Fence replacement - council house neighbours

freeman3030

We purchased an ex-council house 18 months ago. Most of the houses in the street are now privately owned, but our neighbour told us not long after we moved in that he wanted to buy his house from the council.
Anyhow, since moving in we haven't often seen/spoken to one and other. Just the odd hello here and there. We're having a tree in the garden cut down because it's really tall and the fence is starting to bow out because of it. The fence itself is also in a sorry state of repair so want to have the entire garden re-fenced.
I've just looked through all the paperwork from when we bought the house and have a copy of the land registry but it only shows which part of the land is ours. There's no mention of who's fence is who's.
I'm starting to ramble... Obviously I plan on speaking to my neighbour before taking the old fence down and replacing it and I'm also more than happy to pay for it. But can we get into trouble with the council if it is our neighbours fence and not ours?

System

are there any "T" marks on the plans ?That tells you whats yours .

chrisw

If the neighbours are happy and you are paying for a decent replacement, the council won't know or care.

freeman3030

Ah I thought that might be the case. Ill have a look on the plan for 'T' marks, but it's quite small. Thanks for the replies!

Silvertabby

Rule of thumb is that if the fence posts are on your side, then it's your fence, but if the posts are on the other side then it's your neighbours fence.

TheCyclingProgrammer

Silvertabby wrote: »

Rule of thumb is that if the fence posts are on your side, then it's your fence, but if the posts are on the other side then it's your neighbours fence.

This has no legal standing whatsoever - old wives tale.

The deeds will tell you who is responsible for which boundary...but not always.

This is not the same as who owns the fence. The fence belongs to whomever paid for it and had it installed though unless its a shared fence it should have been installed on that person's side of the boundary. Anyone can put a fence up along any boundary as long as its on their property.

moneyistooshorttomention

People "should" give the good side of the fence to the neighbour.

There isn't anything down in law stating that - but it's common decency to do so and most people do (I know it's not everyone - as fence my next door neighbour has is definitely hers - but she put the wrong side towards me.....).

So if you can see the ugly side of the fence facing you - then chances are it's yours.

p00hsticks

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

People "should" give the good side of the fence to the neighbour.

There isn't anything down in law stating that - but it's common decency to do so and most people do (I know it's not everyone - as fence my next door neighbour has is definitely hers - but she put the wrong side towards me.....).

So if you can see the ugly side of the fence facing you - then chances are it's yours.

My understanding is that it's not so much 'common decency' as the fact that all of the fence, including the posts, should be on your own property. So if you put the posts facing towards your neighbours then the panels themselves will be several inches inside your boundary and you are effectively giving them the tiny bit of extra land between the sides of the posts and the fence panels themselves.

Carrot007

p00hsticks wrote: »

So if you put the posts facing towards your neighbours then the panels themselves will be several inches inside your boundary

How are you people fencing? Surely the posts seperate the fence panels and being in the middle of two fance panels are part of the fence. What you are describing sounds horrible.

bob_a_builder

Surely the posts seperate the fence panels and being in the middle of two fence panels are part of the fence. What you are describing sounds horrible

But in fact quite a common fence type...

http://charltonsgates.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Longlast-V-notched-posts_large-500x375.jpg

uknick

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

People "should" give the good side of the fence to the neighbour.

There isn't anything down in law stating that - but it's common decency to do so and most people do (I know it's not everyone - as fence my next door neighbour has is definitely hers - but she put the wrong side towards me.....).

So if you can see the ugly side of the fence facing you - then chances are it's yours.

What's the "good side" of a fence? The slats up or down question?