Quimen vs. Court of Appeals

An easement of right of way shall be established at the point least prejudicial to the servient estate, even if it is not the shortest route, where the dominant estate is surrounded without adequate outlet to a public highway and the other requisites concur; thus a longer detour requiring only the cutting of an avocado tree was preferred over a shorter straight path requiring demolition of a store built of strong materials.

Anastacia Quimen together with her brothers Sotero, Sulpicio, Antonio and sister Rufina inherited a parcel in Pandi, Bulacan which they agreed to subdivide equally among themselves. The shares of Anastacia, Sotero, Sulpicio and Rufina abutted the municipal road, while the share of Antonio at the rear was designated Lot No. 1448-B-C and later divided into Lots Nos. 1448-B-6-A and 1448-B-6-B. Yolanda Q. Oliveros is the daughter of Sotero and niece of Anastacia and Antonio.

Anastacia Quimen's Lot No. 1448-B-1 lay at the extreme left abutting the municipal road, bounded on the right by Sotero's Lot No. 1448-B-2, with Lots Nos. 1448-B-3 and 1448-B-4 further to the right. Directly behind Anastacia's and Sotero's lots lay Antonio's share, divided into Lot No. 1448-B-6-A behind Anastacia and Lot No. 1448-B-6-B behind Sotero, each with an area of 92 square meters.

In February 1982 Yolanda purchased Lot No. 1448-B-6-A from her uncle Antonio through her aunt Anastacia, who was then acting as his administratrix. According to Yolanda, she was hesitant to buy because the lot had no access to a public road, but Anastacia prevailed upon her with the assurance of a right of way on her adjoining property for P200.00 per square meter. Thereafter Yolanda built a house on the lot and used as passage to the highway a portion of Anastacia's property, but when she finally offered to pay for the pathway Anastacia refused payment and thereafter barred her from passing.

In February 1986 Yolanda purchased Antonio's other lot, Lot No. 1448-B-6-B, located directly behind her parents' property. Her parents provided her a pathway gratis et amore between their house, extending about nineteen meters from Yolanda's lot behind Sotero's sari-sari store to Anastacia's perimeter fence. The store was made of strong materials and occupied the entire four-meter frontage, nine meters long, so that the municipal road could not be reached with facility without passing through the back entrance and facade of the store. Petitioner, for her part, denied promising a right of way over her own lot, claiming the agreement referred to Antonio's other lot under her administration when still unsold, and insisted passage through Yolanda's parents was more accessible than a detour cutting her avocado tree.

On 29 December 1987 Yolanda filed an action for right of way through Anastacia's property. Upon instruction of the presiding judge, the branch clerk conducted an ocular inspection and reported the proposed way at the extreme right of Anastacia's property facing the highway, starting from the back of Sotero's store and extending inward one meter then turning left about five meters to avoid the store in order to reach the road, unobstructed except for an avocado tree in the middle. The trial court itself found the lots purchased by Yolanda totally isolated from the highway with imperative need for an easement, yet dismissed for lack of cause of action on the ground that extending the existing straight pathway by removing the obstructing portion of the store was more practical, shorter, and less prejudicial.

• Disregard of Agreement: Petitioner argued that the Court of Appeals disregarded the parties' agreement, denying she promised a right of way over her own lot and claiming the understanding was to provide passage on Antonio's other lot under her administration when still unsold.
• Non-Abutting Servient Estate: Petitioner maintained that her property could not be burdened as servient estate because it does not abut or adjoin private respondent's property.
• Shortest Distance and Least Prejudice: Petitioner argued that the one-meter by five-meter detour is not the shortest access to the public road and is not least prejudicial, insisting passage through Yolanda's parents is more accessible and that cutting her avocado tree would cause substantial loss.
• Extinguishment by Merger: Petitioner argued that when Yolanda purchased Lot No. 1448-B-6-B in 1986, any easement was ipso jure extinguished by merger of ownership of dominant and servient estates in one person, leaving no compelling reason for a right of way as other surrounding lots were suitable.
• Income Loss: Petitioner maintained she derives net income of P600.00 per year from the avocado fruits and, with an average seventy-year lifespan, expects substantial earnings therefrom.

• Inducement by Assurance of Passage: Respondent alleged that even before purchase she was reluctant to buy because the parcels were enclosed with permanent improvements like a concrete fence and store and had no egress to the road, but was induced by defendant's assurance of a one-meter wide and five-meter long right of way at P200.00 per square meter from Anastacia's lot beside the concrete store to her father's land.
• Shortest, Most Convenient and Least Onerous: Respondent alleged that the claimed right of way is the shortest, most convenient and least onerous leading to the road and was used by her predecessors-in-interest from the very inception.

• Entitlement to Legal Easement: Whether private respondent is entitled to demand a legal easement of right of way through petitioner's property.
• Least Prejudicial Location: Whether the one-meter by five-meter passage through petitioner's property is the point least prejudicial to the servient estate although it involves a detour and is not the shortest straight route.
• Agreement and Merger: Whether the parties' alleged voluntary agreement or the subsequent purchase of the second lot bars or extinguishes the claimed easement.

• Entitlement to Legal Easement: Yes. All four requisites concurred — isolation without adequate outlet not caused by the dominant owner, willingness to pay indemnity, and least prejudice — so a compulsory easement lies under Articles 649-650.
• Least Prejudicial Location: Yes. Least prejudice prevails over shortest distance, so the longer route requiring only cutting an avocado tree was properly chosen over demolishing a store of strong materials.
• Agreement and Merger: No. The voluntary arrangement was rendered moot, having become a legal easement by necessity, and no merger extinguishing the easement was established on the facts found.

• Entitlement to Legal Easement: The requisites for a valid grant were satisfied on the evidence and ocular findings: the property was hemmed in by other estates including petitioner's, Yolanda offered P200.00 per square meter as agreed, she did not cause the isolation, and the way claimed was least prejudicial. The trial court itself declared the lots totally isolated with imperative need for egress, confirming the dominant estate's lack of adequate outlet to the highway.
• Least Prejudicial Location: Under Article 650, establishment is at the point least prejudicial to the servient estate and, insofar as consistent therewith, where distance to the highway may be shortest; judicial appreciation may thus adopt a longer way to avoid injury such as constructions or walls. Petitioner's own testimony admitted her brother used her property to reach the road because the store blocked the frontage and, according to Yolanda's father, there was no other way. As between demolishing a sari-sari store of strong materials occupying the entire frontage and cutting one avocado tree on an otherwise unobstructed detour, the latter causes least damage even if longer and not straight.
• Agreement and Merger: The asserted voluntary easement, which the record tended to support despite denial, no longer controlled determination because a legal easement by necessity constituted by law was established upon proof of the statutory conditions. Petitioner's merger theory and reliance on other surrounding lots failed absent proof of extinguishment under law and in light of the finding that the proposed route through her lot remained the least onerous, with appellate factual findings accepted absent glaring error.

• Easement; Right of Way — An easement is a real right on another's property, corporeal and immovable, whereby the owner must refrain from doing or allowing something to be done for the benefit of another person or tenement; it is jus in re aliena, inseparable, indivisible and perpetual unless extinguished by causes provided by law. A right of way in particular is a privilege constituted by covenant or granted by law to pass over another's property when the tenement is surrounded by realties belonging to others without adequate outlet to the public highway, demandable upon payment of proper indemnity.
• Requisites for Legal Easement of Right of Way — The conditions sine qua non are: (a) the dominant estate is surrounded by other immovables without an adequate outlet to a public highway; (b) the dominant estate is willing to pay the proper indemnity; (c) the isolation was not due to the acts of the dominant estate; and (d) the right of way claimed is at the point least prejudicial to the servient estate. Applied here, all four were found present from the complaint, testimony, and ocular inspection, entitling Yolanda to demand passage with indemnity.
• Least Prejudice Prevails Over Shortest Distance — Where the way is shortest and will cause least prejudice, that tenement shall be chosen; if the two circumstances do not concur in a single tenement, the way where damage will be least shall be used even if not the shortest route. Applied here, the longer detour over petitioner's lot avoiding a store of strong materials was preferred to the shorter straight path requiring its demolition, the avocado tree loss being the lesser injury.

• "IN EASEMENT OF RIGHT OF WAY that easement where the way is shortest and will cause least prejudice shall be chosen. However, if the two circumstances do not concur in a single tenement, the way where damage will be least shall be used even if not the shortest route." — States the governing choice-of-route test, with least prejudice prevailing over shortest distance.
• "The owner, or any person who by virtue of a real right may cultivate or use any immovable, which is surrounded by other immovables pertaining to other persons and without adequate outlet to a public highway, is entitled to demand a right of way through the neighboring estates, after payment of the proper indemnity." — Recites the statutory basis for compelling a right of way upon indemnity.
• "[t]he said properties of Antonio Quimen which were purchased by plaintiff Yolanda Quimen Oliveros were totally isolated from the public highway and there appears an imperative need for an easement of right of way to the public highway." — Records the trial court's own factual finding of isolation supporting entitlement despite its dismissal.

• Costabella Corporation vs. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 80511, 25 January 1991, 193 SCRA 333 — Cited with Locsin vs. Climaco, Angela Estate, Inc. vs. Court of First Instance of Negros Occidental, and Bacolod Murcia Milling Co., Inc. vs. Capitol Subdivision as authority for the four requisites of a valid grant of easement of right of way.
• Bernardo vs. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 101680, 7 December 1992, 216 SCRA 224 — Cited for the rule that the Supreme Court does not reweigh evidence, credibility, and surrounding circumstances where appellate findings have factual support.

• Art. 634, New Civil Code — Cited as basis that a right of way may be constituted by covenant or granted by law, supporting treatment of the claimed passage as a legal easement by necessity rather than merely voluntary.
• Art. 649, New Civil Code — Applied to entitle an owner of an immovable surrounded without adequate outlet to demand passage through neighboring estates after payment of proper indemnity, unless isolation is due to the proprietor's own acts; all elements were found satisfied here.
• Art. 650, New Civil Code — Applied to fix location at the point least prejudicial to the servient estate and, only insofar as consistent therewith, where distance to the highway may be shortest; justified preferring the longer avocado-tree route over demolishing the store.

Padilla, Chairman, Vitug, Kapunan, and Hermosisima, Jr., JJ., concur.