Short answer. If the part you sold is the one now enclosed by land you kept, yes — and without being paid for it. The Code strips the usual indemnity where the enclosure was produced by a sale, exchange or partition between the same parties. Donation is the one case that runs the other way.
What the law says
Whenever a piece of land acquired by sale, exchange or partition, is surrounded by other estates of the vendor, exchanger, or co-owner, he shall be obliged to grant a right of way without indemnity.
Civil Code, Article 652 — Land Isolated by Sale, Exchange or Partition. Read the full provision →
The rule and why it is free
A compulsory right of way is normally bought: Art. 649 gives it only after payment of the proper indemnity. This article removes the price in one situation. Where land acquired by sale, exchange or partition, is surrounded by other estates of the vendor, exchanger, or co-owner, that person shall be obliged to grant a right of way without indemnity. The reason is simple: he made the enclosure. He drew the line, he took the money or the counterpart parcel, and he cannot charge again for the access his own subdivision destroyed.
Which direction the obligation runs
Read the article carefully, because it points at the transferor. It covers the piece that was transferred and is now hemmed in by what the transferor retained. Sellers who ask this question are usually worried about the opposite case — the portion they kept for themselves turning out to be the landlocked one. That situation is not covered by this free grant, and it runs into Art. 649's closing rule that the easement is not compulsory where the isolation is due to the proprietor's own acts. Subdividing your own land is exactly such an act.
Donation reverses the flow
The second sentence carves out the gratuitous case: in case of a simple donation, the donor shall be indemnified by the donee for the establishment of the right of way. The logic holds together. A seller was paid and can absorb the burden; a donor gave the land away for nothing, so making him fund the access too would compound the gift. The donee gets the way, but pays for it. Note that the article says simple donation, which is not every arrangement that people loosely call a gift.
Deal with it in the deed
Almost every dispute under this article is a drafting failure. When a lot is split, the deed should describe the access — where it runs, how wide, who maintains it — and it should be annotated on both titles so that a later buyer of the retained land takes with notice. If you are selling an interior portion, expect the obligation and price the sale knowing it exists. If you are buying one, do not accept a verbal assurance about the road; get it written into the instrument you register.
Related provisions
- Civil Code, Article 652 — Land Isolated by Sale, Exchange or Partition
- Civil Code, Article 649 — The Compulsory Right of Way