claim but it was a pain.

this is b.s. they own that property. that's it, they OWN that property, the fact that their neighbors slowly encroached over the years should not be a legal standpoint to them getting the land! what the hell is wrong with this country??

Wow. I guess that's what you get for being a good neighbor. These poor people probably didn't mind their neighbors partying on their property and figured letting them use the land was a nice thing to do. Then they get screwed in the end.

Whatever happened to the neighborly attitude from when I was a kid? We'd play in each other's yard, help each other out by working on the land between our houses, etc.

Now I'm stuck with a crabby woman who accuses me of "stealing her chair" (when I walked down the street to get it for her when it blew away), and demands that I repair my fence RIGHT AWAY, so that she can keep HER dog in HER yard (this is all after putting countless hours of work into my house, which had previously been a party house and eyesore).

Whatever happened to politeness and sharing?

@Brad2723: They still do, however, adverse posession prevents rich SOBs from buying land just for the sake of not letting anyone else have it. The Kirlins did not use their property and did not tell their neighbors to GTFO. McClean and Stevens used the property and made improvements on it whereas the Kirlins had it for the sake of growing weeds. It's VERY easy to prevent adverse possession and all it takes is telling the squatter to GTFO via the County sheriff (so it's a matter of record). Once you give them an order to leave the clock resets to zero. The squatters come back they're back to the beginning. You can also reset the clock by giving explicit permission to use the property. (according to the Wikipedia article on the law)

This is a well known fact of real estate law. Its one of the things you will learn in the basics of real estate studies. Most would not think to use it but there are always a few who are parasites.

"Boulder couple lost 25% of their property after a neighbor used an arcane legal clause to west control of it."

"West" is a verb now?

I hope that the Stevens enjoy their land, because they just sacrificed all of their friends in Boulder for it.

I used to work in the surveying field and I had occasion to work on a couple of these cases over the years. This is not something new by any means, these laws have been on the books in most States for over a hundred years. It is a basic principle of land ownership that if you don't maintain or use a piece of you property and your neighbor does, then he has staked a claim. If you do not legally acknowledge that you are knowingly allowing him to do this but are retaining ownership, then after so many years, seven to ten in most States, he has the rights to make a claim for ownership of the disputed land.

I think it is really quite cool that this can occur. Kind of like the old west with the ranchers and farmers battling it out. Only hopefully with no firearms involved.

I'm so going to show this to my husband when he gets home. There is a walk way on the side of our house that connected up to our neighbors back patio and our back patio. The walk was on our property but connected with a side door of the neighbors house and their back patio. Our neighbor regularly used the side walk, when he put his house on the market I told him we we were fencing in the front and side yard (where the walk was located) because we have a dog. My husband cut the concrete that connected to the neighbor's side door and the neighbor's back patio and we had a fence put it. Without knowing anything about adverse possession, I was worried about letting our new neighbor continue to use the walk way as if it was shared property or their property. We put up the fence which cost us about $7000 but I guess it was totally worth it. Oh, my husband thought I was crazy.

the easiest way to prevent something like this is to give your neighbor permission to use the land - in writing. if it's a permitted use, it's not adverse, and can't change hands in this way.

This case is absolutely ridiculous. Their argument is basically, "Hey I've been trespassing here for years and I like it. Therefore it's mine now." They've been breaking the law for so long that they can now take someone else's land, makes me sick.

Developing an emotionaly attachment to it is completely irrelevant, otherwise I would go develop an emotionaly attachment to my neighbor's new BMW. I wonder if I take it for a few joy rides if I could make the adverse possession argument.

@Mrevil If people with money want to buy land "just for the sake of not letting anyone else have it" that's their business. I don't think most people buy land with the intent of sharing it. If they bought it , have paid taxes, and own it, that should be the end of the argument.

A while back a new neighbor asked if they could plant flowers in the area of our yard that was adjoining theirs.

I refused. I did say at the time (not to the neighbors, though) I thought it was a way, whether they intended it or not, they could end up owning part of the yard.

They had plenty of space to plant on their own land...and years and years later, what they wanted to do to our yard, they haven't even done to their own (no flowers).

And another neighbor called me petty for not wanting their kids to run through my yard. Practically threatened to sue me saying his kids felt 'threatened' (even though their friends would pretend to scream in fright and then laugh after that). Sounded more like he got sick of his kids complaining about me and didn't even find out from them what happened.

I don't talk to him anymore because the stammering anger he expressed was scary.

Now I feel sad. :(

It doesn't sound like the Kirlins protested at all, legally or otherwise, until the couple decided to go for the on-paper ownership of the land they'd been using for the past quarter century.

It's one thing if they were just using the paths to get from the front yard to the back yard, they would seem like assholes making a property grab, but if as the post here indicates, they had a rock garden and held gatherings on the land, with no protest or word from the Kirlins, then what exactly were they waiting for? Moreover, what were they using the land for? I know that if someone came into my front yard and build a rock garden I'd say something about it, but no these people said nothing until it was too late.

Plus, by watching the video it sounds like something else entirely. Mr Kirlin sounded more pissed that he wouldn't be able to build on the land than he was about anything else.

What amazes me though is that hardly anyone in the comments at the original site sees things objectively. Everyone is spouting vitriol at McLean and Stevens and being all politically stabby instead of looking at what's really going on.

America. Land of the lawyers.

This definitely has a "pioneer days" feel to it. Staking a claim? Man.

I seem to remember this kinda thing happening alot, I believe its also called squatters rights. From what I remember, if you maintain land for 10+ years, you can claim it. This counts for private property and crown land. I've even heard of this happening from neighbors who cut lawns and over time can claim ownership. This is not new.

There are laws like this pretty much everywhere.

I was wondering how this came about. You would have to be a total douche to intentionally squat someone's land until you've been doing it long enough to acquire it (20+ years in some states!). I can't imagine someone would actually wait 21 years and then proactively sue to obtain the land.

In another article it turns out that The dispute began in October 2006, when McLean and Stevens filed a restraining order against the Kirlins to stop the couple from building a fence along the dividing line between their properties.

When you own land, you gotta protect it sooner than later, or you could lose it. This isn't a new thing, it's really an old-timey common law thing that probably doesn't make much sense applying it today. But it exists and every land owner should know about it.

I'm pretty sure that the open and notorious use of land has to continue for a long time (like 10 years) for adverse possession to take place. MrEvil is right that you can reset the clock easily by not rolling over and allowing the possession/development of your land by someone else. Unfortunately for the Kirlins, ignorance of the law is no excuse.

@David_B: I'm sorry, but the law does not agree with you.

What a couple of scum bags. Law or not, this kind of behavior doesn't pass the smell test, they know it, and they should be ashamed of themselves. The worst part is it's contagious. People see this kind of behavior, and in order to protect themselves they become complete neighborphobes and crap on anyone abutting their land at the mere whiff of sharing space.

Years ago I decided the next house I get will definitely have a fenced yard!

I'd like to know if the two parties talked about the land AT ALL before one of them took the other to court. Maybe they had a falling out?

@Yep: I became a neighborphobe of sorts after the treatment I received. I'm not mean or anything, I just avoid them if possible.

Even with neighborly treatment, etc, isn't respecting each other's property part of being neighborly?

@DeeJayQueue: A lot of people's net worth is largely the value of their land. He probably wanted to pass it on to kids or whatever or use as a retirement nest egg if he or his wife needed that money.

I've been reading some more about this. Apparently when he found out that this family was going to build a house on their own land, it took this former judge only a couple of hours to get a restraining order on it. Does that sound ridiculous to anyone else? I wonder how long it would take a normal person to get a restraining order like that.

This law needs to be updated. There should be no time limits. It's my land, and I can kick you off whenever I want. If that means that I decide to mow over your garden that you've been planting on my property for 50 years, you can just deal with it. Don't trespass in the first place then.

My parents fenced in their yard because after years of looking out the window to see the neighbor's animal traipsing through it, leaving "gifts" and having the neighbor do absolutely nothing to keep their pet contained in their yard, they finally decided that it was just a better idea to keep other people OUT rather than depend on them to have some kind of politeness or common sense. Our last three houses have had fences.

When we fenced in our yard, we COULD have put the fence about 1 ft farther over, since the property line was there, but it would have looked bad. So we put it where it is, knowing full well that we were effectively giving a small part of the land to our neighbors.

If it came to a court case, they would win.

The whole point of adverse possession is to ensure that land is put to productive use. To me, this means factories and farms. It shouldn't apply to a person's own residential property. If they want to let the land go to weeds, they should be able to, as long as it doesn't violate local ordinances.

@Kimsama Yes I know. That was my point-that the law should be changed.

@David_B: the law should be changed to allow people to horde land, rather than putting it to its highest and best use? i think not. if you're not paying enough attention to keep your boundaries secure, then you don't deserve protection under the law. adverse possession must be open, notorious, hostile, continuous, and exclusive for a large amount of time (generally 7-20 years) - if you can't defeat a claim then you clearly aren't using your land, or your head...

The application of the adverse domain argument to this case remains to be seen. Adverse possession doctrine here in Colorado includes some difficult legal tests to show that they have been using the land in an observable, open and notorious way, uninterrupted for many years. According to local reports here, they haven't been able to produce so much as a single photograph of one of these alleged parties they've been throwing for years. I'm sure this case is going to take years to hash it all out though.

My Father had a similar incident involving his land. His neighbor wanted to purchase a part of the property so that he could expand his home. This guy tried to sneakily use it and had to be warned in a legal way to knock it off a few times.

I'm very glad my Dad knew about "Adverse possession" and the correct way to deal with it.

There is an interesting irony here. The same law that requires landowners to use their property or (in some very limited cases) lose it is the same type law that makes us all gnash our teeth when the xAA and others go after Intellectual Property violators. Basically you see this theme throughout our (admittedly) more arcane laws - it's your property, protect it or lose it.

The only reason why xAA and their cohorts go after downloaders is because if they don't, they (and their constituent members) actually risk losing the ownership rights to their songs / movies / software. Which is why you, as a landowner, have a responsibility to go after (legally) anyone who tries to take your property, or you can - as we see here - lose it.

Agreed, all these laws need to be changed.

@Dlynch Who decides your land's best use? Maybe you don't need your whole yard. Maybe it would be better used for something else. Should we all live in as small a place as possible, so that we don't take up too much space? The answer is no. We live in a free society where we can do whatever we want (within the law obviously) with our earnings. People are allowed to own multiple residences in different locations, are you against that? How much qualifies as "hording?"

The funny thing is that in Boulder they are constantly complaining about people developing too much. Now some of the same people are saying that this family wasn't putting it to enough use by leaving it undeveloped for so long, therefore they can't have it anymore.

I do have to say that it bothers me to see how many people who've commented on this post agree with the action. I mean, really, at which point was it okay for people to take your property just because you didn't feel like using it? It's still yours, you bought it, you've paid taxes for it, and there should never be any obligation that you have to *do* something with it. I guess the next step is going to be when it's determined that living on a piece of property isn't productive enough, and as such, you have to turn it over to someone who will do something "worthwhile" with it. Oh wait...

@Troy F.:

I wonder if the fact that those folks were going to build on their own property would count as 'asserting ownership'? I mean, if the rules say that the property must go unused and uncontested by the current owner for a certain amount of time before someone else can claim adverse possession, wouldn't trying to install your own fence reset the clock? If the point of adverse possession laws is to ensure the land is being used, and the original owners obviously planned to use it, tried to use it, and had to have an injunction filed against them to prevent them from using it, then I just don't see how anyone can claim that the property was going unused.

@protest (and others)

If anything, this law protects the original owner. The encroacher must have continuous use for 20 years. Additionally it has to be "open, notorious, and hostile", which I take to mean "obvious". That's a long-ass time to not notice, and to give permission or evict. Shopping malls (and other public places) close off their property one day per year to reset their clock.

If in all that time, you don't make a stink (or give permission) to someone making gardens and throwing parties on your property, you are clearly not using it.

Could anyone explain how the "hostile" part fits into this case and/or what's meant by that regarding adverse possession?

I would assume that, if the Kirlins realized it was their property, there would have been some sort of "Sure, you can use it" verbal permission.

Maybe the hostile part came into play when there was finally a conflict over it when the Kirlins wanted to fence/develop the land?

Still seems that verbal agreement should be sufficient to prevent adverse possession in residential cases.

@backspinner: It is when the "R" in it goes AWOL. :)

@He: Land is for living on, not for defining someone's net worth. I hate the people who buy houses and land only to inflate their value as a money making scheme. It makes it so that people can't afford to live anywhere decent because everywhere gets gentrified so fast. Plus, I wonder if he's paying a mortgage on his house? If so then he doesn't own it anyway, the bank does.

@dlynch: Let's say that adverse law should be okay...even then, the original owner should receive fair compensation for the land.

Although you'd hope they'd just respect the boundaries in the first place.

@macinjosh:

But it's still *your* property. If you don't want to use it, why should you have to? If you simply allow people to use your property for things because you're a nice person, or because you just don't care, that still shouldn't give anyone the ability to forcibly take your property from you.

A lot of people are taking a weird interpretation of this.

There is nothing that says you have to USE the land for any purpose. All you have to do is take steps to make sure that NO ONE ELSE is using your land.