Legal rights over neighbouring land — rights of light, drainage, support, access and utility easements. Expert advice on establishing, protecting and extinguishing easements for property owners and developers.
An easement is a legal right that allows the owner or occupier of one piece of land (the dominant tenement) to use the land of another person (the servient tenement) in a specific way. Easements are a fundamental feature of English land law and can significantly affect the value, use and development potential of property.
For a right to qualify as an easement, it must satisfy the four criteria established in Re Ellenborough Park [1956] Ch 131:
There must be a dominant and a servient tenement
The easement must accommodate and serve the dominant tenement (i.e. benefit the land, not merely the owner personally)
The dominant and servient tenements must be owned or occupied by different persons
The right must be capable of forming the subject matter of a grant (i.e. be sufficiently certain and not a purely personal right)
Easements Run With the Land. Unlike personal licences, easements are proprietary rights that bind successors in title — they continue to benefit and burden the land even after it changes hands. This makes understanding what easements exist over your property essential before any purchase or development.
Common Types of Easement
Rights of Way
The most common easement — the right to pass over another's land on foot, by vehicle, or both. May be private (between neighbouring landowners) or public (public footpaths and highways). Our dedicated Rights of Way page covers these in detail.
Rights of Light
The right to receive natural light through defined apertures (windows and skylights) in a building. A right of light can be acquired by long use (20 years) under the Prescription Act 1832 and protects against neighbouring development that would substantially reduce light. A significant source of developer/neighbour disputes.
Drainage Easements
The right to drain water (surface water, foul water or both) through pipes, drains or ditches crossing neighbouring land. Drainage easements are critical for development — a landlocked site may be unviable without them. Disputes arise when drains are blocked, diverted or overloaded by new development.
Support Easements
The right for a building to be supported by an adjoining building or land. Particularly important in terraced and semi-detached properties and multi-storey buildings. Withdrawal of support by demolition or excavation gives rise to a cause of action.
Utility Easements
Rights to lay and maintain utility services (electricity cables, gas pipes, water pipes, telecoms) across neighbouring land. Essential for modern development — statutory undertakers have separate powers but private utility easements are common in housing estates and commercial developments.
Parking Easements
The right to park on another's land. Recognised as a valid easement since Moncrieff v Jamieson [2007] UKHL 42 provided it does not deprive the servient owner of reasonable use of their land. Commonly disputed in residential and commercial contexts.
How Easements Are Created
1. Express Grant or Reservation
The most straightforward way to create an easement — the parties expressly agree to grant or reserve a right, set out in writing in the title deeds, transfer deed or a separate deed of easement. Express easements over registered land must be registered at HM Land Registry to be legal easements binding on successors in title.
Disputes often arise where the wording of an express grant is ambiguous — for example, whether a right of way is "for all purposes" or limited to residential use, or whether it includes a right to pass with vehicles. Our solicitors interpret express grants in light of the surrounding circumstances and applicable principles of construction.
2. Implied Grant or Reservation
Easements can be implied into a transaction even where they are not expressly mentioned in the conveyance. The main doctrines of implication are:
Easements of necessity — where without the easement the land conveyed would be landlocked (inaccessible from the public highway), the court will imply the minimum easement necessary to give access
Common intention — where the grant of an easement is necessary to give effect to the parties' common intention at the time of the conveyance
The rule in Wheeldon v Burrows (1879) — when land is sold off by a common owner, all quasi-easements that were continuous, apparent, and necessary for the reasonable enjoyment of the property sold pass automatically to the buyer as implied easements
Section 62 of the Law of Property Act 1925 — a conveyance of land impliedly passes with it all liberties, privileges, easements, rights, and advantages then enjoyed with the land, which can convert a mere licence into a legal easement if not carefully excluded
3. Prescription
Easements can be acquired by long use — known as prescription. There are three routes to prescriptive acquisition under English law:
Prescription Act 1832 — the most commonly used route. A right of way used as of right, without consent, for 20 years (or 40 years for rights of light) becomes indefeasible even if the use began without lawful origin. The right must be enjoyed "nec vi, nec clam, nec precario" (without force, without secrecy, without permission)
Common law prescription — based on a presumption that the right has been enjoyed since "time immemorial" (1189 AD). Rarely used in practice as it is easily defeated
Lost modern grant — the court presumes a grant was made at some point in the past and has since been lost, where 20 years' user as of right is proved. Useful where the Prescription Act 1832 requirements cannot be exactly met
Extinguishing and Modifying Easements
An easement can be extinguished or modified in several ways:
Express release — the dominant owner formally releases the easement by deed
Implied release / abandonment — a court will extinguish an easement where the dominant owner has clearly and permanently abandoned it (though abandonment is difficult to establish — non-use alone is insufficient)
Unity of ownership and possession — if the dominant and servient tenements come into the same ownership and possession, the easement is extinguished
Statute — compulsory purchase or statutory powers can override easements
Upper Tribunal — where a right of way (but not other easements) has become obsolete, unreasonably impedes development or was improperly acquired, the Upper Tribunal (Lands Chamber) can modify or extinguish it under the Law of Property Act 1925 (though primarily used for restrictive covenants)
Rights of Light — Developer Issues
Rights of light claims are among the most commercially significant easement disputes, particularly for developers. Where a neighbouring building has enjoyed light through its windows for 20 years or more, the owner may have an actionable right of light that could:
Block or delay a development by injunction
Entitle the affected owner to substantial damages
Require redesign of the proposed development
Our solicitors advise developers on rights of light risk assessments, rights of light indemnity insurance, light obstruction notices (served under the Rights of Light Act 1959 to interrupt the 20-year period), and negotiated releases of rights of light from neighbouring owners. We also advise neighbouring owners whose rights of light are threatened by new development.
Easements and Development
Developers frequently encounter easement issues on site acquisition and during development. Common scenarios include:
Discovering existing easements that restrict proposed development
Needing to obtain new easements (drainage, access, utilities) to make a development viable
Dealing with rights of light claims from adjoining owners
Extinguishing or modifying easements that have become unnecessary
Section 62 LPA 1925 issues on plot sales — ensuring that licences are not converted into easements binding on future plots
Our solicitors work with developers from site acquisition through to completion, identifying and managing easement risk at every stage.
Frequently Asked Questions
If you have used a right of way across your neighbour's land for 20 years or more without permission, you may have acquired a prescriptive easement under the Prescription Act 1832. Even if the right is not expressly mentioned in your title deeds, you may have a legal right to use it. Our solicitors will review the history of use, advise on whether a prescriptive easement has been acquired, and if so, write to your neighbour asserting the right. If your neighbour refuses to acknowledge it, we can apply for an injunction to restore access and a declaration of your right from the court.
If your property has had light through its windows for 20 years or more without interruption and without the consent of the neighbouring landowner, you may have acquired a right of light under the Prescription Act 1832. A substantial interference with that right — reducing light below what is necessary for the comfortable use and enjoyment of the building as a dwelling or office — can be restrained by injunction or compensated in damages. Act quickly — developers sometimes serve a Rights of Light Act 1959 notice to interrupt the 20-year period. Our solicitors advise on your position and options urgently.
Yes — and it is important to do so. An expressly granted easement over registered land is only a legal easement (binding on all successors in title) if it is registered at HM Land Registry as appurtenant to the dominant title and noted against the servient title. An unregistered express easement may still be enforceable as an equitable easement, but it may not bind a buyer of the servient land without notice. Prescriptive easements acquired over registered land also need to be registered to be fully protected. Our solicitors advise on registering easements and applying to rectify the register where easements are missing.
Ambiguous easement grants are a very common source of neighbour disputes. The starting point is to interpret the grant as a whole in light of the surrounding circumstances at the time it was created — what was the use of the dominant and servient land, what did the parties intend, and what makes commercial sense? Our solicitors review your title documents and advise on the proper scope of any easement. Where the scope is genuinely ambiguous, we can seek a declaration from the court setting out the correct interpretation.