They opened it, checked something, and closed it again. They did not cross onto my land. They did not acknowledge me standing sixty yards away. I noted the time. I noted the truck, white, no markings, a local contractor plate. I photographed it. I wrote everything down when I got home. I did not approach them. I did not speak. I just watched.
Three days later, I received a letter. It was printed on Maplewood Estates HOA letterhead. The return address listed a board president named Richard Thorne. The letter was brief. It welcomed me to the area. It mentioned that the community had historically relied on a shared water source near the property boundary, and expressed hope that I would continue to honor the existing arrangement.
I read that letter four times. There was no mention of any legal agreement, no reference to an easement, no documentation attached. Just the assumption stated plainly that I would continue allowing them to take water from my land because that was how things had always been. I set the letter on my desk. I photographed it. I scanned it. I sent the scan to Patricia that same night with a single line. They’ve acknowledged the pipe in writing without citing any legal basis.
Patricia replied within the hour. She said, “Save everything. Do not respond yet.” So I didn’t. Patricia’s strategy was simple. Build the record first, respond second. She had seen cases like this before, not identical, but similar. A landowner arrives. A neighbor has been using something, a road, a well, a drainage ditch, without permission. The neighbor assumes silence means consent.
The longer the silence, the stronger their eventual adverse possession claim could theoretically become. But Patricia explained that adverse possession on a newly purchased property where the new owner had already documented the encroachment within weeks of taking title was extremely difficult to argue. I had moved fast enough. The survey was dated. The photographs were timestamped. The HOA’s own letter was now in my file.
What I needed next was usage data. I needed to know how much water they were pulling from that well. I needed to know how long it had been happening. And I needed to know whether anyone in the chain of previous ownership had ever given verbal or written permission. I started with the county records office. I spent two full days there.
I pulled the deed history on my parcel going back forty years. I pulled the recorded plat maps for Maplewood Estates. The subdivision had been developed fourteen years ago. The HOA was incorporated twelve years ago. The wellhead on my property, according to an old county groundwater permit I found in the physical files, had been drilled eighteen years ago, before the subdivision existed, by the previous owner of my land, a man named Elton Marsh.
Elton Marsh had died six years ago. His estate had sold the parcel to a land holding company. That company had sold it to me. I found no record of any easement granted to Maplewood Estates or its developer at any point in that chain. Not in the deed transfers, not in the plat filings, not in the county utility records. I photographed every relevant document. I logged every file number. I organized everything chronologically.