We made an offer and got countered and settled to a price we were comfortable with (let's say 400k to keep it round).
Our agent noticed the fence they replaced over the existing old one crossed over the neighbors property line (empty lot owned by investment. Apparently had email permission). An issue, but not a fatal one...
Through this we realized that the driveway was straight up not on the property. It was just re poured entirely in an abandoned city alley, the alley owned in undivided interest by all abutting property owners (4 in total for alley). The entire left side of the property (10ft) is the shared alley, which the seller fenced in and poured driveway on as part of the property.
This annoyed me because the driveway and ability to avoid street parking in a gentrifiying area was a selling point, along with the privacy fence. Now the entire left side of the property could be subject to claims by four other properties if they wanted to contest our fence crossing the alley, parking cars there etc. This alley section runs right against the house,though the alley is entirely overgrown and just absorbed into everyone's property lines. My worry is future renovation will uncover this latent issue and a property owner could be a dickhead about it.
How much should this devalue the property? It is an issue that likely will never arise during use of home, but the next buyer should discover it if they look. 5%? 10%? We really love the house and it is frustrating to had to pull the offer over a technical issue I likely only valued because I'm an attorney. Also frustrating because an unsavvy buyer who comes along could easily just breeze past this issue and offer well above what it's worth with this issue.
Here's lot and alley in question https://imgur.com/a/4HN0clq
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source https://www.reddit.com/r/RealEstate/comments/cy50x8/survey_reveals_fencedriveway_not_on_property/
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