## Facts

- A common grantor owned all relevant land and, in 1940, conveyed a large tract that later became the airport property, leaving a small parcel (about 0.8 acres) retained and landlocked.
- The parties agreed that the 1940 severance created an implied common-law way of necessity over the conveyed tract to benefit the landlocked parcel.
- The retained parcel was later conveyed to successors, and H & F Land, Inc. acquired it in 1992.
- No notice of the claimed way of necessity was recorded in the public records, and the easement was not asserted by actual use during the ensuing decades.
- In 1996, H & F sued for a declaration recognizing a common-law implied way of necessity over the adjacent airport property.
- The airport owner sought summary judgment, arguing the Marketable Record Title to Real Property Act (MRTA) extinguished any such unrecorded, unasserted easement after 30 years.
- The trial court granted summary judgment to the airport owner; the intermediate appellate court affirmed and certified a question to the Florida Supreme Court.

## Issues

1. Whether MRTA applies to a common-law implied way of necessity arising from a prior severance of title.
2. Whether MRTA extinguishes an otherwise valid way of necessity when the claimant neither records a notice nor asserts the easement within MRTA’s 30-year period.
3. Whether any statutory exception prevents MRTA from barring an unrecorded implied way of necessity.

## Decision

- The Florida Supreme Court answered the certified question yes and approved the summary judgment for the airport owner.
- The Court held that statutory and common-law ways of necessity are interests in land subject to MRTA.
- Because the claimed way of necessity was not preserved by recording a statutory notice of claim and did not fall within an MRTA exception, MRTA extinguished the easement.

## Legal Principles

- MRTA confers marketable record title after 30 years, cutting off interests and claims depending on events predating the root of title unless preserved or excepted by statute.
- A common-law implied way of necessity is an interest in land that arises from a title transaction (the severance creating dominant and servient estates) and can be extinguished under MRTA.
- The MRTA exceptions for interests not barred apply only as specified by statute; courts will not create additional exemptions for equitable reasons.
- An unrecorded interest may be preserved by timely recording a notice of claim under MRTA; failure to do so allows the interest to be extinguished.

## Conclusion

MRTA applies to common-law implied ways of necessity, and an otherwise valid way of necessity is extinguished if it is neither preserved by timely statutory notice nor protected by an express statutory exception within MRTA’s 30-year period.


H & F Land, Inc. v. Panama City-Bay Cnty. Airport & Indus. Dist., 736 So. 2d 1167 (Fla. 1999)