[NH Red]

Lost an inherited building lot because of squatters rights. Grandmother let the neighbors use half the lot for a driveway for 30 years. My grandmother passed and the lowlife neighbors claimed it was theirs.

[Alberta's Child]

That’s exactly the type of situation adverse possession (“squatter’s rights”) laws are designed for. No offense to your grandmother, but anyone who gives a neighbor free use of a piece of property without a lease agreement or contract in place probably isn’t suited to own property in the first place.

It’s kind of odd to see so many people weighing in here about the sanctity of property rights — and then applying this standard to cases where property owners didn’t care much about it at all.

[SgtHooper]

Generally, your granny allowing them to use it, would toll the rights in adverse possession from that very moment on. Unless she was NOT the true owner, or this is a weird jurisdiction. Something else happened here. Like granny dies, and new owner fails to watch for adverse possessors, and new owner loses the rights under AP.