Baytown Boundary Dispute Lawyers and Baytown Title Attorneys

Find the right Title & Boundary Dispute attorney in Baytown, TX

Title & Boundary Dispute Law in Texas

There are times when neighbors will find themselves in a situation where how they've been using their land doesn't match up with the property boundaries that are on record. This can be a source of substantial conflict, as one might expect.

Sometimes, neighbors will decide amongst themselves that the issue isn't worth fighting over, and will go on as they did before. This is particularly likely if the neighbors are on good terms, and the difference between their use of the land, and the actual property lines, is small (say, a few feet or less). This is an ideal situation, at least in the short term. It can, however, cause problems in the future - preventing a neighbor from enforcing the actual property lines, if they suddenly have a reason to do so.

In these cases, what often happens is that the owner of the property which is truly larger than he initially believed (due to the property line not being where he thought it was) wants to make use of the additional property, and eject his neighbor from it. The other neighbor, on the other hand, will want to keep using the land as before, to avoid having his property shrink.

Title disputes in Baytown, Texas, on the other hand, involve questions of ownership over an entire parcel of land. This confusion can sometimes arise from improperly recorded deeds, resulting in inadvertent (and, occasionally, deliberate) sales of the same parcel of land to multiple people. Obviously, each buyer wants to be the one who takes title, especially if it seems unlikely that they'll be able to get their money back. This can lead to some very heated disputes.

Possible Outcomes of Boundary and Title Disputes in Baytown, Texas

Courts have many tools at their disposal to resolve boundary disputes. One way is to simply re-draw the property lines to reflect how the neighbors had been using the land before the discrepancy was discovered. This doesn't very change the position of either neighbor, and is sometimes the fairest result. This is most frequently done because the neighbors were both aware of the legal property lines, and that they differed from how they were using the land, and went on using the land anyway.

On the other hand, a court could decide to take the opposite approach, and order the neighbors to abide by the legal property lines. When deciding which course of action to take, courts consider many factors, but most of them boil down to common-sense principles of fairness. For example, if the owner of the land who was encroaching onto his neighbor's land knew of the encroachment, and hid this fact from the other neighbor (hoping to continue to use more land than he paid for), that will weigh heavily in favor of enforcing the legal property lines. On the other hand, if neither neighbor knew about the error, and it turns out that the actual property line goes through somebody's living room, a court probably won't enforce them.

With title disputes (as opposed to the boundary disputes discussed above), a Baytown, Texas court has to determine who owns an entire parcel of land. There are some pretty complicated legal issues involved here.

Without delving into the details too much, courts typically resolve title disputes by looking at who recorded the deed first, and whether or not that person had notice of any prior sales of the same land. To succeed in a dispute like this, a buyer will usually need to prove that they were the first to record their deed, and that they had no notice (or reason to know) of any prior conveyances of the same land.

What Can A Baytown, Texas Attorney Do?

As you might have gathered, it's not uncommon for the legal issues governing boundary and title disputes to get very complicated. Moreover, any dispute that can affect one's use or ownership of land has very high stakes (land isn't typically cheap, after all). Therefore, it shouldn't come as a surprise that hiring a competent Baytown, Texas real estate lawyer to help in situations like this is always a good idea.

Talk to a Real Estate Law Attorney now!

Life in Baytown

Baytown is located in Harris and Chambers County, Texas. Per the 2010 census, the population of the city is 71,802 people.

Some great attractions to check out while in Baytown include Baytown Nature Center, Houston Raceway Park, the National Hot Rod Association (NHRA), the Baytown Symphony Orchestra, and the San Jacinto Mall.

Famous residents include Bobby Fuller, Gary Busey, Leeland Mooring, Joe Tex, Drew Tate, Romany Malco, and Rocky Bernard.

Top industries include construction, education, transportation, and retail. Although legal services is not included, there are many established law offices and firms in and near Baytown. These entities train excellent attorneys to handle any and every legal need of residents and businesses.

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