Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Re: prescriptive right of way ownership rights

You do not have "prescriptive rights" unless you have gone to court and have had that determined in a court of law--just because you have used a certain right of way for 30 plus years does not automatically give you a prescriptive easement. You have nothing to sell at this time. However, if you sell the property to which you hold title, and the next owner wants to go to court and have a legal determination of an easement by prescription over the right of way in issue, he can utilize those years you have made use of the right of way, if he chooses, to seek to quiet title to an easement.

Re: prescriptive right of way ownership rights

The previous answer won't necessarily lead you astray, but I would state it differently.

Your thirty years of constant use did and does give you a prescriptive easement to use the road for access purposes (assuming other conditions for prescriptive easement are met). The right is not personal to you, however; it attaches to your parcel and would be enjoyed by successive owners of your parcel if you sell. You cannot sell an easement separately from the parcel it benefits, and this is true whether the easement was obtained by express grant, reservation, prescription or otherwise. (Exceptions to the foregoing are conceivable, but uncommon).

Going to court to quiet title doesn't create any rights. It does, however, afford you the substantial protection of having a judge confirm those rights in a judgment that can be recorded, making future question or challenge much less likely and much more difficult; this will in turn enhance the marketability and value of the benefitted parcel.