Neighbour saying my garage is in his Garden

silvercar

xmeenax said:

theoretica said:

Flugelhorn said:

suspect OP's garage is in the neighbours land - wonder how long it has been there? - easiest solution would be to have access to back garden / a parking space somewhere along the border before the garage

My guess from old maps is it has been there for over 50 years... 

It has been, yes. The old owner was in his 90s and been living in that house since a child until I purchased it this year.

…and the neighbour only decides it’s an issue now that the property has changed hands? Makes you wonder if there was a previous agreement and the neighbour is trying it on.

prowla

xmeenax said:

Just to give you a clearer view of where the garage is located, I've taken this screen shot from google earth. The black cross is where my garage is and the black line is the right of way that leads to a main road. Number 54 is mine, 52 his. He also owns 50. The car park you see belongs to aldi.

It looks to me like the OP's garage is indeed on the neighbour's land, but the neighbour couldn't build onto it without blocking the OP's right of way.

However, the OP's garage is blocking the neighbour's access to half of their back garden.

Based on that picture, the OP's garage is in the wrong, but if they removed it the neighbour would gain nothing as they couldn't use the land exclusively anyway.

Gycraig

If garage has been there 50 years or whatever it is wouldn’t the land become ops through adverse possession ?. 

 

Ksw3

Gycraig said:

If garage has been there 50 years or whatever it is wouldn’t the land become ops through adverse possession ?. 

 

I could be wrong but I believe AP is likely to be rejected if the land is registered and the AP claim is contested.

GDB2222

Ksw3 said:

Gycraig said:

If garage has been there 50 years or whatever it is wouldn’t the land become ops through adverse possession ?. 

 

I could be wrong but I believe AP is likely to be rejected if the land is registered and the AP claim is contested.

Yes, and no! There are transitional provisions where AP was established before 2003. 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/adverse-possession-of-1-unregistered-land-and-2-registered-land

This is something for the OP to discuss with his/her solicitor.

Grumpy_chap

It might be worth the OP driving their car in and out of the garage a few times to demonstrate that the RoW is in use - assuming RoW exists

Norman_Castle

GDB2222 said:

Does that garage have any real value? You would be hard pressed to get a car down that drive.

There's limited parking at the front of the properties. If I lived there I'd defend the access to the rear garden. Even if the garage was removed the op's garden could be used for parking.

Section62

prowla said:

Based on that picture, the OP's garage is in the wrong, but if they removed it the neighbour would gain nothing as they couldn't use the land exclusively anyway.

The neighbour would gain the ability to build right up to the edge of the RoW without having 'party wall' type issues of attaching their new structure to the OP's garage.

Although hopefully the neighbour is just planning some kind of outbuilding rather than an extension to the house.

Section62

Norman_Castle said:

GDB2222 said:

Does that garage have any real value? You would be hard pressed to get a car down that drive.

There's limited parking at the front of the properties. If I lived there I'd defend the access to the rear garden. Even if the garage was removed the op's garden could be used for parking.

Absolutely this^.

Both on and off-street parking are extremely limited by the banjo layout.  The need to charge EV's will exacerbate this problem.  Having access to rear parking - even if annoying to get to - could make the difference between properties like this being attractive (to car-owning families) or not.

Ath_Wat

Section62 said:

prowla said:

Based on that picture, the OP's garage is in the wrong, but if they removed it the neighbour would gain nothing as they couldn't use the land exclusively anyway.

The neighbour would gain the ability to build right up to the edge of the RoW without having 'party wall' type issues of attaching their new structure to the OP's garage.

Although hopefully the neighbour is just planning some kind of outbuilding rather than an extension to the house.

They could well be planning nothing and just want the garage off their land.  "I'm planning to build there" might well be just something to say to stop the OP claiming that it doesn't actually hurt them to have the garage there.