Fence Ownership (yes I know It's a tricky one)

WIAWSNB

You continue to misrepresent 'convention'. I'll leave it there.

moneysaver1978

Difficult situation and we have been there before! The "T" mark shows that the fence belongs to our neighbour but she insisted that it was ours since she had been maintaining the other side. Other neighbour confirmed.

So we decided to replace the fence ourselves - not ideal but at least we had some leeway (like "good side", doing it all properly, trying to be a good new neighbour since she's elderly and recently widowed).

It is a great shame that the registry documents in general were not properly updated or modernised. "T" marks in these days are almost meaningless, it could just be a piece of string or some chicken wire if you don't care.

WIAWSNB

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81980283#Comment_81980283

Good of you to take on the task. In many such cases, it's the least painful way. And you cannot 'force' the other person to do the right thing anyway.

Do I take it that your neighbour was at the end of a row, so had two boundaries to look after? (The neighb at the other end having just one?)

However, the rools are the same as they have always been. 'T' symbols along one boundary 'indicates' responsibility, but only (this surprised me) if accompanied by a written description to this effect in the deeds.

Most folk would still nod and accept what it 'suggests', but the contentious cases do not involve most folk. So we then have to look at actual rools.

And the rools are, if you don't want a physical fence, and don't need to contain beasties within your own property, then you just don't need to put up a fence. And you cannot force anyone else to do so either.

(Very rare exceptions such as the deeds being very specific, and updated to legally include the current owner).

moneysaver1978

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81980309#Comment_81980309

Funnily enough, no not at the end of a row. She (and other neighbours) had always maintained the fence on their left side while the "T" marks the right side. So our other neighbour took care of "our" fence and so on.

During the house purchase process, the home buyer pack thing that the previous owner provided thought the same and when I asked our solicitors, they said to ignore that and use the registry as the "source of truth". 🤫

You're right though that the "T" just shows the boundary and nothing more.

WIAWSNB

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81980323#Comment_81980323

Blimey!

So the neighbour had two fences - the deeds one, and the agreed neighbourly convention!

Poor thing 🙂

Extra kind of you to sort this the way you did.