How long does it take to create a prescriptive easement in Hawaii?

20 years of open, notorious, continuous and adverse use is the period generally applied in Hawaii, commonly cited to Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-31. The clock only runs while the use is visible and without the owner's permission; written permission restarts it.

Can someone take ownership of my land in Hawaii, not just a right to cross it?

A prescriptive easement only creates a right of use after 20 years. You keep title. Ownership claims run through Hawaii's separate adverse possession rules, which require possession of the strip itself rather than a shared use of it.

What has to be proven for an easement claim in Hawaii?

Twenty years of adverse use. Native Hawaiian traditional and gathering rights are separate from prescription and are constitutionally protected.

Where are easements recorded in Hawaii?

Easements are recorded at the county level. For the Hawaii counties we cover that means Hawaii Bureau of Conveyances (statewide). 1 of those counties publish a free public parcel viewer you can check before you order title work.

Does a Hawaii title commitment list every easement on the property?

Schedule B lists the recorded exceptions the title company found, which covers most utility, access and drainage easements. It will not show a prescriptive easement created by 20 years of use with nothing on paper, and it rarely tells you where on the lot the easement actually sits. That takes the recorded instrument plus a survey.

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Hawaii prescriptive easement law

Q: Which Hawaii law actually sets the clock?

Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-31. In its own words: "No person shall commence an action to recover possession of any lands, or make any entry thereon, unless within twenty years after the right to bring the action first accrued." We transcribed that from the official text on September 7, 2026.

Q: What does it cost to record an easement in Hawaii?

Hawaii records with the Registrar, State Bureau of Conveyances: Hawaii records centrally, not by county. A flat per-document fee set by the Bureau of Conveyances: about $36 for a document up to 50 pages and $101 for longer instruments.

Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-31

Prescriptive period

20 years

What actually decides a claim here

Twenty years of adverse use.
Native Hawaiian traditional and gathering rights are separate from prescription and are constitutionally protected.

The rule that matters most

Hawaii's twenty-year prescriptive period exists alongside constitutionally protected Native Hawaiian traditional and customary rights and kuleana access, which are a wholly separate legal basis for crossing or gathering on private land and are not proven the same way.

Hawaii Revised Statutes section 657-31 supplies a twenty-year limitations period, and Hawaii courts require the claimant to prove open, continuous, and adverse use for that full period on land that is otherwise capable of prescription. Hawaii's land history adds complexity: many parcels trace to Land Court registration under the Torrens system, kuleana lots carved out of the Great Mahele, and ancient trails, all of which interact with prescriptive claims differently than on the mainland. A driveway or footpath dispute between residential neighbors is analyzed under ordinary prescriptive-easement principles, but disputes touching traditional gathering, access to the shoreline, or ancient trail corridors typically invoke separate doctrines, not the twenty-year private prescriptive framework.

What a claimant must prove in Hawaii

The claimant carries the burden of proving each element by clear and convincing evidence. Land registered in Hawaii's Land Court system carries additional protection against unregistered claims, so a claimant should confirm whether the burdened parcel is Torrens-registered before assuming an ordinary prescriptive theory will apply.

Open and notorious use

The use must be visible enough that an attentive owner would discover it, such as a maintained walkway, driveway, or fence line rather than occasional unmarked foot traffic.

Continuous use for twenty years

The use must persist in the manner ordinary for the claimed easement throughout the full statutory period without an effective interruption.

Adverse use under claim of right

The use must be inconsistent with the owner's title rather than a revocable accommodation, and permission from a current or prior owner defeats this element while it lasts.

A private prescriptive claim distinct from Native Hawaiian rights

A claimant relying on long personal or family use should not conflate that use with constitutionally protected traditional and customary practices, which rest on different historical and cultural proof rather than the twenty-year statute.

What can break the claim

Assuming that land registered in Hawaii's Land Court is subject to an unregistered prescriptive claim in the same way as ordinary recorded title; Torrens registration limits some prescriptive theories.
Treating decades of family or community access to a trail or shoreline path as an ordinary prescriptive easement when the stronger and more relevant doctrine may be traditional and customary practice under the Hawaii Constitution and case law, which has separate proof requirements.
Overlooking that permission, including informal permission tied to plantation-era or family arrangements common in Hawaii's land history, defeats adversity for as long as it continues.
Failing to identify a definite, described route, since a court must be able to fix the location and width of the right it recognizes.

Worked homeowner example

A footpath used for twenty-two years to reach a taro patch

Facts: A family has crossed a neighboring parcel for twenty-two years to reach a small taro patch it has cultivated, without ever asking permission, though the family also asserts a cultural connection to the practice.

How the rule applies: Twenty-two years clears the statutory calendar for an ordinary prescriptive easement if the crossing was open, continuous, and adverse. But if the family's claim rests substantially on customary and traditional practice tied to Native Hawaiian rights rather than an individual assertion of a private right, the correct legal framework, evidentiary showing, and available relief differ from the prescriptive-easement statute.

Practical next step: Separate the two theories early, gather dated evidence of the specific route and use, and identify whether the land is Land Court registered before assuming which doctrine actually fits the facts.

A published Hawaii example

Tanaka v. Mitsunaga (43 Haw. 119 (Haw. 1959))

Neighbors owning adjoining Honolulu lots disputed a claimed easement over a shared concrete driveway that extended partly onto each parcel, after the servient owner blocked the disputed portion.

Outcome: The Hawaii Supreme Court affirmed denial of the claimed easement, concluding the evidence did not establish that the driveway use over the disputed strip was adverse rather than a use consistent with common ownership history and mutual accommodation among the parcels.

Why it matters: Shared driveways with a common history of ownership require particularly careful proof that later use became adverse, since continued convenience after a common source of title can look permissive rather than hostile.

Read the published decision

The Hawaii law in its own words

Hawaii writes the rule into its code at Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-31. Read the operative sentence closely: the language a court applies is the statutory language, not a summary of it, and small phrases such as "under a claim of right" or "paid all the taxes" decide real cases.

“No person shall commence an action to recover possession of any lands, or make any entry thereon, unless within twenty years after the right to bring the action first accrued.”
Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-31 · checked 2026-09-07

Open Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-31

Recording an easement in Hawaii

Hawaii records at the Registrar, State Bureau of Conveyances: Hawaii records centrally, not by county. A flat per-document fee set by the Bureau of Conveyances: about $36 for a document up to 50 pages and $101 for longer instruments. See the fee authority.

Hawaii land is recorded either in the Bureau of Conveyances, for regular system land, or in the Land Court, for Torrens-registered land, and a title search should identify which system applies before an easement is drafted. A negotiated easement should be recorded against both the benefited and burdened parcels with a legal description tied to a certified survey, since Hawaii's mixed regular and Land Court recording systems can otherwise leave an easement unindexed against the correct title.

Primary sources for this guide

Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-31 - Hawaii's twenty-year prescriptive period
Haw. Rev. Stat. Ch. 502 (Bureau of Conveyances); Ch. 501 (Land Court) - Hawaii Bureau of Conveyances and Land Court recording

Need the document itself? Follow the step-by-step records walkthrough to pull the recorded easement on your parcel from free county, state, and federal sources.

How Hawaii compares with the rest of the country

Hawaii runs a longer clock than most of the country: 20 years against a 15-year national median, so use that started recently is unlikely to have ripened into a prescriptive right yet. 21 states in total use a 20-year period. Nationally the periods run from 5 to 30 years, and 27 states are quicker than Hawaii.

Easements you actually see on Hawaii title work

Across the Hawaii counties we publish guides for, these are the exceptions that show up most often in Schedule B: Access easements serving kuleana parcels, Drainage easements across steep valley lots, Hawaiian Electric and Board of Water Supply easements, Shoreline and public beach access easements. The recorded instrument controls the width and location. A plat note or a county parcel viewer is only a starting point.

County-by-county recording rules in Hawaii

Easements are recorded county by county, and the filing rules are set by the office that takes the document. Not by the state. Open a county to see who records there, how that office structures its fees, what makes a document get rejected, and where the free official index and parcel viewer live.

Look up Hawaii county records to jump straight to a county page with its recording rules, typical strip widths in feet, and the steps for disputing an easement.

Browse free Hawaii easement records and parcel GIS sources

Hawaii easement questions

Read the official Hawaii code Estimate the value impact Check a property in Hawaii

Common questions from homeowners

Related terms

prescriptive easement

easement by necessity

right of way

encroachment

General educational reference only. Prescription periods and their exceptions change, and several states set the period by case law rather than by statute. Read the linked official code and consult a licensed attorney in that state before relying on any of it.