Like many of my courses, this course on easements was suggested and inspired by one of my students. As I looked into the possibility of writing such a course, my first thoughts were “Will my students be interested in this subject?” and “How important is knowledge about easements to North Carolina (NC) brokers?”

I was surprised as I began reading about easements that very little about this subject taught to NC prelicensing students. Yet I receive a number of calls and emails from my students every year about transactions that had easement troubles—sewage easements, drainage rights of way, and the like. None of their easement problems were easy to resolve. I often had to go down the rabbit hole of research to help guide them about possible resolutions.

I was also surprised to find that easements were interesting! Well, maybe easements aren’t as interesting as what’s on Netflix, but brokers might find that knowing more about easements would help them in their next transactional encounter.

As a result of my delving into the subject of easements, I decided that these questions are the most relevant:

• What are easements?
• What are the various categories of easements?
• What are the differences between easements, rights of way, licenses and encroachments?
• What are the terms that attorneys use to describe easements?
• What are various uses for easements?
• How are easements created?
• How are easements terminated?
• How are easements discovered?
• How do contracts, deeds, and title insurance handle easements?
• What disclosure obligations do brokers have?