dispute with neighbour over our builder -help!

yasj

update:
Neighbour came back and apologised for her letter after reading my reply .
She feels she was being unreasonable and is willing to let our builders do the work on her roof and get it assessed after.
we now have decided that we are going to go ahead and give her the money as long as she knows that once she hires her own roofer, any problems that arise after with regards to that repair is not our responsibility.

Thanks all for your wise words-I love this forum!:A

As for that box of chocolates, I'm afraid thats going to take a bit of time .......

gordikin

Buy the chocs....and eat them yourself!

yasj

Buy the chocs....and eat them yourself!

By Jove-I sure will!:T

DVardysShadow

jamesb1239 wrote: »

Honestly DVardysShadow was there any need? I would expect somebody new to the forums to make a few mistakes, like i'm sure you did when you first started out.

To be completely honest somebody with over five thousand posts on the forum should understand and apply the forum etiquette a little better.

As yet, there seems to be no acknowledgement of the fact that cross posting can cause people to waste time composing an answer which has already been given. OP calls it an "annoyance" in quotes, which means he/she does not take it seriously.

AFAIAC, if applying forum etiquette means not pointing out the problems of crossposting, then I am not in favour of forum etiquette. I have been bitten too many times by this problem to care about holding back.

dickydonkin

CouponWoman wrote: »

You do have the right to go onto a neighbours property to do certain repairs, however if I am not mistaken you have to give written notice (if you have a difficult neighbour). Your neighbour cannot stop you if you need to do the repair to maintain your property.

I don't like my neighbour but when she needed some repairs to her extension the builders asked can they work from my side and I said yes as long as they cleaned up any mess.

If she is still difficult you might need to contact a solicitor, check your contents insurance as you might have legal expenses cover which will deal with it on your behalf.

If not you might find the local authority helpful.

Good luck

Couponwonan - we both have something in common - a very difficult neighbour.

I had a similar problem when constructing a small extension a couple of years ago.

I went to the council and explained that I would certainly be met with resistance despite having approval from the council to proceed and I wanted everything above board before going ahead.

They did however, mention the 'Party Wall Act' and advised me to notify her of the construction work as it would be taking place within 10 metres of her foundations (or something similar - I can't remember exactly).

She refused to allow my builders the very limited access required to her garden and she even got a solicitor involved.

Unfortunately, the solicitor was not up to scratch on the PW act and it transpired some aspects of the act did not apply to 'new structures' and I went ahead and sent a letter to the solicitor telling him he was incorrect (to which he agreed believe it or not).

The construction went ahead, however, to avoid confrontation, my builders were able to do the work without encroaching onto her property.

That did not stop the threatening phone calls to my wife when I was at work from someone purporting to be friends of my neighbour and suggested I don't go ahead with the construction to 'avoid harm'.

Obviously, the Police were called at this stage - and yes, she is a bit bonkers!

To cut a long story short, after some enquiries, you can legally force the issue in relation to access to neighbours properties to allow general maintenance and repair.

Unbelievably, last year her the joint in her gutter was leaking and she asked me if I could repair it and I could accesss her garden to do so:eek:!

I think you can guess the response!

mkaibear

dpassmore wrote: »

Couponwonan - we both have something in common - a very difficult neighbour.

I had a similar problem when constructing a small extension a couple of years ago.

I went to the council and explained that I would certainly be met with resistance despite having approval from the council to proceed and I wanted everything above board before going ahead.

They did however, mention the 'Party Wall Act' and advised me to notify her of the construction work as it would be taking place within 10 metres of her foundations (or something similar - I can't remember exactly).

She refused to allow my builders the very limited access required to her garden and she even got a solicitor involved.

Unfortunately, the solicitor was not up to scratch on the PW act and it transpired some aspects of the act did not apply to 'new structures' and I went ahead and sent a letter to the solicitor telling him he was incorrect (to which he agreed believe it or not).

The construction went ahead, however, to avoid confrontation, my builders were able to do the work without encroaching onto her property.

That did not stop the threatening phone calls to my wife when I was at work from someone purporting to be friends of my neighbour and suggested I don't go ahead with the construction to 'avoid harm'.

Obviously, the Police were called at this stage - and yes, she is a bit bonkers!

To cut a long story short, after some enquiries, you can legally force the issue in relation to access to neighbours properties to allow general maintenance and repair.

Unbelievably, last year her the joint in her gutter was leaking and she asked me if I could repair it and I could accesss her garden to do so:eek:!

I think you can guess the response!

I would hope that your response was "certainly" and do it with a smile.

After all, if you were a donkey about it then you have in future made the problem worse not better. If you've done something nice for her then there's at least the chance that next time she'll be reasonable.