Your property questions answered

Right of way blocked

We own a mid-terrace house in Dublin 7 that has been rented for a number of years. The house has rear access through a narrow lane. We are planning some major renovations to the kitchen and rear and have noticed that the house at the end of our terrace has extended at the back completely, blocking off the lane. Is it legal for someone to block a right of way? Could they have got planning and we missed the notice? Are we entitled to claim compensation for the extra inconvenience, mess and cost involved?

• An adjoining owner is not entitled to block a right of way. Whether they got planning permission or not is not the point. According to Rory O Donnell of O Donnell Sweeney solicitors, getting planning permission to build something does not affect the rights of the people who are entitled to use the right of way, it merely deals with the land use as far as the planning authority is concerned. O Donnell goes on to suggest that if someone finds a right of way that they are entitled to has been blocked, they should take legal action to enforce their right. Doing this is not as simple as it seems because the law relating to this area is quite complex.

A lot will depend on whether there is a formal grant of right of way in your deeds or whether the right of way was one established by use. Get your solicitor to look at your deeds and if you have a formal right of way in these you should get your solicitor to take the matter up with your neighbours.

You say that the house at the end of your terrace has extended and blocked off the lane. It is not clear whether they have just built walls extending their garden so as to block the lane or whether they actually erected a house extension on it. If your right of way was based on use, the position is less clear-cut. People who block rights of way usually claim that the right of way has been abandoned.

Your solicitor will need to go into all the facts to establish the situation. If the owner of an adjoining house has extended their garden to include a laneway and your right of way is very clear cut then it should be possible to have the lane reinstated. If there is a building on it, a court is less likely to order it to be removed but would be likely to award damages because a rear entrance is a valuable asset to a house, particularly when getting building work done.

House sale keeps falling through

People complain about gazumping all the time but we are selling our house and on two occasions the sale has fallen through because the people who put in an offer, and even paid a deposit, later pulled out. Is there anything we can do? The whole thing is very frustrating and is taking a very long time.

• There isn't really anything you can do. In a private treaty situation, potential buyers (and sellers) can pull out at any time right up to contracts being signed. People pull out of sales because deeds are not in order, planning permission for extensions are not in place or the price is too high in relation to other houses that come on to the market in the area. You can remedy these things but if they are pulling out because they've changed their minds, then really there's little you can do.