When I bought my twelve acres, I was so fixated on soil texture and sun exposure that I completely ignored the road maintenance agreement covering the half-mile caliche easement leading to my property. The listing called it 'established access' and I read that as settled and fine. It was neither.
Three neighbors share that easement and there is exactly zero written agreement about who grades it, who pays for culvert repairs, or what happens when someone parks equipment across it during harvest season. I've spent more energy managing those relationships than almost anything else on this farm. One bad storm washed out a section and we nearly went to mediation over repair costs.
If you're buying rural land with shared road access, treat the road maintenance agreement with the same seriousness as water rights. Get it in writing before closing, not as a handshake after. 'Established access' in a listing means nothing without documented maintenance terms.
Anyone else discover that neighboring landowner relationships around shared infrastructure were the hardest part of rural ownership nobody warned them about?