Purchasing part of neighbours land

simons_s

Hi

I've been in talks with my neighbour about buying part of his land.

My current garden is about 150sqm and the piece of my neighbours garden he's willing to sell is around 250sqm. Purely garden space with no access to road.

Problem is, he's asked for £20,000. He's firm on this price as well. This does sound very expensive to us but it would let us have a completely private large patio / decking area off our living room and access to the little stream that runs down behind our houses.

Wondering if it's even worth getting the land valued by someone if he's firm on the price? Is this increase in garden space likely to increase the value of my property anywhere near this much?

Is 20k extortionate or not so bad for a garden? We would love the land, I'm guessing we just have to decide if it's worth that to us but I'm just very confused about it all.

silvercar

Round here that would be a bargain!

What percentage of the property value is it? Would it make an average garden large or a small garden decent?

TonyMMM

A valuer may be able to advise on what (if any) the extra garden would add to the value of your property, but your neighbour can ask any price they want. If they say £20k and won't budge, then that is the true "value".

da_rule

Even if you get it professionally valued what do you expect to happen? If he’s decided that that’s how much he wants then it’s unlikely to make much of a difference.

Also, he may have valued it based on how much it’s going to devalue his property by. Or perhaps he has a mortgage and the mortgage company require a big payment to release that part of the property.

simons_s

silvercar wrote: »

Round here that would be a bargain!

What percentage of the property value is it? Would it make an average garden large or a small garden decent?

We're in Staffordshire if that helps. I think maybe around 5 or 6%?

This would make an average garden large. I wouldn't say our garden is small really compared to the others around here.

TonyMMM wrote: »

A valuer may be able to advise on what (if any) the extra garden would add to the value of your property, but your neighbour can ask any price they want. If they say £20k and won't budge, then that is the true "value".

This is what I had thought
The price is what they want to sell it for I guess.

AdrianC

What would increasing the size of your garden by 166% add to the value of your house?
What would losing that much garden decrease the value of his house by?


Now add in the ballache value...

pattypan4

cheap at the price

fishpond

There is only one person who can put a price on this piece of land, and the neighbour has, = £20000.
Take it or leave it.
You may want to ask who is going to pay the cost of registering it/legal fees.

ACG

You can get it valued 100 times, but if he is holding out for £20k, it is what it is.

You could maybe try calling his bluff and saying it is a little too much, thank him for considering it but it is not meant to be and see what he says. Have a think about it, if it is worth it to you, you can always go back a week later and say you have spoken about it again and decided you would like to proceed.

Davesnave

Oddly enough, we had £20k in mind for some land we retained when we sold. We needed to use the plot for a year or two, but we informed 4 neighbours it would eventually be sold. We expected interest due to their houses having miniscule gardens.

Like you, when the land became available, the neighbours baulked at the sort of price we sought, which was fair and took account of the work/legal costs they'd have. At first they counter-offered £8k, so we laughed and left them to it for a year.

Punctuating the long wait, one neighbour had the bright idea of having the land valued, so we were sent a glossy report which said it was worth £12k as 'garden land,' with no mention of the value it would add to each property, or other advantages, like making extensions viable. We responded by pointing this out.

Eventually, after more months had passed, one of the neighbours had us confirm that we'd take £20k + all legal expenses paid. Others came on board, because they didn't want to miss out or have a neighbour with a strip of garden behind theirs. The fourth neighbour hung back, made extra demands and then, when we told them 'No,' joined the others.

As fishpond says, the person who decides the price of the land is the owner, especially if they are not in immediate need of the money. Land rarely devalues and the longer it's left, the wilder it becomes and the harder it is to reinstate.

simons_s

Thank you all for your responses.

It sounds like 20k isn't an unreasonable amount to ask for. My main worry was that this was a ludicrous amount for land that is only valuable to next door, or me, but it appears it's not.

Am I right in thinking the first step to getting this done is to contact a surveyor to draw up a plan? And then after we have a plan, pass this onto a solicitor who will register with the land registry?

Does anyone know who is responsible for building & paying for the fence on the new boundary? As I will be buying the land and because the fence that side of the house is already mine, I'm going to assume I will be paying for that as well. Is that correct?

Thanks!