Getting My Property Measured

Kelkiwi

Hi all,

I have just had advice form my neighbour who rents out her house next to us that the position of my back fence should be further back than the previous owner erected it, he was lazy because of tree roots apparently. Who would I get to measure and mark the boundaries of my property properly? Also how do I know what the measurments of my section are supposed to be?

Cheers.

jason_s_2

If you rent off the council then you can ring them and ask your housing officer to look into it. If you own the property then all then boundrys will be clearly marked on the deeds.

Kelkiwi

I own the property (well the bank does anyway) and only bought it in Dec last year, I will have a look at the deeds, but I think they are so old that they actually show the front boundary of the property to be in the middle of the road, so I am not sure on the accuracy of the rest of it all.

Cheers

Doozergirl

Problem is that the boundary line on the deeds is about a metre thick when you blow it up to scale, so unless you're much more than a metre off, it's of little help.

A boundary marker should always be kept, even if the fence or wall is in a different position.

nutmegman

how do you view your deeds when the bank has them? I have never seen my deeds

Kelkiwi

I have the deeds as apparently now the banks don't hold them they just have a financial interest registered against the proeprty and I only bought my house in December last year.

ic

How does the fence line compare with neighbours fences, have you clearly got a longer garden?

Deeds can be downloaded (for a small fee) from www.landregistry.gov.uk. Banks no longer retain deeds as they're all held by the land registry.

Kelkiwi

ic wrote: »

How does the fence line compare with neighbours fences, have you clearly got a longer garden?

Deeds can be downloaded (for a small fee) from www.landregistry.gov.uk. Banks no longer retain deeds as they're all held by the land registry.

I am a couple of metres short of the neigbours on both sides length wise to the back fence,there are horrible overgrown tree bush things in the 2 metre space that looks like rather than sort those the previous owner has just put the fence back a bit to save on any hard work, nothing meets up and it all looks skewed?

[Deleted User]

Check out the forums at www.gardenlaw.co.uk, they'll give you great advice.

It is very hard to determine where the exact boundary line is, the deeds are not very precise, you'll never know for sure. You are lucky to have a neighbour that knows where your original fence was. Assuming that you own that boundary, I would contact whoever lives on the other side to warn them and move the fence, otherwise you could lose that piece of land after 12 (I think) years.

liitleblackcat

I downloaded our registration from the Land Registry to sort out a boundary issue and found a previous mortgage that we had paid off a few years before was still registered. I think it cost £2 but it may be more now.

Having sorted that out, although the Land Registry plan you get with your boundaries showing is at 1:1250, it was quite clear where the fences should go from how the plan showed all our neighbours' boundaries as well. There was no argument when I said I was moving the fence to line up with the others.

Mojisola

Kelkiwi wrote: »

I am a couple of metres short of the neigbours on both sides length wise to the back fence

That sounds as if your garden should be 2m longer. Were you happy with the size of garden when you bought it? Do you want the work involved in clearing the undergrowth and moving the fence? What's beyond your garden - does it back onto another garden?

Main problem is, if it's left as it is, someone else may claim it and that might lead to problems when you come to sell.

I'd second Van1871's suggestion of https://www.gardenlaw.co.uk - very helpful site - and free!