My neighbor is suing me and I think he is just plain extrorting money. Easment issue.

[machaiah]

We bought a piece of land to build our house in Contra Costa County east of San Francisco. This land "A" was part of a larger parcel which was subdived years ago in to parcel "A" and "B". B is now owned by my neighbor and when we purchased A we knew that there was a proposed driveway easement to parcel B through A. We approached neighbor and asked if he was willing to move the easement to the north end of our property line instead of it being in the middle of the property. We agreed to it and part of the agreement was for us to cut an old bar which is now 3 ft into the new easement.
However, now the county is telling us we cannot just cut the 3 ft because new setbacks will be effective and this means we have to cut it back 15 ft from new easment edge. We stand to loose the whole garage.
We are trying to resolve this matter with the county and we have no options but to tear it down. It took us a long while to figure that out.
Meanwhile neighbor is suing us for 350,0000 stating we did not abide by contract to cut barn by 3ft.

We could not as county would not issue us a permit.
We offered to go back to the old proposed easement and he now refuses.
We agreed to abandon an easement of which he never has a recoreded copy.

Where do we stand? Do I have a case to defend myself

Thanks
Regards
Frustrated with suing and money hungry neighbors

 

[lwpat]

You do not need to defend yourself. You need an attorney to properly file an answer or you will be in default. Easements are special and you need an attorney to review the paperwork. If your agreement with the neighbor was verbal, you have a complete bar due to the Statute of Frauds. If in writing you have a defense due to legal impossibility. Both have to be properly pleaded.