Drive down SW 172nd Street on the south side of Three Tree Point on a summer afternoon and you will see what looks like a settled arrangement between land and water. Flags fly over beach cabanas. Detached garages sit steps from the tideline. Patios and low bulkheads mark off what every owner along that narrow stretch treats as their private beachfront yard, the kind of amenity that justifies the price tag on a Puget Sound listing.

The City of Burien disagrees with that arrangement, and has for years.

According to reporting from The B-Town Blog, the city's public works leadership considers the beach cabanas, detached garages, and other permanent structures on the south side of Three Tree Point to be sitting inside an 80-foot public street right-of-way, not on private land. In August 2021, Burien's city council authorized a letter to roughly 40 addresses along that boulevard stating the city's position plainly: it retains an interest in using the full width of that right-of-way, and any owner who wants to avoid liability for something that happens on that strip should remove the obstruction voluntarily. A KING 5 segment covered the same standoff, describing homeowners at odds with the city over the beach-front structures they had assumed were theirs.

This is not a story about erosion, or about which municipality holds jurisdiction over which end of the point. It is narrower and, for a buyer or seller on this specific street, more consequential: a chunk of what the market prices as private waterfront yard may not legally belong to the house at all.

What the city says you don't actually own

Burien's letter did not treat this as ambiguous. The city's position is that the 80-foot right-of-way along SW 172nd Street is a dedicated public street, not an easement subject to interpretation, and that structures built inside it without authorization are encroachments the city can order removed. Some of these cabanas and garages have stood for decades, which is part of what makes the dispute so unresolved. The city has acknowledged the structures predate any current enforcement push, and has declined to say what specifically triggered the 2021 letter after years of the same structures sitting in place.

There is a legal path to legitimacy. Burien's code allows a right-of-way use permit, and the city's letter specified that any cabana seeking approval would likely need what the code calls a Type F permit, one of six right-of-way use permit types the city recognizes. The catch is in the fine print: a Type F permit can be revoked whenever the city requests removal, and it makes the property owner responsible for any injury or loss connected to the structure for as long as it stands. According to the same reporting, the city has issued plenty of other right-of-way permits to owners along SW 172nd Street over the years. It has issued close to none of the Type F permits that would actually cover a beach cabana.

That gap between "there is technically a permit for this" and "the city almost never grants it" is the part a listing photo cannot show you.

One resident who has lived along the street for more than two decades put the dispute in blunter terms, telling The B-Town Blog that "they have been trying to build a case that they have a claim to this property." Whether that reading is fair or not, it captures why this has stayed unresolved. Neither side has forced a resolution, which means the legal status of these structures is still open on the day any given offer gets written.

Why the median price doesn't show you this

Three Tree Point trades like its own micro-market inside Burien, and the numbers back that up. As of July 2026, the median home sale price on Three Tree Point sat between roughly $1,335,000 and $1,374,500, with homes typically going pending in 33 to 36 days, well ahead of national norms. That pace and price band reflect a place where waterfront and view comps follow their own logic rather than a citywide average.

None of that pricing distinguishes between a lot where the fenced yard, cabana, and bulkhead are unambiguously part of the parcel and a lot on SW 172nd Street where some of that same square footage sits inside a right-of-way the city has twice, years apart, asserted its authority over. An appraiser working from tax parcel lines and a buyer walking the property with an agent may both be looking at the same fence line and drawing different conclusions about what is actually being conveyed.

This is the piece worth sitting with before writing an offer on this specific block. The comps tell you what similar houses sold for. They do not tell you whether the deck you are counting as outdoor living space is standing on land the seller has the right to sell.

What to actually ask before you write an offer

If you are looking at a property on the south side of Three Tree Point along SW 172nd Street, a few questions belong in your due diligence before the inspection period closes, not after:

1. Does the seller have a right-of-way use permit for any cabana, garage, patio, or bulkhead on the beach side of the street, and if so, is it a Type F permit or one of the more routine types the city grants more freely?
2. Has the property received any correspondence from the City of Burien referencing the right-of-way, the 2021 letter, or a request to remove or modify a structure?
3. Does the title report or survey show the parcel boundary running to the water, or does it stop short of some or all of the structures you are seeing on a walkthrough?
4. Is there a homeowner's insurance policy in place for the structures in question, and does it address liability for something happening in a right-of-way rather than on private land?

A title company and a real estate attorney familiar with Burien's municipal code are the right people to answer these with certainty. An agent's job on this street is knowing to ask the questions before the clock starts running on an inspection contingency.

What this means if you're the one selling

If you own a home along this stretch and are considering listing, the smartest move is to get ahead of the question rather than let a buyer's attorney raise it during due diligence. That means pulling any correspondence you have received from the city, checking whether a right-of-way use permit exists for structures on your property, and being ready to disclose what you know rather than let a buyer discover it through their own research. Burien's code compliance office handles these questions directly and can tell you where your specific address stands.

None of this makes a Three Tree Point listing on SW 172nd Street a bad opportunity. The point remains what it has always been: a quiet, low-turnover corridor with direct water access and views that draw buyers from across the region. It does mean that on this particular street, the paperwork matters as much as the photos, and a seller who handles that proactively tends to have a smoother path to closing than one who waits for a buyer's attorney to find it first.

FAQ

Does this right-of-way dispute affect the whole Three Tree Point neighborhood? No. Based on current reporting, the dispute is specific to the south side of SW 172nd Street, the stretch between that road and the water where the beach cabanas and detached garages sit. It is not a jurisdictional issue affecting the broader point.

Has the City of Burien actually ordered any structures removed? As of the most recent reporting, the city had sent its letter and asserted its position but had not announced a wave of removals. The dispute remains open, which is exactly why a buyer or seller on this street needs current information rather than assumptions based on how long the structures have stood.

Can a buyer get a Type F permit after closing if the seller never applied? That is a question for the city's code compliance office and a real estate attorney, since the permit is tied to the structure and the right-of-way rather than automatically transferring with a sale. Confirming the status before closing is far simpler than sorting it out afterward.

If you are looking at a property on this stretch of Three Tree Point, or you own one and want a clear-eyed read on how this affects your listing strategy, Michelle Codd Homes can walk the parcel with you, pull the right questions together, and make sure nothing about your beachfront yard surprises you at closing.