4.6.5.2. Lands Encumbered by Easements.In federal acquisitions of property already encumbered by an easement, the appraiser must value the property in light of the preexisting easement—and not as an unencumbered fee.899 As the Supreme Court held: 

[T]he Constitution does not require a disregard of the mode of ownership—of the state of the title. It does not require a parcel of land to be valued as an unencumbered whole when it is not held as an unencumbered whole. It merely requires that an owner of property taken should be paid for what is taken from him. It deals with persons, not with tracts of land. And the question is what has the owner lost,? not What has the taker gained?900 

As a result, it is improper to disregard preexisting encumbrances and their impact on the property, as “there is ‘no justice in (requiring the Government to pay) for a loss suffered by no one in fact.’”901 In a total acquisition of property encumbered by a preexisting easement, the measure of compensation is the market value of the property as encumbered.902 In a partial acquisition of property encumbered by a preexisting easement, the measure of compensation is the difference between the market value of the property as encumbered before the acquisition, and the market value of the remainder property—subject to the preexisting and newly acquired easements—after acquisition.903 Regarding an appraiser who misunderstood the nature and extent of the interests being acquired and failed to consider preexisting encumbrances, one court held, “his appraisals and estimates of damage are largely, if not entirely, based upon unwarranted and unjustified theories of law and assumptions of fact and, as such, must be completely rejected . . . .”904 

Appraisals must “take into account all encumbrances on the land” as the question is “the fair market [value] of what the [landowners] had left . . . .”905 Depending on the nature of the preexisting and newly acquired easements, the difference in market value may be nominal.906 172