My fence vs neighbour's hedge
Discussion
desolate said:
Back in the real world, I'd love to see someone complain to the police and demand action over the neighbour's tree branches that had been hanging over their garden, had been cut back and not returned. Happens all the time. Courts clogged up with it.
So we can agree that Chris was correct then, even if it is a technicality.
The police go get involved in such dispute as I know from personal experience.
it didn't go to court though but at one stage it looked possible and it took some good policing from a experienced copper to make the parties see sense, including the junior plod involved at the outset.
Such matters go to the civil court all the time.
The police go get involved in such dispute as I know from personal experience.
it didn't go to court though but at one stage it looked possible and it took some good policing from a experienced copper to make the parties see sense, including the junior plod involved at the outset.
Such matters go to the civil court all the time.
desolate said:
So we can agree that Chris was correct then, even if it is a technicality.
You and I have nothing to agree about. http://www.boundary-problems.co.uk/boundary-proble..."Should you then return the trimmings to your neighbour, as they are his property? General practice is that you trim your side of the hedge and dispose of the trimmings yourself."
desolate said:
The police go get involved in such dispute as I know from personal experience.
Now why do I find that hard to imagine
desolate said:
it didn't go to court though but at one stage it looked possible and it took some good policing from a experienced copper to make the parties see sense, including the junior plod involved at the outset.
Such matters go to the civil court all the time.
And the members of the public involved should be ashamed of themselves for wasting Police time.Such matters go to the civil court all the time.
popeyewhite said:
desolate said:
So we can agree that Chris was correct then, even if it is a technicality.
You and I have nothing to agree about. http://www.boundary-problems.co.uk/boundary-proble..."Should you then return the trimmings to your neighbour, as they are his property? General practice is that you trim your side of the hedge and dispose of the trimmings yourself."
desolate said:
The police go get involved in such dispute as I know from personal experience.
Now why do I find that hard to imagine
desolate said:
it didn't go to court though but at one stage it looked possible and it took some good policing from a experienced copper to make the parties see sense, including the junior plod involved at the outset.
Such matters go to the civil court all the time.
And the members of the public involved should be ashamed of themselves for wasting Police time.Such matters go to the civil court all the time.
I am a member of the public and I have nothing to be ashamed of.
OP back from the dead with an update! Since summer is around the corner we are looking to re-sort out our mess of a garden. The previous suggestions are all really helpful so I appreciate the input 
I've been busy with work and life that the fence is still in limbo. It's currently on it's last legs and I will have to do something pretty soon. As tempting as it is to simply erect a nice fence inside the current one I think it would cause an issue when we came to sell the property and the old one will push onto it with the neighbour's further hedge growth. As difficult as it will be, I suspect we will have to take down the current fence and replace it from scratch.
Today is an example of why this is going to be so difficult to contend with. One of the previous posters sarcastically mentioned about the ivy ruining the fence rather than the neighbour's actual hedge, I saw to it this morning.
Pre-Op
Post-Op
Most of the ivy is coming over the fence from their side, though there is roots on ourside too. Their "hedges" are also well over the boundary of the fence. Today I had the audacity of removing (most of) the ivy and trimming their hedge back as it passed over the top of the fence. I knew I wasn't going to get through it without some sort of aggro. The first thing I knew was they let their Great Dane loose which proceeded to batter the fence (see "reinforcements" behind the chair), then the crazy came out of the house and proceeded to go bat s
t mental at me.
I explained that I was simply removing the ivy from my property and trimming their hedge that came over my boundary, due to her reckoning the fence is in the wrong place I know owe damages to her for trimming the hedge... Even if the fence is in the wrong position, I'm well within my right to remove their hedge/ivy from my property, the fence. She proceeded to list the rest of my apparent crimes shouting over the fence and my partner informs me she can hear them debating/writing an angry letter to us as I type this She states that removing the ivy will cause the fence to collapse, though she is desperate for us to replace it at the same time 
We also got personal abuse about stuff completely immaterial to our properties. I managed to keep calm and told her we were carrying on regardless.
She is also very upset that she cannot allow her Great Dane to roam their garden today as it simply will not stop aggressively barking at us whilst we work on the garden and fence, during which we have to keep our dogs inside due to the risk. I do believe that if the Great Dane got through it will do serious harm to our dogs and possibly us too. As such I will be reinforcing the fence with chain link and metal stakes until I can work out what to do with the actual fence. She cannot control this dog, it is never walked due to her not being able to control it. In fact in nearly two years of living here I have never seen it off their property. When it actually comes to removing the rotten fence there will be a risk with this dog loose.
Since my last post I've gone through our house paperwork and any title information I can lay my hands on. The title plan from the land registry simply has two parallel lines marking the garden border. I've measured the widths of the garden, at the front of the garden nearest the house the fence to the brick wall is 23ft, near the shed at the back it's 26ft. So technically there is a 3ft difference compared to the "parallel" lines of the title plan. This is also assuming the brick wall is totally reliable and straight border reference.
Digging through the mountain of paperwork there is a photocopied surveyors (not land registry I believe) plan dating from 1947, being so old and badly scanned the measurements of the garden width are hard to distinguish but it simply has one measurement of garden width which I believe to state 24ft. At the front of the garden this is impossible to be accurate as between the brick wall and the edge of the house by the fence it can only be a maximum of 23ft, there's no debating 23ft. So I don't think the 1947 survey can be totally relied on. That said at this point, I'm tempted to just to stick the fence at 24ft at the rear of the garden and lose the 2ft we currently have. I'm planning to build decking at the rear of the garden and build a bespoke shed, so I don't want to be forced to move the boundary at a later date through legal matters.
Does anyone know if they can force the fence to be moved even though we bought the house with no boundary disputes or the issue being raised at the time.
When we bought the house there was no boundary disputes declared and we were also told of NO neighbour disputes either, though I know for a fact there was police attending for neighbour disputes between the ex tenants and my awful neighbours. Though as we bought the house from the LAND LORD, I'm not sure the non disclosure of neighbour disputes count as it was between the tenants. We are tempted to pursue this with the estate agents we bought the house with as we simply would not have bought the property with full disclosure. Since buying the property there was an incidence in which I called the police to report an harrassment incident about her, since this will have to be fully disclosed when we come to sell the property I don't know what affect on value this will have.
I will be calling a boundary surveyor next week, thinking of talking to citizens advice and thinking of raise a complaint with the estate agent.
Fun and games eh
UPDATE: Since writing this my partner has overheard them actually talking about falsifying claims against over many matters and that the fence has actually been in place for 25 years...
I've been busy with work and life that the fence is still in limbo. It's currently on it's last legs and I will have to do something pretty soon. As tempting as it is to simply erect a nice fence inside the current one I think it would cause an issue when we came to sell the property and the old one will push onto it with the neighbour's further hedge growth. As difficult as it will be, I suspect we will have to take down the current fence and replace it from scratch.
Today is an example of why this is going to be so difficult to contend with. One of the previous posters sarcastically mentioned about the ivy ruining the fence rather than the neighbour's actual hedge, I saw to it this morning.
Pre-Op
Post-Op
Most of the ivy is coming over the fence from their side, though there is roots on ourside too. Their "hedges" are also well over the boundary of the fence. Today I had the audacity of removing (most of) the ivy and trimming their hedge back as it passed over the top of the fence. I knew I wasn't going to get through it without some sort of aggro. The first thing I knew was they let their Great Dane loose which proceeded to batter the fence (see "reinforcements" behind the chair), then the crazy came out of the house and proceeded to go bat s
t mental at me. I explained that I was simply removing the ivy from my property and trimming their hedge that came over my boundary, due to her reckoning the fence is in the wrong place I know owe damages to her for trimming the hedge... Even if the fence is in the wrong position, I'm well within my right to remove their hedge/ivy from my property, the fence. She proceeded to list the rest of my apparent crimes shouting over the fence and my partner informs me she can hear them debating/writing an angry letter to us as I type this
She states that removing the ivy will cause the fence to collapse, though she is desperate for us to replace it at the same time We also got personal abuse about stuff completely immaterial to our properties. I managed to keep calm and told her we were carrying on regardless.She is also very upset that she cannot allow her Great Dane to roam their garden today as it simply will not stop aggressively barking at us whilst we work on the garden and fence, during which we have to keep our dogs inside due to the risk. I do believe that if the Great Dane got through it will do serious harm to our dogs and possibly us too. As such I will be reinforcing the fence with chain link and metal stakes until I can work out what to do with the actual fence. She cannot control this dog, it is never walked due to her not being able to control it. In fact in nearly two years of living here I have never seen it off their property. When it actually comes to removing the rotten fence there will be a risk with this dog loose.
Since my last post I've gone through our house paperwork and any title information I can lay my hands on. The title plan from the land registry simply has two parallel lines marking the garden border. I've measured the widths of the garden, at the front of the garden nearest the house the fence to the brick wall is 23ft, near the shed at the back it's 26ft. So technically there is a 3ft difference compared to the "parallel" lines of the title plan. This is also assuming the brick wall is totally reliable and straight border reference.
Digging through the mountain of paperwork there is a photocopied surveyors (not land registry I believe) plan dating from 1947, being so old and badly scanned the measurements of the garden width are hard to distinguish but it simply has one measurement of garden width which I believe to state 24ft. At the front of the garden this is impossible to be accurate as between the brick wall and the edge of the house by the fence it can only be a maximum of 23ft, there's no debating 23ft. So I don't think the 1947 survey can be totally relied on. That said at this point, I'm tempted to just to stick the fence at 24ft at the rear of the garden and lose the 2ft we currently have. I'm planning to build decking at the rear of the garden and build a bespoke shed, so I don't want to be forced to move the boundary at a later date through legal matters.
Does anyone know if they can force the fence to be moved even though we bought the house with no boundary disputes or the issue being raised at the time.
When we bought the house there was no boundary disputes declared and we were also told of NO neighbour disputes either, though I know for a fact there was police attending for neighbour disputes between the ex tenants and my awful neighbours. Though as we bought the house from the LAND LORD, I'm not sure the non disclosure of neighbour disputes count as it was between the tenants. We are tempted to pursue this with the estate agents we bought the house with as we simply would not have bought the property with full disclosure. Since buying the property there was an incidence in which I called the police to report an harrassment incident about her, since this will have to be fully disclosed when we come to sell the property I don't know what affect on value this will have.
I will be calling a boundary surveyor next week, thinking of talking to citizens advice and thinking of raise a complaint with the estate agent.
Fun and games eh
UPDATE: Since writing this my partner has overheard them actually talking about falsifying claims against over many matters and that the fence has actually been in place for 25 years...
Since she's going mental anyway just get it over with - go back outside and tell her that you're going to be replacing the fence imminently, and that it's going to be replaced right where it sits currently.
Tell her. That way it's one thing off your mind and next job is simply get a fencer in to do it. I wouldn't waste money on a boundary expert.
Tell her. That way it's one thing off your mind and next job is simply get a fencer in to do it. I wouldn't waste money on a boundary expert.
The fence line does look pretty suspect in that last photo to be fair, almost like it was put up to a line extending further and further towards your neighbour as it goes down your garden.
Life is far too short to be arguing over a hedge and a fence, we all know older folks have far too much time on their hands and can easily make your life uncomfortable.
As all the posters above mentioned, take lots of photos. Get as much evidence as possible (surely there were measurements made and checks done when you bought the place). Then get someone in to build a sturdy and tall wooden fence. None of that cheap crap that's already there. Then move on with your life. The neighbours dog will no longer have a chance of getting through, you won't have a fence that looks like toppling over and your neighbours will still be stbags. They're already stbags so nothing lost there.
Take action, you're already worried about the dog battering through and that's something you can fix. You'll really regret it if you sit on your hands and one of your dogs or, god forbid, one of your family gets bitten.
Life is far too short to be arguing over a hedge and a fence, we all know older folks have far too much time on their hands and can easily make your life uncomfortable.
As all the posters above mentioned, take lots of photos. Get as much evidence as possible (surely there were measurements made and checks done when you bought the place). Then get someone in to build a sturdy and tall wooden fence. None of that cheap crap that's already there. Then move on with your life. The neighbours dog will no longer have a chance of getting through, you won't have a fence that looks like toppling over and your neighbours will still be s
tbags. They're already stbags so nothing lost there.Take action, you're already worried about the dog battering through and that's something you can fix. You'll really regret it if you sit on your hands and one of your dogs or, god forbid, one of your family gets bitten.
You are perfectly within your rights to replace the fence, it's normal thing to do. You may need to have a quiet word with your local community police officer though. I can imagine she will be a nuisance so you may well need the support of a local officer to visit her to explain a few facts. Either way just get it done.
My wife often tells me the mistake her family made in feeding their Labrador some left over mince with onions in it.
Apparently, it ruined the carpet.
Op, I would suggest you use slotted concrete posts and go for concrete panels that you can paint, and replace with wooden panels in the future.
Apparently, it ruined the carpet.
Op, I would suggest you use slotted concrete posts and go for concrete panels that you can paint, and replace with wooden panels in the future.
A brick built boundary will be very expensive but clearly he best.
One point I'd add is many years ago a friend of mine had recently bought a terrace house and one side was hugely overgrown and his fence was literally falling apart.
So he went to meet his new neighbours both sides and all seemed pleasant. ...he went for a high quality fence (the one they build as they go along and not just panel fence. Job done on one side (the st garden) and then they were returning after the weekend to do the back section on a different neighbour. My friend went away for the weekend and on his return Sunday early evening he just happened to look out the back garden and to his disbelief the fence was down. It turns out neighbour with st garden got someone in to dig creators around all the posts as in bier view they encroached I to her land by a 1/4 of an inch (just on the posts). He had a hugely heated debate with them on the front porch once they clarified what they had done. He ended up losing 2 inches of his land the entire strip of the garden and had to pay another full days labour to re erect plus there was some damaged bits of fence.
One point I'd add is many years ago a friend of mine had recently bought a terrace house and one side was hugely overgrown and his fence was literally falling apart.
So he went to meet his new neighbours both sides and all seemed pleasant. ...he went for a high quality fence (the one they build as they go along and not just panel fence. Job done on one side (the s
t garden) and then they were returning after the weekend to do the back section on a different neighbour. My friend went away for the weekend and on his return Sunday early evening he just happened to look out the back garden and to his disbelief the fence was down. It turns out neighbour with st garden got someone in to dig creators around all the posts as in bier view they encroached I to her land by a 1/4 of an inch (just on the posts). He had a hugely heated debate with them on the front porch once they clarified what they had done. He ended up losing 2 inches of his land the entire strip of the garden and had to pay another full days labour to re erect plus there was some damaged bits of fence. Be absolutely 100% certain legally where your boundary lies and build a new fence on it. If it's on your land you can stick up whatever you want. Great Dane gets a builder's steel toe cap in the liver. I'll say it again - be 100% certain whatever you build is on your land. You're not going to be able to avoid confrontation so just get it done post-haste.
Buy 5l Glyphosate (Roundup) on Amazon. Apply liberally to any of the creeper on your side, especially to the leaves.
Repeat in two weeks. Keep on cutting back the residue which overhangs your property and offer the cuttings back to neighbour.
Throw frozen sausages over the fence at night (only joking). 👌
Repeat in two weeks. Keep on cutting back the residue which overhangs your property and offer the cuttings back to neighbour.
Throw frozen sausages over the fence at night (only joking). 👌
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