Boundary issues

jamesp31

Hi, we moved into a refurbished house last year and have finally got our back garden landscaped. However now the work is complete our neighbour on our left side says we have taken some of his garden. Basically he has a 6 foot fence between our gardens. There were also concrete posts within our boundary, which we removed whilst doing the gardening work, not realising these posts actually indicated the boundary between our properties (we assumed the fence indicated the boundary rightly or wrongly). The posts were around a foot from the fence halfway along the left side of the garden. We have not deliberalty intended taking extra space, we assumed our space was everything our side of the fence. Now our neighbour is insisting on us erecting a 6 foot fence along the boundary line which he has stated he will pay half for. Is this a good idea, or should we just put up a much cheaper picket fence to clearly mark out the boundary? The daft part is that if he wants to maintain the foot wide strip of land he has to seek permission from us and come into our garden to do so. Why his fence wasn't along the boundary in the first place is beyond me. Anyone else had any similar issues?

slowpoke_rodriguez

It may have been that the previous owner of your house wasn't too good at maintaining his fence (the boundary fence) , so your neighbour erected his own fence on his property.
I don't know why he waited all this time to tell you though; maybe he didn't know what you were doing.

jamesp31

It's just a pity that we've spent literally thousands on the garden, the gardeners were here for around 6 weeks, and he chooses to mention it now! they are old council properties, I really can't understand why there's all these issues with boundaries, why isn't the fence the boundary?!

good_advice

Hi, I think you need to decide which fence on what side of your garden you have to keep in good repair?
Looking From the front of our house the boundry fence that is ours is on the right. The boundry fence to the left next door have to keep in good order.

You say the left side. Here it would be upto the neighbour to move his fence. Pay for every bill.

jamesp31

So basically, as the boundary in question is the left, and HE wants a fence put up ( though we do as well) he should not be expecting us to pay for it, as in effect that fence would belong to him, is that what you are saying?

sidefx

jamesp31 wrote: »

So basically, as the boundary in question is the left, and HE wants a fence put up ( though we do as well) he should not be expecting us to pay for it, as in effect that fence would belong to him, is that what you are saying?

Why on earth did he not tell you whilst you were having the work done!

Why doesn't he just move his current fence to where the boundary line is? Seems silly to have 2 fences with a strip of land in between.

G_M

'left' 'right'?

You cannot judge the boundary ownership on the basis of this.

Plus of course even if the boundary is yours, you are under no obligation to put a fence on it. Since there is a perfectly good fence a foot beyond the boundary I see no good reason to erect another fence. Just make sure you don't make use of the foot on your side of his fence.

At least not for now.....

Assuming the concrete posts belonged to you, it is up to whether to replace them. Again, I see no good reason to do so. Of course, if they were his concrete posts then you had no right to remove them, but he does not sem to be claiming this.

What exactly have you done in terms of your garden make-over on this foot of land which is apparently his? If he is right, and the land is his, then of course he has the right to require you to return it to whatever condiion it was previously in and replace any plants of his you removed.

a nonsense of course, given that he has a 6 foot fence seperating this foot of land of his from his own garden, and with no other access. However, he has the right, and is clearly making a fuss, so offer to remove your plants, rockery etc from this strip. But I see no reason to agree to erect a 2nd fence!

(whisper - and in 6 months time, you can discretely weed/replant 'his' foot of land......)

jamesp31

Exactly he should of spoken sooner. He has 2 sheds along the edge (in place of 2 panels) and he said when he put that fence up, he purposely put it up about s foot inside the line so he could access the back of the shed if needed. We don't dispute the boundary line itself, if he wants that patch then fine, though yeah can't understand the logic in having 2 fences alongside each other with a very narrow patch in the middle doing nothing. We just want to know what is the right thing to do. Father in law can make us a picket fence for nothing so no expense to us, though if he keeps his fence up, we will be looking at a picket fence with a patch of grass behind we can't touch, and that he can only access if he comes into our garden. We think he probably wanted a new fence all along and is hoping we will help pay for it

Davesnave

sidefx wrote: »

Why on earth did he not tell you whilst you were having the work done!

Why doesn't he just move his current fence to where the boundary line is? Seems silly to have 2 fences with a strip of land in between.

Unless he wanted the strip of land there to maintain his fence from, though about 30cm is really too narrowfor that.

When my Dad moved to new bungalow, he was peturbed one morning when the fence at the back of his garden opened and the neighbour behind stepped through, Cuprinol in hand. In that case, the person had a 50cm concrete stip behind his fence for maintenance.

Dad hated it, but the guy was within his rights, as it was his own garden he was walking on. It sounds as if this neighbour has a similar idea, but totally unrealistic expectations.

To the OP and others: there is no simple rule about which fence on which side of your garden you own or maintain. It isn't a consistent thing, but people perpetuate the myth, as they're doing here.

There is no requirement for there to be any fence marking a boundary, though many people find that most convenient. The boundary is where it is, independent of any fence.

I would tell your neighbour his land is still there and meet him half way by offering to go halves on a very simple boundary marker of some kind, but not a 6' fence. This isn't something you need an argument about.

Maybe from his side of the 2m fence he simply couldn't see what you were doing, or wasn't as nosy as most of us would be!.

jamesp31

G_M wrote: »

'left' 'right'?

You cannot judge the boundary ownership on the basis of this.

Plus of course even if the boundary is yours, you are under no obligation to put a fence on it. Since there is a perfectly good fence a foot beyond the boundary I see no good reason to erect another fence. Just make sure you don't make use of the foot on your side of his fence.

At least not for now.....

Assuming the concrete posts belonged to you, it is up to whether to replace them. Again, I see no good reason to do so. Of course, if they were his concrete posts then you had no right to remove them, but he does not sem to be claiming this.

What exactly have you done in terms of your garden make-over on this foot of land which is apparently his? If he is right, and the land is his, then of course he has the right to require you to return it to whatever condiion it was previously in and replace any plants of his you removed.

a nonsense of course, given that he has a 6 foot fence seperating this foot of land of his from his own garden, and with no other access. However, he has the right, and is clearly making a fuss, so offer to remove your plants, rockery etc from this strip. But I see no reason to agree to erect a 2nd fence!

(whisper - and in 6 months time, you can discretely weed/replant 'his' foot of land......)

Basically the garden was on overgrown jungle. We have turfed it and put some gravel along the he lower edge, so it's a lot tidier than it was. If he wants us to return his narrow patch then we would have to get a load of weeds planted.

He seemed annoyed we had removed the concrete posts as he says they clearly defined the boundary, though he has not actually said they were his. Another friend has advised us that if it IS his boundary, and we pay half towards a new fence, we are basically paying for something that will never belong to us, and if he ever were to sell, the new owners would be well within his rights to take it down and we wouldn't have a leg to stand on

good_advice

jamesp31 wrote: »

So basically, as the boundary in question is the left, and HE wants a fence put up ( though we do as well) he should not be expecting us to pay for it, as in effect that fence would belong to him, is that what you are saying?

Yes. That is what would happen in our garden. You both agree you are on his land, but the fence be would be at his cost to move.

When you moved into your home, was it not made clear which boundry fence was yours ?
Often in a row of houses one is yours alone.