[WSBARP] House built, blocks PC's view - practical recourse

[Ray Cleaveland]

Tom,

Without some kind of height-restricting easement, your guy may be out of luck. The encroachment case that Mr. McIntosh may be referring to is out of Skamania county. Proctor v. Huntington, 146 Wn. App. 836, 192 P.3d 958 (2008). Guy mistakenly built his house over the line. The court made him compensate for the encroachment rather than tearing his house down… alas, equity triumphs over law once again.

Thank you,
Ray

From: wsbarp-bounces at lists.wsbarppt.com <wsbarp-bounces at lists.wsbarppt.com> On Behalf Of Tom Lee
Sent: Friday, January 06, 2023 12:37 PM
To: WSBA Real Property Listserv <wsbarp at lists.wsbarppt.com>
Subject: [WSBARP] House built, blocks PC's view - practical recourse

Hello Braintrust,

PC has a neighbor building a house which is only about 7 feet away from PC's property lot line. The covenants clearly state that the building setback must be 20 feet from all lot lines. Worse, Neighbor's home construction has completely blocked PC's view of the Columbia River - PC bought his house for the river view. PC feels the situation has devalued his house and property as a whole.

Does anyone have practical legal advice on how to address this situation? Given the neighbor's house is already built, I am worried about just jumping into a lawsuit because I am wary about the court granting relief for what the PC probably wants, which is for the neighbor to tear down his house.

Thoughts?

Best,
Tom

--

TOM LEE

Attorney

R. THOMAS LEE, PLLC | Attorney and Counselor at Law | A Professional Limited Liability Company

Direct: 425-219-6736

rtl at rtleelaw.attorney<mailto:rtl at rtleelaw.attorney> | website: www.rtleelaw.attorney<http://www.rtleelaw.attorney>

This E-Mail message and any documentation accompanying this transmission may contain Attorney Work Product, privileged, and/or confidential information and is intended solely for the addressee(s) named above.  If you are not the intended addressee/recipient, you are hereby notified that any use of, disclosure, copying, distribution, or reliance upon the contents of this E-Mail message and/or attached documentation is strictly prohibited and may result in legal action against you.  Please reply to the Sender advising the Sender of the error in transmission and immediately destroy the message and any accompanying documents.  Thank you.

CONFIDENTIALITY NOTE: This transmission may contain information belonging to the sender that is confidential and/or legally privileged. The information is intended for the use of the individual or entity to whom it is addressed. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or the taking of any action in reliance on the contents of this information is strictly prohibited. If you have received this transmission in error, please delete it immediately and notify us by telephone of the error so we may correct our records. IRS CIRCULAR 230 DISCLOSURE: To ensure compliance with Treasury Department and IRS regulations, you are informed that unless expressly indicated otherwise, any federal tax advice contained in this communication (including in any attachments) is not intended or written by Martin Burns or Burns Law, PLLC to be used, and cannot be used by the taxpayer, for the purpose of (i) avoiding penalties that may be imposed on the taxpayer under the Internal Revenue Code or (ii) promoting, marketing, or recommending to another party any transaction or matter addressed herein or in any attachments.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/wsbarp/attachments/20230106/b74c93a4/attachment.html>