In an important decision for owners of waterfront property, a divided Appeals Court panel has ruled in a case of first impression that where registered land expands by accretion, the owner need not return to court to separately register the accreted land. As a result, that land enjoys the same protection against adverse claims as the originally registered parcel.
In Brown v. Kalicki (pdf), the plaintiffs were owners of adjoining beach lots in Harwich, Massachusetts. The lots were registered in the 1920s and 1930s and each lot’s southern boundary was “Nantucket Sound.”
Over the ensuing decades, accretion caused the beach to expand seaward by some 350 feet. In 2011, the owners filed so-called “supplemental petitions” asking the Land Court to determine the sidelines of the expanded lots. Several Harwich residents intervened in those cases and objected, claiming they had acquired a prescriptive easement to use the beach. The status of the accreted land as registered – or not – was critical,
