Court Opinion

ID: 9730927
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 15:28:30.023246+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:11.186665
License: Public Domain

SCHLEGEL, Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent.
I believe the majority has elevated a claim of acquiescence in a boundary line to the level of an adverse possession claim. Judging from the majority opinion, it appears that a party claiming a barrier (fence) as a boundary must positively assert to the party upon whose land the barrier encroaches that the barrier is a boundary. The majority implies such an assertion is necessary, even though the boundary claim — as evidenced by the fence — has existed for many more than ten years as prescribed by Iowa Code section 650.14 (1991).
It seems to me that the instant case is precisely the type of case intended by section 650.14. The fence was erected between lots 12 and 13 by a predecessor in title in 1962. The title was recognized as the boundary between these lots for all of the years the two predecessor owners held title to the land. The Platters were confronted with the fence when they purchased the land and considered it the boundary for the entire time they owned it. They testified they did not believe the fence was on the line; however, they did not do anything about it.
In other words, the Platters allowed the Harveys to believe the fence was the boundary and permitted the Harveys to care for the two or three feet of land erroneously included in lot 13, without saying anything to the contrary. The Platters cannot claim now, “[w]e didn’t have notice that the Harveys claimed the fence as the boundary.” Iowa Code chapter 650 (1991) and, specifically, Iowa Code section 650.14 (1991) were adopted to address the exact problem arising in the instant case. To rule as the district court did and as the majority has done is to render this provision meaningless. I would reverse.