Farmer put fence around our house

ScorpiondeRooftrouser

AdrianC wrote: »

I think you might be misreading. The sentence in the Sun article is...

Poorly worded, I agree, and could be read either way.

Tsk. What are standards coming to, when the Sun is not the zenith of literary perfection?

Ah, "they" as in Persimmon? Quite possibly. However, it's still not the farmer's land?

Also, isn't the small fence that people are getting excited about just a temporary thing? It looks like it's cobbled together out of untreated, unfinished wood.

AdrianC

My suspicion...

There's a small ransom strip of some kind around the estate, which Persimmon own as part of the common parts (as with the roadways etc), maintained out of a service charge. You can see past the house, there's a full-height boarded fence. Persimmon clearly didn't do that with this one, because it'd affect the view, so they just did the half-arsed boundary marker post-and-rail. The farmer thinks they should have done it all, so finished the job for them...

parkrunner

maisie_cat wrote: »

So the only reason that the panels have been pulled down is because the farmer attached them to fence posts belonging to the developer. So now the farmer will put fence posts on his side of the boundary and put up a 2m fence, which he can do without planning permission. He can even paint the fence a lovely shade of gunge green on both sides and nobody can do anything about it.
Why does anybody buy a new house? developers are vermin, and using their solicitor is asking for trouble. Did these people not see how close the boundary was? Anything can change on the other side of that fence!

If nobody bought new houses there would be millions of homeless people. All houses are new at some point.

Davesnave

parkrunner wrote: »

If nobody bought new houses there would be millions of homeless people. All houses are new at some point.

If nobody bought the sad offerings that some of the big boys produce, they'd have to up their game or go bust.



Now, I wonder which it would be?

boliston

i've had a look at the site plan https://www.persimmonhomes.com/brook-view-10473 and it looks like they have corner plot 38 - the fence only seems to block 2 of the windows and the main windows of the property appear to face back and front rather than side - the only "odd" feature appears to be having the main front door at the side of the property rather than the front.

EachPenny

AdrianC wrote: »

I think you might be misreading. The sentence in the Sun article is...

Persimmon removed the fence after Blackburn with Darwen Council planning officials visited and told the firm the fence was constructed on land they owned.

Poorly worded, I agree, and could be read either way.

Tsk. What are standards coming to, when the Sun is not the zenith of literary perfection?

That part of the article caught my eye, it is unusual for 'planning officials' to get involved in boundary disputes of this kind - they might have commented on the need for planning consent for the fence, but I struggle to believe they would have given a difinitive answer as to whose land the fence was on.

AdrianC wrote: »

My suspicion...

There's a small ransom strip of some kind around the estate, which Persimmon own as part of the common parts (as with the roadways etc), maintained out of a service charge. You can see past the house, there's a full-height boarded fence. Persimmon clearly didn't do that with this one, because it'd affect the view, so they just did the half-arsed boundary marker post-and-rail. The farmer thinks they should have done it all, so finished the job for them...

I agree. I think boliston's assessment of it being plot 38 is right - in which case the full-height boarded fence is around the garden to the rear of the house. Interesting that the occupants of the dwelling are permitted to have a high solid fence to give them privacy in their back garden, but the right of the farmer to have their privacy is being questioned.

The satellite image on google maps shows plot 38 during construction with scaffolding and possibly a temporary fence on the strip of grass next to the farm track. Perhaps there was some encroachment at that time which has led to an ongoing problem?

More interestingly, the satellite image also shows the 'view' from plot 38 looks directly onto an area of concrete which looks suspiciously like the floor and foundations of old piggeries or similar. If that area belongs to the farmer it does look perfect for the storage of straw, perhaps even FYM.

ProDave

What a sorry situation.

Mostly the fault of the builders for putting an inappropriate house design on that corner plot. And why go and put the front door all the way round 2 corners from where you arrive by car or on foot via the road? That alone would have put me off that house on that particular plot.

For all we know the farmers own house is just across the field and he objects to people looking into his house?

In any event he can put the fence back on his own land and there is nothing anyone can do. He could be really vindictive and decide that is the place to put his haystack, or build a new cow shed.

And the buyer was not a prisoner or trapped. Nothing this fence did impeded access to or from the property in any way.

pinklady21

Goodness me, those wee boxes seem to all be shoehorned in! And there is a stream running through the midst of it too. I wonder how the farmer is planning to develop his land next door.
I also wonder if the same farmer sold the land to Persimmon and thinks he didn't get a good enough deal. Heh ho.

seashore22

In some ways we have a similar situation with our house - house on a small plot sideways on and adjoining fields.
Our house is a self build (not by us). The main part of the plot was bought and then a couple of extra slivers of land was bought from the field owner to make a bigger garden.
Either in the planning permission or in the details when purchasing part of the field, it was made a condition that the owners of the house had to have a field fence, similar to the one the builders have used in this case and not a more normal panel fence.
I wonder if there are similar conditions on the builders for this house too and they would have needed to get rid of the fence the farmer had put up as it went against that condition. I wouldn't be surprised in that case that the council supported them and not the farmer.

EachPenny

seashore22 wrote: »

Either in the planning permission or in the details when purchasing part of the field, it was made a condition that the owners of the house had to have a field fence, similar to the one the builders have used in this case and not a more normal panel fence.
I wonder if there are similar conditions on the builders for this house too and they would have needed to get rid of the fence the farmer had put up as it went against that condition. I wouldn't be surprised in that case that the council supported them and not the farmer.

If the farmer put the fence on his land then any conditions in the planning consent for the development would be irrelevant. Those conditions would affect the developer and people buying houses on the estate, but couldn't bind a third party neighbour.

What might have happened is the farmer has put the fence on land they don't actually own, or else the nature of the fence (land use type, height etc) means planning consent was required before the fence (the farmer's one) was put up.

Another possible 'gotcha' is that the track is a public footpath - a Highway - and therefore any permitted development rights might not be as anticipated.