Amenities: a common scheme is not a grant

This is the holding that matters most to New Hampshire associations, and the Court stated it in two sentences.

"While our cases recognize that a common scheme of development may give rise to enforceable equitable servitudes … they do not recognize the creation of a right of use arising from the existence of a common scheme of development."

And, closing the door on the argument even if the factual premise were granted: "Even if the plaintiff were able to establish that Lot 3 was intended to be part of a common scheme of development together with the lots shown on the 1959 subdivision plan, the existence of such a common scheme of development would not grant Lot 3 an implied easement for the use of the defendant's property."

The doctrinal point, stated as a category-level rule: a common scheme of development is a sword for restrictions. It is what lets one owner enforce a setback or a use limitation against another when the paperwork is imperfect. It is not a source of affirmative rights to use somebody else's land.

Prescription: not available on these facts

The Court affirmed summary judgment for the Club on the prescriptive-easement claim. The plaintiff could not identify any prior owner of the lot who had used the beach adversely for the full twenty-year period.

That is the practical answer to the argument boards hear constantly — "everyone in the neighbourhood has always used it." In New Hampshire that is not a legal theory on its own. It has to be packaged as prescription and proved, owner by owner, across twenty continuous years of adverse use.

What this changes for a New Hampshire board

It gives boards an on-point, precedential decision for the recurring problem of lots added to a development after the original subdivision claiming the same amenity rights as the original lots.

The Court's analytical sequence is the one that applies to a board:

First, what does the deed say? An express grant ends the inquiry. The 1959 lots here had one.

Second, what plan does the deed reference, and what is drawn on it? A plan reference implies an easement in the roads shown on that plan — and note the limit: the roads on the 1972 plan, not on the 1959 plan. The implication follows the plan the deed actually names.

Third, is there anything else? Common scheme does not supply amenity rights. Long use does not, unless it satisfies prescription.

Two operational consequences follow. The deed and the referenced plan are what a board denying amenity access can point to, along with a record of having done so — the Club's 2002 and 2015 statements that the lot "never had beach rights" are the kind of contemporaneous record that matters. And a board's ability to control its roads is no measure of its ability to control its beach; the decision treats them differently on purpose.

A citation correction

At least one New Hampshire law-firm write-up cites this case as 2026 N.H. 6. That is a different case. The opinion's own caption reads "Martin v. Far Echo Harbor Club, 2026 N.H. 9."

What to watch next

The remand. The Court reversed on the roads and affirmed on the beach, so what returns to the trial court is the scope of the road easement rather than the existence of it.

More broadly, this is the only decision in the window squarely about a New Hampshire common-interest community. Across all 88 New Hampshire Supreme Court opinions issued between January 2025 and September 2026, there is no decision construing the Condominium Act, RSA 356-B. The most recent remains Moda v. Fernwood at Winnipesaukee Condominium Association, 2024 N.H. 65, decided November 26, 2024.