Not sure how to obtain an access route to land or a building? We explain the legal options in Slovakia — from an easement to a court solution and a practical step-by-step procedure.
Access to a property is a basic precondition for its proper and full use, and its absence in practice leads to disputes between owners of neighbouring parcels. Among the most frequent problems are cases where a property owner has no secured access to their land or building because a neighbour refuses to allow passage across their parcel. In this article, we address the two main areas of access: access to a building and access to land. The law provides different options for each of these situations, so it is important to distinguish between them.
Where access to a building is lacking, several legal solutions come into consideration; the choice depends chiefly on the specific circumstances of the case and on whether the owners concerned can (or cannot) reach agreement.
One option is to buy the part of the neighbouring parcel across which the access road is to run. This is a permanent solution offering a high degree of legal certainty, because ownership allows you to use the land fully without depending on the neighbour's will.
An easement-creation agreement is the most frequent way of resolving the situation. Concluding the agreement does not by itself bring the easement into existence. The easement arises only when the decision approving registration in the Land Registry (kataster) becomes final. The decision approving registration becomes final on the day it is issued. No appeal, no petition for a retrial, and no review outside appeal proceedings is available against a decision approving registration.
Access to a building can also be addressed through alternative contractual forms, for example by concluding a lease of part of the parcel or a gratuitous loan-for-use agreement, allowing temporary use of the access road. These solutions, however, offer a lower degree of legal certainty, since they do not create a right in rem attached to the property and depend on the will of the neighbouring parcel's owner, who may terminate them or decline to extend them. They make sense mainly where agreement is possible but creating an easement is unacceptable to the other side, or where a short-term, transitional solution is needed.
Where agreement between the owners is not possible, the creation of an easement can be sought by court decision. Standing to sue belongs to the owner of the building who seeks the creation of the easement. Creating the easement requires several conditions to be met cumulatively:
A right corresponding to an easement can also be acquired by adverse possession, where someone continuously and lawfully exercises the right for at least 10 years (e.g. crosses another's land over a long period and in good faith). The conditions are lawful possession, good faith, and that the subject matter is capable of being so acquired (i.e. it is not land that can only be owned by the state).
In cases where access to land is lacking (without any building), the options under the current legislation and case law are very limited, since a court may create a way of necessity only in favour of an existing building, not of the land itself. If the owners cannot reach agreement, the legal tools for securing access to land are severely limited.
Practically the only avenue is that owners of neighbouring parcels are obliged to allow entry onto their land, for the necessary time and to the necessary extent, where the maintenance or cultivation of the neighbouring parcels indispensably requires it. If damage results, whoever caused it must compensate it and cannot escape this liability. If entry is not allowed voluntarily, filing an action can be considered.
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