While having a real estate attorney is not a requirement when you buy a house, it can be a good idea. By hiring a real estate attorney, you can have someone there to help protect you and help you understand what you are getting yourself into. Among the things your attorney will do, looking into the easements and covenants of the home are several important steps that can be helpful for you.
What are easements?
An easement is a piece of land that is set aside for the purpose of certain things. If you are buying a house that has an easement, it means that you will own this piece of the property, yet other people will have access to use it. It's important to know about any easements on property you are buying, because it can help you plan for the use of the property. If a property has an easement that you did not know about, it might ruin the plans you had for that piece of property.
A common reason for an easement is to allow utility workers access to certain areas. For example, if there is a cellphone tower behind your home, there might be an easement there to allow the workers to get to this tower to perform work on it. Another good example of an easement is when there is a house that is landlocked behind another house. For the owner of the landlocked house to get to his or her home, there might be a driveway on the other person's property. This driveway would be considered an easement.
What are covenants?
If you have never owned a home in a neighborhood before, you may have no clue what covenants are. This too is an important thing to understand before you buy a home, because the covenants in the neighborhood might interfere with your plans.
Covenants that neighborhoods have are sets of rules and guidelines. In some cases, they can be very minimal, but there are other times when they are very strict. They may dictate what you can put in your yard, the maintenance you must do at your home, and the types of trees you can plant.
A real estate attorney can help you understand if the home you are buying has easements or covenants, but that is not all. To learn more about how a real estate attorney can help you while buying a house, contact one such as John M. Ogden.
