Neighbour put up new fence on different boundary , Legal ?

My neighbour of a few years decided to erect a new fence yesterday between our gardens,its his fence so i left him to it , but now all the posts are in (badly) , he has gone to a different boundary point in his garden, narrowing his own garden and widening mine near the bottom by about 2 feet ??? I know ive gained land in my garden but can he legally do this ?? and what are the legal problems gonna be if we decide to sell next year and move on ?? .. any comeback from this ?
Shall i just go round and tell him its gotta go back as it was ?

narrowing his own garden and widening mine near the bottom by about 2 feet

I don’t see a problem. Tell your buyer that he did this and, technically, the neighbour owns the last 2ft of their garden. Can’t see that’d put off anyone and maybe in time they might be able to formalise the new boundary as some form of tacit consent ?

One way to look at it is that he has simply put a fence up on his land. The boundary hasn’t changed.

The boundary is dictated by the red line on the title deeds registered with the land registry. The fence line is irrelevant. Although in practice of-course people will view the fence line and assume it is the ‘correct’ delineation of the boundary. But it isn’t. If it’s in your favour I wouldn’t get too bothered.

He can build a fence where he likes on his land . If you sell you need to point out the actual boundary to your purchaser to avoid confusion .
On the other hand start cultivating and using the extra bit without secrecy force or permission. Keep it up for twelve years and it’s yours.

Thanks for this :), Ill let him get on with it then

Aye, leave him to it.

My folks had a neighbour build their new fence a metre over the boundary. They took it down again when prompted.

He’s moved his fence so the bodies are in your garden now.

Yup like crankboy says look after it for 12 years, if your neighbor doesn’t remind you annually who’s land it is then its yours. In the simplest of terms of course.

Have you looked at how the boundry is marked on the deeds? Maybe he checked, and has corrected the fence accordingly?

Start a small cannabis farm on the extra bit of land. Claim your neighbour did it. Get him sent to prison. Problem solved.

if your neighbor doesn’t remind you annually who’s land it is then its yours.

Please explain?

We have the opposite issue, there’s a drain cover right on the boundary between us and the neighbour, so our garden fence (wall actually) starts inside our boundary, follows the line of drain cover and then once past it dog legs to the actual boundary.

The surveyor picked it up when we bought it and the solicitor wrote a letter to the previous neighbours (they’ve since changed) to get them to confirm they have no rights to it, which they happily did being a lovely old couple.

As such it’s legally noted, etc. Is that enough or does it have to still be notified annually.

I don’t know if the new neighbours had the same noted in their searches. Or if the previous neighbours disclosed it to them on purchase. It’s valueless to all intents because it’s only about 2ft x 1 ft, and has a drain cover on it….. but could be an issue if we wanted to extend and wanted the full width of our property, in which case we’d resite the drain anyway.

if your neighbor doesn’t remind you annually who’s land it is then its yours.

Please explain?

The Law of Adverse Posession.

As such it’s legally noted, etc. Is that enough or does it have to still be notified annually.

It’s not actually an “annual” thing, but as CB refers to: no secrecy, no force and no permission are the keystones.

You may wish to inform the new neighbours though.

Who’d a thunk my degree might actually have something useful in it?

Cheers Stoner.

My parents acquired some land that way, they were advised that the original owner had to remind them annually. I suppose that could be if the land owner didn’t change the boundary markings back?

I also acquired some the same way when the school erected a new fence around 4 feet further back from the original.

What if you cut the grass on that bit of land?

Is that allowed or are you going to have to put up with a small stretch of messy grass next to your tidy lawn ?