Role first
The map starts with your role because the same facts point to different doctrines depending on which side you are on. A servient owner facing an adverse use is usually in prescriptive-easement territory. A landlocked claimant is in necessity or implied-easement territory. A mid-purchase buyer is almost always looking at a recorded express easement. A utility-encroachment situation is a scope-of-easement question. A conservation prospect is on the voluntary-grant track.
Then your state, then one detail
Your state determines the prescriptive period and which statutory routes (way of necessity, private road, cartway) are available. The one detail question — how long the use has run, whether the parcel was severed, what the title commitment says — narrows the match to the most likely doctrine.
Why both paths, always
Every result offers a DIY procedural checklist and a free state-bar referral. We are an information hub, not a law firm, and we never trap a user into a paid referral as the only exit. The map points you to the doctrine and the procedure; a licensed attorney advises on your specific facts.