Hi,

As above, Neighbour wants to move a fence 1 ft into my garden

He says a post was put in squint for the previous owner 5 years ago and he would like to correct it this week as he has time.

The deeds just show a straight line. The fence is a bit squint.

I’ve never heard of a story like this ending- after the boundary was moved we both lived happily ever after-. They always seem to end in seething bitterness and acrimony.

My Neighbour is a decent chap. We are civil, nothing more.

We are having a look at it today after work.

Any suggestions for living happily ever after?

Cheers : (

He may seem like a decent chap but he’s dropped this on you at the 11th hour. Tell him no until you’ve looked into it.
Why has he never mentioned this before? and why did he not sort this out with the previous owner at the time?

If it’s wrong, then correcting it seems fine. Just remember to hammer frozen sausages into that strip first.

How much do you care about the 1ft he’s going to ‘take’? Is it obvious that he’s right (or wrong)?

These things become disputes because people get disproportionality upset about ‘their land’. It’ll be as big a deal as you or he make it.

Put the fence on the boundary line as shown on both your deeds. Shake hands, retreat to your diminished garden and weep bitter tears of middle class regret. 🙂

Honestly, if the fence is actually in the wrong spot, and hasn’t been there long (five years isn’t that long), then I can’t see the point of poisoning your relationship with your neighbour over it.

Kill your neighbour.

Mount his severed head on the squinty fence post as a warning to others.

Put a string line up to see how “squint” the fence is and correct it to that line. Make sure you keep an eye on what he’s doing so he doesn’t gain anything outside of what he legally owns.

Shake hands, have a beer, then bum his dug with frozen sausages!!

Kill your neighbour.

Mount his severed head on the squinty fence post as a warning to others.

Bloody amateur, you’re leaving yourself open to revenge from family members there. Kill everyone.

Tell him to put it one foot his way!

Kill everyone.

That would be, quite literally, overkill.

We have two posters advising you to shake hands over it; mods Boris has got two log ins you need to act!

Mark it out. Agree. Virtual hand shake. Walk away.

…and in a month or so bum his dog with frozen Bombers.

Tell him to put it one foot his way!

You need to ascertain whether he’s just OCD or if he’s buried his ex wife or pirate treasure under that bit of land first.

Suggest he gives you 1ft of the rest of his garden to make the fence straight. If he refuses then consider the following:

Does he have an eye patch, wooden leg and talk in a heavy Cornish accent about his resentment for the Spanish Navy? If he does then it’s treasure, if he doesn’t it’s his ex wife.

Depends how obvious it is that it’s squint. Is there an obvious line to draw?

Our garden had a squint fence. Basically 20 odd years ago the previous owner got a fencing co in who just bashed a fence in avoiding anything difficult like stumps and old concrete posts. It was a good bit (18″) inside our boundary at one end. The stumps of the original concrete posts had been left so when I redid the fence I just put it back to those, hard to argue with that.

I’d at least want to see the post hole before he goes and moves the fence to confirm it’s agreeable.

I *think* the cut-off point is seven years to sort such matters out. I have similar – our old neighbour ‘dressed’ his garden to make it look visually like he owned more than he did (this was done before we moved in). I checked the deeds and they showed that I was correct and considered speaking to him about it but decided that it wasn’t worth the hassle because I didn’t actually need the land (it’s just a 3ft deep hedge anyway). He has now moved out and we really like the new neighbours so I have decided to drop it completely.

Edit: 12 years

In respect of unregistered land, a “squatter” may have acquired title to their neighbour’s land (so as to “move” the paper-title boundary line) if they have been in exclusive possession of the land for 12 years.

Plant knotweed in it, tell him to fill his boots, report it to the council next year.

Build a wall. A big, beautiful wall. Get him to pay for it, too.

Sounds like the neighbour actually wants to move the fence 1ft into his own garden?

Kill the neighbour’s wife/family/bummed dog.
Bury them on the 1ft strip in question.
During his dark bereavement stage, help him move the fence.
Call police..”my neighbour buried his wife/bummed dog RIGHT against his fence line…
Move fence 3feet BACK into HIS garden whilst he’s in jail.
Do the same the other side.
Play tennis in larger garden.

DrP

As above, how do you know, how can you find out, how can he prove that the current kink gives you more than it should, and his proposed action corrects it? Could easily be nibbling away at your garden already and his straightening robs you of even more.

Thanks!

That’s cheered me up loads!

@flicker

Yes there is some dropping it at the 11th hour. He works in “building” I suspect he has suddenly got the time to do it. We will be looking at it together today.

How much do you care about the 1ft he’s going to ‘take’? Is it obvious that he’s right (or wrong)?

These things become disputes because people get disproportionality upset about ‘their land’. It’ll be as big a deal as you or he make it.

I don’t know how upset I am, depends on where 1 foot is! I’d rather live happly every after and avoid the

etreat to your diminished garden and weep bitter tears of middle class regret. 🙂

This is my plan

Put a string line up to see how “squint” the fence is and correct it to that line. Make sure you keep an eye on what he’s doing so he doesn’t gain anything outside of what he legally owns.

Shake hands, have a beer, then bum his dug with frozen sausages!!

Well not the last bit : )

You need to ascertain whether he’s just OCD or if he’s buried his ex wife or pirate treasure under that bit of land first.

When I got the place. Under the living room floor boards was completely clean. As in not even a spider web, not one hint of plaster dust or anything. There was a skateboard type thing to move about under the boards. The carpets were nailed down and had paper under them, paper that had faded through the carpets, suggesting nothing had been done under there for 10+ years. Thats where the “treasure” was : ) or something else? The previous owner of my house was hoovering under floor board ocd, that doesn’t tally with any thing squint. The workbench he built is PERFECT and made of 20cm thick boards.

Sounds like the neighbour actually wants to move the fence 1ft into his own garden?

Nope he definitely wants to move it into my garden!

It’s 1ft of garden. It’s not worth the hassle. It’s probably worth a bottle of Lagavulin though.

You could drink it together, passing a quaich to and fro over the new boundary and watch for shooting stars together. You’ll cherish that moment and remain lovers for ever. The fence, and the notional boundary it represents, shall crumble and fade like the shooting stars.

Nope he definitely wants to move it into my garden!

I think the suggestion by @daveyboy is that the fence might be currently going into the neighbour’s garden because of the kink (ie, you currently have some of their garden and he wants it back).

Obvious thing is to mark the legal boundary and put the fence where it’s supposed to be. That way you both get the garden you’re supposed to have. Anyone who complains about that is being unreasonable.

I had a very similar thing, move fence 1ft into my garden it ended up going 1ft the other way.
Don’t expect a Christmas card 🤣

He says a post was put in squint for the previous owner 5 years ago and he would like to correct it this week as he has time.

Why didn’t he correct it five years ago?

It’s 1ft of garden. It’s not worth the hassle.

Awesome, can I have a foot of your garden? At what point does it become worth the hassle? Two feet? Six? All of it?

Obvious thing is to mark the legal boundary and put the fence where it’s supposed to be.

This would seem to be the best course of action. If you can’t ascertain where it should be, then how do you know he’s right and the ‘kink’ isn’t actually in his favour?

I think the suggestion by @daveyboy is that the fence might be currently going into the neighbour’s garden because of the kink (ie, you currently have some of their garden and he wants it back)

Aah! Yes if it is his garden, he is welcome to it back 😀

Obvious thing is to mark the legal boundary and put the fence where it’s supposed to be. That way you both get the garden you’re supposed to have. Anyone who complains about that is being unreasonable.

No complaints, everybody happy and everyone thinks everyone is reasonable is exactly what I’m aiming for!

Christmas cards would be awesome. No Christmas cards Would be the status quo. It’s other things getting posted through letterboxes I’d like to avoid!

Awesome, can I have a foot of your garden?

I have a bit that’s 25m wide and about 3m deep that you can have if you want.

It’s a pain in the arse if i’m entirely honest, but, by all means, fill yer boots.

From a serious perspective, you need to look at the title plan and description.
Even then it can be difficult to determine where the boundary is.

Let him move it the foot, but then when he’s on holiday or something, move his house 1 foot nearer the fence.

That’ll teach him not to duck with you.

…and in a month or so bum his dog with frozen Bombers.

It’s a good job I’m the only person working in the office today as I’ve just burst out laughing.

Insist that he replaces the fence with a wall at his expense. Then knock it down in the dead of night and claim that local kids did it. Escalation! This is war etc

Put the fence on the boundary line as shown on both your deeds

Your deeds are better than mine. Mine have no measurements on and look like they were drawn by a 4 year old.

hols2
Member

Obvious thing is to mark the legal boundary and put the fence where it’s supposed to be. That way you both get the garden you’re supposed to have. Anyone who complains about that is being unreasonable.

The downside with this is that the legal boundary, er, isn’t. Essentially under what is called the ‘general boundary rule’, the legal boundary between properties is not shown on the title plan – that is just an indication as to the area where the boundary is.

Unless the boundary has been ‘fixed’ – i.e. determined by application to the Land Registry by reference to an actual measured survey, then the title plan is only indicative of the boundary lines.

The only way to get a definitive answer as to the boundary would be to commission a boundary survey and then apply to the LR for determination, all of which is quite costly and takes a while, and will deffo get your neighbour’s hackles up!

Even then it can be difficult to determine where the boundary is.

This – at the scale they are drawn, a pencil line would be about 1ft wide at 100% scale 🙂

Why didn’t he correct it five years ago?

It’s 1ft of garden. It’s not worth the hassle.

This. I suspect he’s suddenly got some time off work due to the current situation.

Obvious thing is to mark the legal boundary

Hopefully we can go from an older bit of fence. That would be easy 😀

Unless the boundary has been ‘fixed’ – i.e. determined by application to the Land Registry by reference to an actual measured survey, then the title plan is only indicative of the boundary lines

That’s exactly the sort of thing I would like to avoid

This – at the scale they are drawn, a pencil line would be about 1ft wide at 100% scale 🙂

Even more so if that’s the case! That is exactly the long bitter drawn out thing to avoid.

Hopefully it’s just one foot of garden

Had a similar issue (albeit the other way around) with my neighbour some 12 years ago. We’d drawn plans for an extension, which had all been approved (and the neighbour was fine with them). It was only when we were doing a check immediately before we started work that we noticed that something didn’t add up. After a bit of checking, it became apparent that the boundary fence was nowhere near where it should have been and was some 3ft from the centreline of the two (semi-detached) properties, to the favour of my neighbour. We’d never noticed as they have an odd extension on the back of their house which hid the asymmetry, but it was wrong nevertheless and, annoyingly, in the way of my new extension!

To cut a long story short, went through it with him, reviewed the plans, he agreed that it needed to be moved and we did so. We didn’t take the fence change all of the way down the (very long) gardens, but just a few meters which worked out fine for both of us. Fortunately, with a semi like ours, it was pretty bloody obvious that it was wrong, which makes it much easier to put right and this very much helped the cause.

We’re still living here and still on good terms with the neighbour, so I obviously did something right 🙂

Is there a common sense interpretation of the deeds? Does the fence line follow a building, or kerb line? Does it bisect a gap between two buildings?

People tend not to draw random lines.