Can I Terminate An Easement For Violations

[erehrig]

I bought a home in NH with a U shaped driveway in March of 2006. Next to my home is a commercial building (with a family that also rents the apartment above the business) with no access to their back door which incidentally is not used for anything. They do have street front parking but the easement was in place before we owned the property to allow the tennants additional off-street parking. When we signed the lease we agreed to an easement that allowed parking up to 5 vehicles in an allocated area but also stipulated that they could not:

1. Block the driveway, and
2. They are required to enter through the northerly driveway and exit through the southerly driveway.

The main issue here is that the traffic pattern we have dictated is not being followed by the tenants next door and the driveway continues to be blocked. Not mentioned in the easement is common sense things like drive at safe speeds and do not litter on the property (which are both current issues for safety, aesthetics, and liability).

Written in to the easement is an out if the grantees pass away or if there is a transfer of the property.

My question(s) is (are):

Am I stuck here or can I take some sort of action? I have verbally explained the rules to the tennants and sent a letter containing a copy of the easement, a cover letter indicating what the tennants were doing in contrast to the easement, and picture evidence of several infractions. This was sent to the business, the family residing in the apartment, and the property owner in March 2007.

I believe the only thing we rec'd in return for this was payment of a transfer tax on the deed.

"The consideration for this easement is such that only minimum transfer tax is due."

Am I bound to this easement because the only written and agreed upon out was the death or passing of property clause?

Thank you in advance for any insight into this issue.

[lwpat]

This is a great post for why you should never grant an easement across your property. Unfortunately you are probably now stuck with it. I don't understand "signed the lease" when you first said you purchased the property. Have an attorney send them a letter stating that the next time the easement is bocked the vehicles will be towed.

[erehrig]

Sorry, bad wording. I did not mean lease. We purchased the property.

From your reply though I assume there is not much recourse even if the use of the easement is causing liability issues with the enter/exit wrong-way violations and excessive speeding through our residential driveway.