Fort Wayne Boundary Dispute Lawyers and Fort Wayne Title Attorneys

Find the right Title & Boundary Dispute attorney in Fort Wayne, IN

Title & Boundary Dispute Law in Indiana

If you discover that you and your neighbor's use of your respective properties do not reflect the legal property lines, this can create a problem.

In a seemingly-ideal situation, the neighbors will choose to ignore this new revelation, and go on as they always have. Of course, this doesn't happen commonly, and might have consequences down the road, including title eventually changing to reflect the perceived property lines, without the choice of either neighbor.

However, it's more common for the neighbor whose land is being encroached upon by the other neighbor to seek enforcement of the legal property lines. The other neighbor will almost certainly want to use the property as he had been, since enforcing the legal property lines would cause him to lose some of "his" land.

People in Fort Wayne, Indiana should also be aware of the possibility of title (ownership) disputes. Unlike the boundary disputes discussed above, the outcome of a title dispute can determine who owns an entire parcel of real property. Confusion over who actually owns a piece of property is more common that some people might imagine. Many local property records are still kept on paper, are not very well-organized, and sometimes date back a hundred years or more. A lost or misfiled deed is the most common way for a title dispute to arise. However, sometimes fraud on the part of a seller can lead to title disputes. Unscrupulous individuals will sometimes try to sell the same piece of land to more than one person. And some people even try to sell property they don't own, occasionally succeeding (and this isn't just limited to bridges in London). Normally, once the buyers discover they've been duped, the "seller" is nowhere to be found, leaving them to figure out who owns the land they all thought they had purchased.

Possible Outcomes of Boundary and Title Disputes in Fort Wayne, Indiana

There are many ways to resolve boundary disputes. One way is to change the legal property lines to reflect the use that the neighbors had been making of the land before the discrepancy was discovered. This is typically considered a sort of "neutral" result - nobody's situation changes. If both neighbors knew about the real boundaries for a very long time, and did nothing about it, a court may view this as them having acquiesced to the status quo, and decide that it would be unfair to force the neighbors to change their use of the land after such a long period of time. This might also be done if enforcing the property lines would place a very large burden on one neighbor, and re-drawing them to reflect their actual use would put a comparatively small burden on the other neighbor

A court might do the opposite, and decide to enforce the property lines as they're drawn. This will generally benefit one neighbor and hurt the other. A court will probably do this if one neighbor knew that his land was encroaching onto another person's property, and actively tried to hide that fact from his neighbor. Obviously, such bad behavior shouldn't be rewarded. Conversely, if the neighbor whose land was being encroached upon knew about the discrepancy, and did nothing about it, the court will probably change the property lines to reflect this prior use, to prevent that neighbor from being rewarded for "sitting on his rights."

In Fort Wayne, Indiana courts have many options when it comes to resolving title disputes. However, these disputes are usually governed by some fairly difficult (and old) legal principles. While they're typically built around policies that most people would find to be quite fair and reasonable, their application can be nearly impenetrable, even for some lawyers.

Without going into too much detail, the person who recorded their deed first will be the one who takes ownership, provided he or she did not know (or had no reason to know) of the existence of the other deed.

What Can A Fort Wayne, Indiana Attorney Do?

The legal issues surrounding title and boundary disputes can get pretty convoluted, and there are normally very high stakes involved (most people think their land is pretty important). For that reason, a good Fort Wayne, Indiana real estate attorney will prove invaluable if such a dispute arises.

Talk to a Real Estate Law Attorney now!

Life in Fort Wayne

Fort Wayne, Indiana gives visitors the small-town feel that makes Indiana so great. Along with the small town community-feel, Fort Wayne has a lot of things for visitors to do.

For the nature lovers, they can visit Foellinger-Freimann Botanical Conservatory, which is famous for the display of beautiful plants, shopping, and family outings. Another site great for family outings is the Fort Wayne Children's Zoo, which includes great restaurants and cafes and wonderful exhibits of animals!

Sports lovers will have their sports-loving needs catered to with the Fort Wayne TinCaps Baseball Stadium and Parkview Field. The nature lovers have Rivergreenway Trail, and Headwaters Park.

Other popular attractions include Hoosier Park Racing Casino for the adventurous risk-takers, Fort Wayne Civic Theatre for those who love shows, and Veterans Memorial National Shrine, which holds over 5,000 artifacts from the Civil War for all the visitors who are history-buffs.

Fort Wayne is also filled with many small to medium sized law firms who practice in all areas of law. Thus, Fort Wayne citizens do not have to travel far to receive personalized and effective legal representation.

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