“In response to your query we are not willing to amend the mutually agreed upon, legally binding contract concerning our property easment”.
If questioned as to the motivation behind the response … we would not want to negotiate at the risk of being called “profiteers”.
Lawyer was just being their lawyer. The tactic was wrong and backfired. Obnoxious. First question is, do you want the traffic? Is this ROW (and a new house) far enough from your own home to matter little? Yes or no. If it won’t affect you, speak with a realtor, see how losing that strip of land could affect your property value, see what $$ makes sense to sell it for.
If it does affect you, no $$ is worth it. Not for you, Consolation. The neighbors can sell their home and leave this issue behind.
Of course, selling won’t help fin aid, lol.
@Consolation so I’m curious - any response from the sleazy lawyer after you said you are no longer interested?
I do like that your lawyer shared that email with you.
I sent an email to our lawyer this evening stating that our only motivation in considering the amendment was to be neighborly and helpful, and that our agreement would have no benefit whatever to us and in fact opened us up to potential harm, but that such consideration on our part was at an end after reading the other lawyer’s insulting and illogical email. I said we had no wish to incur further legal costs in a fruitless negotiation.
H predicts that their response will be to come back agreeing to our terms. I said, too bad, that offer is no longer on the table.He agreed.
When they bought the property and started putting the drive through our woods, neither they nor their contractor–also a local, one of his kids was in my S’s class–ever notified us in any way that they were going to start work on what is, after all, our land. I went over and talked to the guy who was clearing and said “what’s going on?”, after which we got a call from the contractor, then from the husband, eager to make amends. Later, he met us at the site and showed us what they were planning to do regarding the ROW. They really did want to have a small footprint, which I appreciate. The husband grew up in town, too. I didn’t expect anything other than someone dropping by or calling or whatever, introducing themselves, and saying they were planning to start work on the ROW on X date. In a neighborly and considerate manner. Not a big deal. Maybe I should have been forewarned, but he seemed like a nice guy,
I would also wonder how additional new houses will impact your property tax rates as well as the value of your house.
“H predicts that their response will be to come back agreeing to our terms. I said, too bad, that offer is no longer on the table.He agreed.”
Make sure your lawyer knows that and conveys that fact to your neighbor’s lawyer. Nip it in the bud in a way that allows no room for them to come back trying to agree to terms that are no longer on the table.
I must say that this scheme is a convoluted way of financing their children’s college education. Speculative as well. If they can fund or finance the construction of a new house why not just fund or finance the college tuition?
Consolation, Just to clarify in your post #63: Is the driveway they put in on property they purchased? If ithe driveway is on your property, that they have been using for their driveway, they could try to claim a prescriptive easement. Just checking to make sure that is not the case…
@jshain The driveway is on our property, but we granted an easement over a narrow strip along the edge to serve ONE house when our other neighbor was trying to sell the lot to settle his father’s estate and retain the rest of the land as one parcel. His land, BTW, is officially a “tree farm,” which is a Maine thing where you get a property tax break by keeping it undeveloped. He must have had to pay back property taxes when they subdivided those 4 acres.
@HarvestMoon1 , my understanding is that they wish to realize the capital from their current house and put some of it toward building a smaller house on the second lot, in order to reduce their living expenses going forward. They have several kids with the first wife (one of whom is special needs) and a much younger child from their own marriage. I think they are attempting to take the long view.
Consolation, I would specifically discuss prescriptive easements with an attorney that specializes in this. My parents had a similar situation with their next door neighbor who was using and maintaining my parent’s land for a couple of decades. My dad wanted to move his fence down slope to the side edge of his property. The neighbor (wife was a corporate attorney) sued my parents and (sort of) won! My parents could not reclaim their property during this neighbor’s lifetime. Neighbor wanted the prescriptive easement to be passed down to her heirs but the judge said no. It was a long (translated: expensive) legal fight.
Ugh, this kind of lawyer crap is why DH and I have an official office policy that we will never work for an attorney again. The only two times in 19 years of business that we’ve been threatened with litigation was when the clients were lawyers. 
And ANY unbiased person would have said the two accusations were totally groundless.
@jshain we already granted a legal easement over a specific strip of land with specific terms and it is legally registered. I don’t think we need to worry about the kind of situation you describe.
^Sounds like you buttoned everything up!
@Consolation any updates? For some reason this situation fascinates me.
Surprise, surprise, their lawyer came back with a somewhat apologetic letter and said they would meet our terms immediately.
From the looks of his letter, which says he didn’t intend for us to see the other one, and the higher ups in the firm cced on it, he may be in some degree of doo-doo. Deservedly.
We haven’t responded yet, but I plan to say no.
Stick to your guns!
The neighbor’s attorney did not think your attorney would show you his previous email to your attorney? Does he not think your attorney is going to represent YOUR best interests?
No, No, NO! Definitely, NO!
Deserves the doodoo if that is the case. A friend told me decades ago never to put anything in writing that I would not want someone to see or that could come back to haunt me. You’d think a lawyer would have at minimum that much sense.
Stuck to your guns. You kind of went against your instinctive reaction initially cause you were trying to be nice. The lawyer kind of did you a favor in a weird way :).
H*LL NO! You told them to stop communicating. Perhaps your attorney can say any further correspondence will be prince strewed as harassment and that you would expect no further contact from them on this matter, And that this is your final response.