Cases - Wheeldon v Burrows

Record details

Name

Wheeldon v Burrows

Date

[1879]

Citation

L.R. 12 Ch D 31

Keywords

Easement - rights of light - creation of easement by implied grant - continuous and apparent easements - easements of necessity - creation by implied reservation - whether the right to light was necessary for the reasonable enjoyment of the dominant property - whether a right to light had been acquired by implied grant - access to neighbouring land

Summary

This case concerned whether rights of light had been impliedly reserved by the vendor for the benefit of the land retained, not whether there had been an implied grant to a purchaser on a sale of land. However, Thesiger LJ in the Court of Appeal set out 2 general rules: one relating to implied grants and one to implied reservations. His rule in relation to implied grants has become known as 'the rule in Wheeldon v Burrows'. He stated the rule in these terms:

'on the grant by the owner of a tenement of part of that tenement as it is then used and enjoyed, there will pass to the grantee all those continuous and apparent easements (by which, of course, I mean quasi easements), or, in other words, all those easements which are necessary to the reasonable enjoyment of the property granted, and which have been and are at the time for the grant used by the owners of the entirety for the benefit of the part granted.'