“Land-locked property” refers to a property that has no direct access to a public street, so the only way on or off the property is to cross land owned by someone else.
The land-locked owner has the legal right to a “way of necessity” across an adjacent property. This legal
permission is called an “easement” and does not need to be registered with any government body to be valid.
However, its establishment is bound by the following: Easement can run across only one of the adjacent properties. If necessary, the dominant (land-locked) owner may construct a road across the servient (burdened) property. Care must be taken to cause as little damage as possible to the servient property.
The dominant owner must pay appropriate compensation to the servient owner. However, if a property once had direct access to a public street but became land-locked after being separated from the adjacent property, the owner is entitled to an easement through the same property without having to pay compensation.
The concept of servitude also applies to cases other than land-locked properties. A landowner is entitled to servitude right of way if:
- He or she has openly used a passage for 10 years or more with the intention to establish a right of way and without objections from anyone, or
- He or she has made an agreement, with or without compensation being paid, with the owner of the servient land. In the latter case, the law requires that the servitude right of way be registered with the local government land office.