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

15 years of open, notorious, continuous and adverse use is the period generally applied in Michigan, commonly cited to Mich. Comp. Laws § 600.5801. 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 Michigan, not just a right to cross it?

A prescriptive easement only creates a right of use after 15 years. You keep title. Ownership claims run through Michigan'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 Michigan?

Fifteen years of open, notorious, adverse, continuous use. Periods of successive users can be tacked together where privity exists.

Where are easements recorded in Michigan?

Easements are recorded at the county level. For the Michigan counties we cover that means Kent County Register of Deeds, Oakland County Register of Deeds, Wayne County Register of Deeds. 3 of those counties publish a free public parcel viewer you can check before you order title work.

Does a Michigan 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 15 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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Michigan prescriptive easement law

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

Michigan records with the Register of Deeds. Set by statute at MCL 600.2567(1)(a): a flat $30.00 to enter and record a document, whatever its page count.

Mich. Comp. Laws § 600.5801

Prescriptive period

15 years

What actually decides a claim here

Fifteen years of open, notorious, adverse, continuous use.
Periods of successive users can be tacked together where privity exists.

The rule that matters most

Michigan lets successive users tack their periods of use together when privity of estate exists between them, so a claimant can often combine a predecessor's years of driveway or path use with the claimant's own to reach the fifteen-year total.

Michigan requires fifteen years of open, notorious, adverse, and continuous use to establish a prescriptive easement, a period drawn from the general real-property limitations statute, MCL 600.5801. Michigan courts frequently see these claims arise from shared driveways, lake-access paths, and boundary-area walkways between adjoining residential lots, often litigated alongside a closely related doctrine of acquiescence to a boundary line. Tacking successive owners' periods of use is a well-established feature of Michigan practice, provided the claimant shows privity, typically through a conveyance connecting the predecessor's and successor's interests in the benefited land.

What a claimant must prove in Michigan

The claimant must prove each element, and Michigan's courts of appeals have made clear that the burden of persuasion stays with the claimant throughout trial, even though the burden of coming forward with rebuttal evidence can shift to the owner once a sufficient prima facie showing is made.

Open and notorious use

The use must be sufficiently visible that a reasonably attentive owner would discover it, such as a worn driveway strip or a maintained path to a dock.

Adverse use

Michigan measures adversity by whether the use occurred without seeking or receiving permission, in a manner that would support a trespass, nuisance, or interference claim if brought by the owner.

Continuous use for fifteen years

The use must persist through the statutory period, though Michigan permits tacking of a predecessor's use where privity of estate connects successive claimants.

A defined, identifiable use or route

The claim must attach to a specific driveway, path, or other ascertainable use rather than an undefined right to cross the servient parcel generally.

What can break the claim

A landowner who grants permission, even informally, defeats adversity for as long as that permission is understood to continue, a point Michigan courts have repeatedly emphasized in driveway disputes.
Claimants relying on tacking must show privity connecting their period of use to a predecessor's; simply occupying land once used by someone unrelated to the chain of title is not enough.
Michigan's acquiescence doctrine, which resolves boundary-line disputes through long recognition of a line, is a distinct legal theory from prescription and should not be conflated with it.
A shared lake-access easement can raise separate riparian-rights questions in Michigan that go beyond ordinary prescriptive-easement analysis and may require additional proof.

Worked homeowner example

A driveway strip used across three ownership changes

Facts: A homeowner has used a strip of the neighboring lot for a driveway for six years. The prior owner of the homeowner's lot used the same strip for eleven years before selling, without ever asking the neighbor's permission.

How the rule applies: Because Michigan allows tacking where privity of estate exists, the homeowner may be able to add the eleven years of the predecessor's use to the six years of personal use, potentially satisfying the fifteen-year period, provided the earlier use was itself adverse and the sale created the needed privity.

Practical next step: Obtain documentation of the prior owner's use, confirm the chain of title establishes privity, and evaluate whether the original use began with or without permission before treating the driveway as a secured right.

A published Michigan example

Killips v. Mannisto (244 Mich. App. 256, 624 N.W.2d 224 (2001))

Neighbors disputed use of a triangular strip of land, titled to the defendant, that had been used since around 1975 as part of the plaintiffs' driveway, with the trial court granting the plaintiffs the right to use the strip under theories of prescription and acquiescence.

Outcome: The Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that the burden of persuasion remained on the plaintiffs throughout trial and that predecessors' acquiescence and use could be tacked onto the current owners' period to satisfy the fifteen-year requirement.

Why it matters: Michigan's tacking rule can rescue a claim that looks short on its face, but only where the chain of title and the character of the predecessor's use are carefully documented.

Read the published decision

The Michigan law in its own words

Michigan writes the rule into its code at MCL 600.5801. Applied to prescriptive easements in Marlette Auto Wash v. Van Dyke SC Props., 501 Mich. 192 (2018). 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 may bring or maintain any action for the recovery or possession of any lands or make any entry upon any lands unless, after the claim or right to make the entry first accrued...”
MCL 600.5801. Applied to prescriptive easements in Marlette Auto Wash v. Van Dyke SC Props., 501 Mich. 192 (2018) · checked 2026-09-07

Open MCL 600.5801. Applied to prescriptive easements in Marlette Auto Wash v. Van Dyke SC Props., 501 Mich. 192 (2018)

Recording an easement in Michigan

Michigan records at the Register of Deeds. Set by statute at MCL 600.2567(1)(a): a flat $30.00 to enter and record a document, whatever its page count. See the fee authority.

A written easement in Michigan should include a metes-and-bounds or survey-based legal description and be recorded with the register of deeds in the county where the property is located. Each county register of deeds sets its own current recording and page fees under state authorizing statutes, so verify the applicable schedule before filing.

Primary sources for this guide

Mich. Comp. Laws § 600.5801 - Michigan fifteen-year real-property limitations period
Mich. Comp. Laws § 565.451 - Michigan register of deeds recording statute

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 Michigan compares with the rest of the country

At 15 years, Michigan sits right at the national median, which is also 15 years. 8 states in total use a 15-year period. Nationally the periods run from 5 to 30 years, and 18 states are quicker than Michigan.

Easements you actually see on Michigan title work

Across the Michigan counties we publish guides for, these are the exceptions that show up most often in Schedule B: Backlot lake access and dock easements, Consumers Energy distribution and pipeline easements, County drain and open watercourse easements, Drain easements administered by the county, DTE Energy electric and gas easements, Great Lakes Water Authority and municipal sewer 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 Michigan

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 Michigan 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 Michigan easement records and parcel GIS sources

Michigan easement questions

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

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.