To share or not to share?

hopesanddreams

Ok please help! We have recently moved into private rented accommodation and things have taken a turn for the worst....We have a 'shared driveway' and the neighbours are constantly blocking our car in. Had enough yesterday and asked (nicely i might add) them to please stop. Their reply was as we dont own our house but they own their property they have legal rights to park there and we do not..................What ???????????????????? When i mentioned that was a silly thing to say he said it was true and we shouldnt be parked there but they can. I should ring the letting agents to ask them but I'm not sure. I have looked at various land registry/boundary websites and seems to cost a lot of money to view who owns what. I obviously didnt want this to become a petty silly argument but that seems to be the case now. Any advice welcome.

:(:(:(:(

BitterAndTwisted

Park on the street

madhouseof4

We have a similar issue where we currently live, we own our home, next door is rented and we have a 3 way shared driveway. The previous tennants were constantly parking ON my front garden, right in front of my front door making it difficult to get out and always allowed visitors etc to pull up half across my actual drive (only the bottom half is shared). Drove me batty. We asked them nicely before speaking to the agents. After getting nowhere, I spoke with the lady who owns the house (she was my neighbour for years). It ended when they finally left. I never would have pulled the "I own my house, you don't" card though. I feel for you and hope that you can find a peaceful solution to this. Needless to say, we flat out refused a house we looked around recently because it had a shared drive... nothing wrong with the house itself with modernisation wouldn't have solved.

hopesanddreams

cannot park on the street the drive leads directly onto the road so no room for parked cars hence the shared driveway i suppose..........

Yorkie1

They are talking rubbish in saying that only owner occupiers can exercise rights. If the property you rent has rights over the driveway, you can exercise them as if you were the owner (assuming the owner / your LL hasn't excluded those rights in your tenancy).

They are just throwing their weight around.

I'm sure it doesn't cost much to download the land registry stuff for the house you rent, including plans and copies of rights / easements (legal term for rights of way etc etc).

If you have a good relationship with your LL, write and ask for confirmation of your property's right of access over the shared drive.

devotee

Ask the letting agent to check the landlord's deeds. Who cares if you don't own the property if it's a shared drive meant to be used for both houses. Who has the right of way?

devotee

Yorkie1 wrote: »

They are talking rubbish in saying that only owner occupiers can exercise rights. If the property you rent has rights over the driveway, you can exercise them as if you were the owner (assuming the owner / your LL hasn't excluded those rights in your tenancy).

They are just throwing their weight around.

Exactly! You should not be treated as a second class citizen and be asked to park round the corner or not have the car only because you're renting. What would he do if the owner occupier were to block him in with his car?

hopesanddreams

thanks for replies i could park right at the edge so he couldnt but i didnt want it to start being 'tit for tat' really got young children and moved here to get away from neighbours brawling/shouting in the streets..............thought by paying extra for private renting it would get better.............mmmmmmmmmmmmmm:cool:

Yorkie1

If you do get sight of the actual document / terms, look to see exactly how it is phrased.

There are various permutations. One house may own the entire driveway, with a right to the other house to pass over it on foot or in vehicle for whatever purposes; sometimes both houses own up to an invisible line e.g. down the middle. Whichever applies, if one has a right to pass down the driveway then the other cannot block access so as to prevent that right being exercised.

For example, if the other house owns the driveway and you only have a right of way over it on foot, then you don't have a right to put your car on it whether for parking or other access. If the drive is owned to the middle line by each house, and access in a vehicle is given only to drive over it but not park, then if you need to cross the middle line to park then neither can officially park.

There are lots of other permutations but it gives a basic, slightly confusing, illustration.

So it's not easy to say in reality what the rights of each house are.