Finding easements
How do I find out who owns an easement on my property?
Start with the grantee named in the recorded document, then trace assignments and corporate successors, the company on a forty-year-old grant is frequently not the company that holds it today.
The recorded instrument names the original grantee. Pull it by book and page from the county recorder, clerk, or register of deeds, and note the exact corporate name and the date.
Then look for assignments. Utility and pipeline easements change hands through mergers and asset sales, and the recorded chain in your county may be incomplete because corporate mergers are often filed elsewhere. State corporation records and public utility commission filings fill the gaps.
For an appurtenant easement, the holder is simply whoever owns the benefited parcel today, which the assessor's records will tell you. That is usually the fastest research task in easement work, and the one owners most often overcomplicate.
What this looks like in practice
Tracing a holder is a paper chase with two very different difficulty levels. Appurtenant easements are easy: the holder is whoever owns the benefited parcel today, and the assessor tells you that in a minute. Easements in gross can take days, because forty years of utility consolidation leaves gaps in the county record.
The shortcut that works surprisingly often is calling the utility that currently serves the area and asking their land services group to search by book and page. They maintain their own corridor records, and they generally know whether a legacy grant became theirs.
What to do next
- 1Get the recorded instrument and note the grantee's exact legal name and the recording date.
- 2Pull the recorded documents from the county recorder, clerk, or register of deeds, most offices provide a certified copy for a few dollars per page, and many publish a free online index.
- 3Search the grantor-grantee index under that company name for later assignments.
- 4If the trail goes cold, check state corporation filings and public utility commission records for successors.
What to look for
- The grantee's exact legal name and any "successors and assigns" language.
- Recorded assignments, mergers or memoranda referencing the original book and page.
- For appurtenant rights, the current owner of the benefited parcel in assessor records.
- Utility commission or state corporation filings when the named company no longer exists.
Questions people ask next
Why is the company on my easement no longer in business?
Because utility and telecom ownership consolidated heavily. The right survives the company through the "successors and assigns" language, so the corridor is held by whoever acquired the assets, even if no assignment was recorded in your county.
Can the title company tell me who holds it?
They can tell you what is recorded, which is the starting point rather than the whole answer. Anything beyond the recorded chain — corporate mergers, internal transfers, usually takes separate research.
Who holds a plat-dedicated utility easement?
Typically the providers serving the subdivision, and sometimes the municipality as dedicatee. There may be no single named holder, which is why permission requests go to each affected utility.
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.
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