My question involves real estate located in the State of: Florida
I live in a beachfront neighborhood in the Florida panhandle. In my subdivision we have several homes located right on the beach front which is a bluff overlooking dunes and a beautiful white sand beach; however, the majority of the homes are off the beach, located on streets extending North and away from the beach. The off beach homes have access to the beach at common property stairways.
The neighborhood subdivision was originally platted by a Florida land development company in 1948 after which another company, a real estate developer, marketed and sold all of the lots. I purchased one of the subdivision lots off the beach and built a home there 2 years ago.
I recently discovered that about 10 years ago some of the beach front owners began initiating quiet title lawsuits against the long since dissolved developer, whose corporate officers are deceased or very elderly. About half the beach front owners have now secured title to what was the public beach.
Some of those very same owners have more recently installed no trespassing signs on their beach front and are preventing people from setting up chairs, fishing, etc, in front of their homes.
I secured a copy of the original 1948 subdivision plat submitted by the land development company. The plat was filed and accepted by the County on October 6, 1948.
The plat clearly identifies and defines the all legal boundaries of the subdivision.
On the written legal description of the subdivision, the southern boundary of the subdivision is described as the “bluff line of the Gulf of Mexico”. On the plat each beach front lot has a fixed southern boundary that corresponds with the marked “bluff line of the Gulf of Mexico”.
This would indicate that the beach front lots at the time of the original platting did not include the beach, which extends beyond the bluff line. On this same plat the bluff line corresponds with the beach lot's southern property line. Their stairways, some seawalls and other infrastructure lie beyond that southern boundary.
As I mentioned before, the beach front owners acquired quiet title by suing the developer of the subdivision, but I am at a loss as to how the developer could have acquired any title to the beach since it was never part of the original platted subdivision whose boundaries should be the same for the developer. Was that fact conveniently overlooked?
I am not sure if anyone showed up at the quiet title hearing to represent the now dissolved developer corporation, but I am sure that nobody from the neighborhood was even aware of the lawsuits.
I am starting to think that the quiet title lawsuits were directed at a party that never had title to the property in question; almost a straw man kind of situation. Is that possible or common?
I am in the process of getting copies of the quiet title lawsuit documents/evidence so I can get a better handle on what happened. The neighborhood I live in consists of mostly out of state investment property owners, out of state second home owners and a few full time elderly residents. In other words, nobody is minding the hen house.

