Midvale Boundary Dispute Lawyers and Midvale Title Attorneys

Find the right Title & Boundary Dispute attorney in Midvale, UT

Title & Boundary Dispute Law in Utah

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.

In these instances, neighbors usually have the option to resolve the dispute by themselves. If the neighbors are on amicable terms with each other, and the dispute is minor (for example, it only includes a difference of a couple feet), and enforcing the property lines would be a major inconvenience for one or both of the neighbors, they'll probably decide to just go on as they had before. This is a viable option, to be sure, but it's not a perfect one: if, sometime down the road, one of the neighbors wants to attempt to enforce the legal boundaries, they might find themselves unable 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 further 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.

In addition to the boundary disputes mentioned above, land owners and buyers in Midvale, Utah should also be aware of the possibility of a title dispute. Rather than being a disagreement over the exact boundaries between two pieces of land, a title dispute is a conflict over who actually owns an entire plot of land. Uncertainty over ownership of land can come up more often than you might think, and is most often caused by a buyer's failure to correctly record a deed, or the accidental loss or destruction of a deed. Sometimes, however, these disputes can be more dishonest in origin: on occasion, unscrupulous sellers of land will attempt to sell the same parcel to more than one person. Obviously, once you've sold land to one person, you can't sell the same land to anyone else, as you no longer own it. These tricksters know this, but are attempting to gain a large amount of money through the multiple sales. Once this is done, they typically attempt to flee the state or country before the buyers discovery they've been duped. This leaves it up to the buyers to figure out amongst themselves who owns the land.

Possible Outcomes of Boundary and Title Disputes in Midvale, Utah

Courts have many tools at their disposal to resolve boundary disputes. One way is to just 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.

Nonetheless, a court might also enforce the legal property boundaries, particularly if failing to do so would place a significant burden on the owner of the encroached-upon land. If the owner of the encroaching land knew of the encroachment, and concealed it from his neighbor, this fact would further weigh heavily in favor of enforcing the legal property lines.

When a title dispute comes up in Midvale, Utah, the court has to apply some pretty complex legal and equitable principles. These rules are sometimes very obscure, mainly because they can trace their origins back hundreds of years, to the common-law courts of England. However, a close examination of them reveals their basic goal: deciding ownership disputes based on longstanding conceptions of basic fairness.

In general, the person who initially recorded the deed at the appropriate government office will be the one who the court deems to own the land, if they didn't have any reason to know about the existence of the other deed, or other sale, or whatever else gave rise to the title conflict.

What Can A Midvale, Utah Attorney Do?

The legal issues surrounding title and boundary disagreements can get pretty confusing, and there are typically very high stakes involved (most people think their land is pretty important). For that reason, a good Midvale, Utah real estate attorney will prove invaluable if such a dispute arises.

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Life in Midvale

Midvale, Utah is a city located in Salt Lake County. It has a population of about 27,000 people.

Prior to the arrival of white settlers, the area now known as Midvale was populated by the Ute Indians, and had been for thousands of years. When settlers arrived in the 19th Century, growth of the town was very slow, and its economy was based almost entirely on subsistence agriculture.

However, the town began to grow, both in population and wealth, with the discovery of rich mineral reserves. Once word got out in the 1850sabout the area's natural wealth, large-scale settlement began.

Modernly, Midvale is closely linked to Salt Lake City, economically. Many people who live in Midvale are employed in the much larger urban center of Salt Lake City. Midvale enjoys the quiet and friendly character of a small town, but its proximity to a large city allows residents to partake of the attractions and amenities that only a big city can offer.

If you have a legal issue, there's probably at least one Midvale, Utah lawyer who can handle it. Midvale, Utah attorneys are highly skilled, and are capable of assisting clients with almost any legal problem.

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