## Facts

- Plaintiffs held record title to Lot 1407; defendants owned adjacent Lot 1408 in a lakefront planned development.
- A survey stake mistakenly placed the boundary so that both sides believed a strip of Lot 1407 belonged to Lot 1408.
- Relying on the mistaken marker, defendants’ predecessors improved and used the strip by installing a sidewalk, sprinkler system, poplar trees, and lawn, and used the sidewalk for access to a deck and dock.
- Property taxes were assessed by lot number; the disputed strip remained part of Lot 1407 on the tax rolls.
- On stipulated facts, the trial court quieted title to the disputed strip in plaintiffs, finding defendants’ possession not hostile and that defendants had not paid taxes on the disputed land.
- Defendants appealed, asserting title by adverse possession and, alternatively, a prescriptive easement.

## Issues

1. Whether occupation of a neighboring strip under a mistaken belief about the boundary can satisfy the “hostile” element of adverse possession.
2. Whether the adverse-possession tax-payment requirement is met when the claimant pays taxes assessed on the claimant’s lot number but not on the record owner’s lot number that includes the disputed strip.
3. Whether defendants established a prescriptive easement based on their use of the sidewalk and landscaped strip.

## Decision

- The California Supreme Court affirmed the judgment quieting title in plaintiffs.
- The court clarified that a boundary mistake does not, by itself, defeat hostility if the occupier intends to claim and use the occupied land as the occupier’s own.
- Defendants nevertheless failed to prove adverse possession because they did not satisfy the statutory requirement of paying all taxes levied and assessed on the disputed land for the statutory period.
- The court also rejected defendants’ claim of a prescriptive easement over the disputed area.

## Legal Principles

- Adverse possession by claim of right requires actual, open and notorious, continuous and uninterrupted possession for the statutory period, hostility under claim of title, and payment of all taxes levied and assessed on the disputed land for the statutory period.
- “Hostility” does not require intent to dispossess a known true owner; it is met when the occupier claims the land as the occupier’s own and possesses inconsistently with the owner’s rights, even if the occupier is mistaken about the true boundary.
- The tax-payment requirement is a strict statutory condition: paying taxes assessed on the claimant’s own parcel does not satisfy the requirement for land assessed as part of another parcel.
- A prescriptive easement requires open, notorious, continuous, and adverse use for the statutory period; the court declined to recognize an easement on these facts.

## Conclusion

The court left title to the disputed strip with the record owners, holding that a good-faith boundary mistake can still be “hostile,” but adverse possession fails without strict proof that the claimant paid the taxes assessed on the disputed land, and no prescriptive easement was established.


Gilardi v. Hallam, 636 P.2d 588 (Cal. 1981)