Criminal (?) property damage from tenant neighbour

Mackers12

Titus_Wadd said:

I don't suppose the friendly neighbour next-door has a contact address for their landlord?

I hadn't thought of this! The ones who live below seem understanding and I think this might be the best bet actually - I'll get in touch with their landlord and see if they might have a phone number or email for the 1st floor landlord! To Adrian C - I think this answers your question in case you were thinking along similar lines (different landlords own the two flats). 

saajan_12

Mackers12 said:

In which case you have no complaint about the neighbour removing the stuff off the top of the wall as they also have a right to do work on a joint area the same as you did.
This is where discussions should have taken place to decide on something both sides are happy with or don't touch it. You both have the same rights for the top.

I am sure that what you quote is only for doing work on YOUR side of the party wall. 

The wall is absolutely nothing to do with the tenant. She has no rights in relation to the wall. If it were the landlord - I'd agree with you. But it's not. Thanks anyway!

Well no, it doesn't work like that. Just like you might not have personally done the work but rather appointed a trades person. 

For the neighbouring property, whether its the freeholder / leaseholder / AST tenant / house guest / child / trades person / .. that does the changes, its the same thing to you regarding changes to the party wall. If that person wasn't actually authorised by their LL etc, thats a matter between them.  

unforeseen

Mackers12 said:

In which case you have no complaint about the neighbour removing the stuff off the top of the wall as they also have a right to do work on a joint area the same as you did.
This is where discussions should have taken place to decide on something both sides are happy with or don't touch it. You both have the same rights for the top.

I am sure that what you quote is only for doing work on YOUR side of the party wall. 

The wall is absolutely nothing to do with the tenant. She has no rights in relation to the wall. If it were the landlord - I'd agree with you. But it's not. Thanks anyway!

No but it's to do with the landlord (I assume they are the owner) but you never asked them. You made a unilateral decision to render a part of the wall that needed the agreement of both parties.
You could argue that the tenant was protecting the landlords interests. 

Lunchbox

Mackers12 said:

Just to stress the point on whether we have acted wrongly in rendering the wall, I do not believe we have. 
https://www.gov.uk/party-walls-building-works sets out the general principles for party walls and makes clear that for minor works to any party wall (including plastering) - notice under the party wall act is not required. It does not differentiate between minor works for indoor or outdoor, hence our view is that no notice was required. We are always very careful and check things like this before we do anything.  If we thought for a second our works would be illegal without notice - we'd have 100% followed whatever process we needed to. 

MovingForwards said:

Have you tried searching online for flat to rent X road and see if the old advert pops up with the letting agent details.

Thanks for this - I just tried but sadly no luck! 

What does your lease say about the garden/wall and are either or both within your demised premises (the area within a red outline on the lease)? I’d be very surprised if you’re able to make any alterations to any structure outside your flat’s inner walls without freeholder permission. For example, we have a balcony which is exclusive to our property but it isn’t part of the demised premises and we only have a ‘right to use’ it; we aren’t able to alter it in any way, and this is a fairly common arrangement for outdoor spaces of leasehold properties. Even our windows aren’t demised.

Mildreds_Earrings

Mackers12 said:

Thanks all for the views! 
I have the name of the landlord from the land registry, but the only address included is the address of the property where the tenant is now living. So I could write to the landlord at the address I know he does not live there and would not receive. I think he may live out of country, the property is in a bit of a state of disrepair - for example the area, requires him to have a private property rental licence , which I know he does not have. 

On the police, sorry I should have mentioned this up front - my fiance did call but at this point I don't think they are interested. I would have thought having hard evidence of a clear threat to commit criminal damage, followed shortly by the damage itself occurring would be enough for them to do something - but the police have said if she is claiming the damage was caused by a child, they aren't able to get involved unless we have hard evidence of the act, like a witness or footage. The police said they might be able to help mediate if things get worse.

@Mackers12 complete an online form for the Police that covers your area (Metropolitan, West Yorkshire etc). Provide as much details as possible. You will be provided with a crime reference number. A copper will phone to see what action you want to take. Let them know that you don't need any action taken just yet but you wish to leave the incident on record, then you'll have that as back up. Continue to make a record of everything and remember to include time, dates etc. 

Please reconsider erecting a fence for the aggressive neighbour. I realise you're trying to be nice but she has already showed her true colours with her behaviour and your kindness might come back to bite you.  No good deed goes unpunished... 

Mackers12

Thanks all, I've now got the details of the landlord and a CRM from the police so I'll discuss the issue with the landlord and see how that goes. Thanks everyone for your help! I'll post an update if this gets resolved (or escalates...)

Ditzy_Mitzy

Just out of interest, @Mackers12, do you own your flat and garden freehold?

David2710

Mackers12 said:

Hi all. 

Sorry I'm not sure if this is the best place to post but I'm hoping somebody might be able to offer some advice on our situation. We own a garden flat, and share a garden party wall with the neighbouring property. The wall on our side was looking a bit run down, so we did some minor work to make it look better on our side and atop. This was just plastering to smooth it up, no structural work.

We weren't required to required to give notice as it's minor work, but we did let the neighbours in the basement flat next to us know, and they were fine with it.  However, the 1st floor flat also has access to their garden, and this tenant was not around at the time to ask (she was on holiday... despite lockdown...). Anyway, this tenant (who rents and has access to the garden beside us) came back and was fuming at what we had done. 

We have a phone call recording of her threatening to destroy they wall, saying "I'm going to chip away at it. I'll just chip it". Her argument is that she just doesn't like the look of it. I explained as she rents it's a matter for her landlord, not her. She basically blackmailed us by saying if we didn't buy her fence panels for her side she'd hack away at it she she wouldn't have to look at it. We actually reluctantly agreed (we thought a few trellis panels would be cheaper than a solicitor...) and we thought it was fine - but she knocked on the door yesterday to say why the fence hasn't been up yet, and to tell us that her 'child' has damaged the wall, so we better get it sorted soon. There's no way her 4 year old daughter would take a chisel to our wall - this was (in our view) clearly her following through on her threat (she couldn't even reach the bit that was damaged)!

This is criminal property damage, right? We've put up a camera to keep an eye on our wall for now, but we are terrified she's going to wreck it. I've tried to get contact details for the landlord as I feel he needs to be involved / aware - but she won't give them, and the managing agent company is refusing to provide them. I've got the landlords name from land registry but that's not helped to get a number.

Any and all help appreciated!

With respect you should have done the courtesy to write to your immediate neighbours and to give a date BEFORE doing any alterations. If you'd done that there wouldn't be any problems. If there were any subsequent complaints your bases were covered. Saying the tenants was away at the time simply doesn't wash and the fact you refer to your neighbour as a 'tenant' comes across as a bit snobbish if I may say so. Best course of action is to speak or write to the tenant and to empathise not to antagonise. Come to a mutual agreement and be nice or this could escalate into something quite ugly. 

Mackers12

 neighbour as a 'tenant' comes across as a bit snobbish if I may say so. 

You may say so, particularly as I am inviting views - but I don't think it at all snobbish to use the word tenant in explaining the situation - it's accurate and very relevant! Referring to them only as a neighbour wouldn't be helpful as those providing advice would need to know if she owned the property.There is no judgement in the use of the word tenant. She was gone for weeks (despite lockdown). I agree we could have waited, though she hasn't particularly been the best neighbour and I think it more appropriate to take the majority of advice on here which suggests to engage the landlord. 

Ditzy_Mitzy said:

Just out of interest, @Mackers12, do you own your flat and garden freehold?

Hi and, yes we do own the garden in terms of leasehold and share of freehold (there were no issues with the freehold).

Mackers12

Just to update for anyone interested or reading that I think this is now resolved. The landlord has agreed we were perfectly entitled to do what we have done, and gave a clear warning to the tenant that any damage will likely result in criminal proceedings being brought by us. He wasn't happy at all at what she had done, and was very understanding. The neighbour who caused the damage then came to the door to apologise and to plead for us not to get the police involved, as she'd had dealings with police previously. So I think the message has finally landed!

Thanks to the vast majority who gave really helpful advice on here - very much appreciated.