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« on: October 08, 2025, 03:44:33 pm »
If anyone has any advice, I would be grateful. My father in law is having a bit of problems with the neighbours with respect to boundaries.
His house was newly built 60 years ago on what was pasture, and the boundary was a hedgerow. This area of the garden is an orchard, at far end of property.
Anyway the end by the neighbours had become to be honest a bit unkempt, with a lot a brambles, nettles and bindweed. The hedge had died or was leggy. So I can understand the neighbours might have been a bit miffed. Their end of the garden was no longer secure, and they had to deal with spread of weeds. So far so understandable (Although they did trespass to do so)
Anyway one day we came out to find that much of the hedge had been removed and they had planted a row of laurel inside our property line!
My wife challenged them, and they maintained that they have the correct boundary, and the hedge was put on the boundary. They have since moved some of the hedge to be "within the boundary" as a "concession", but we regard as being on our land.
There was a lot of nastiness (They called my wife a F** B**ch) when she challenged them. So she doesn't want to "have another chat and sort it out"; that boat has sailed.
My father in law thinks the hedge is his. But when I asked, I found that it was not planted by him and was the original hedgerow. The deeds show nothing.
I'm trying to put this to bed.
I am taking it that the midpoint of hedge is the boundary. On the basis that that is the normal situation for a hedgerow unless there's a ditch.
My wife wrote to them , showing a copy of plan of our deeds and theirs (downloaded from land registry), which to me supported our claim of where the boundary was, and that their hedge was a trespass. The plans for the two properties showing boundary were slightly different, and I reminded them that the plan was a ‘graphical representation which only shows the general position of the boundary’ a line I lifted - but didn't credit - from Land Registry website.
We said we intended to resolve situation by putting up a timber fence, at our expense, on boundary*, so garden is secure. We would give them the benefit of the doubt where the lines differed to their advantage, but would mainly be using the line of hedging and my father-in-law's knowledge, as the original and only ever owner. We gave them 2 weeks to respond with any objections.
* I now realise this was a tactical mistake. As putting up a fence on the boundary requires their permission, whereas not so if boundary is wholly on our property.
They replied with section of a copy of their Deeds, copper plate script from 1931, as follows;
In these it clearly states that the 2 side boundaries of our property each measure 150ft. This is obviously more accurate information than the ‘graphical representation which only shows the general position of the boundary’, as you pointed out in your letter.
They then go on to say that they spent a lot of time measuring the distance, putting stakes in ground, to determine distance and boundary.
We very much dispute your statement that we have now planted a hedge on your father’s property, all the roots of our laurels are our side of the boundary.
We do object to you giving us an ultimatum – an agreement between us needs to be reached before any work takes place. We are going abroad later this month and will obviously have to take action if we return and find that you have erected a fence.
We have already spoken to solicitors who deal with boundary disputes and they are ready to act on our behalf if and when necessary.
We hope that our evidence has made the situation clearer, and we are hoping we can agree that you either completely remove the hedge and replace it with a fence on an agreed boundary line or we would not object to a newly planted hedge on the agreed boundary line.
We would be open to having a planned meeting with you to discuss this situation or I understand there are Boundary Disputes Mediation services which can help in these circumstances.
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That sounds conciliatory but here's the interesting thing:
Their deeds do not state this! The deeds say measurement is an approximation! We believe their 150 foot gotcha has no legal merit. To save repeating myself I quote below the relevant section of the letter I have drafted in response:
With respect to your deeds from 1931. You have severely misrepresented this document. You state categorically “In these it clearly states that the 2 side boundaries of our property each measure 150ft”. In fact the document states no such thing. The relevant section defines “a depth throughout of One Hundred and Fifty Feet or thereabouts”. You omitted the key piece of information that the measurement was an approximation and not an exact figure as you asserted.
You also state: “This is obviously more accurate information than the ‘graphical representation which only shows the general position of the boundary”. Again this is a misrepresentation of the title deeds. The relevant section defines the measurements with the caveat “or thereabouts” then explains this is “more particularly delineated and described on the plan”. That is to say that the plan is considered more important than the measurements when defining boundaries. Again this is the exact opposite of what you assert.
To spell it out, the measurements on the deeds hold less weight than the plan. And the plan itself only shows the general position of the boundary. This does NOT grant you the authority of taking a point at a measured 150 feet and declaring it de facto as your property, as you seem to imply.
I haven't sent it.
My questions are.
Is that too strong?
Am I correct translating the legal terminology "Or Thereabouts" and "more particularly delineated...".
Would you consider their claim that "it clearly states that the 2 side boundaries of our property each measure 150ft" as a serious misrepresentation of the title document, or an acceptable emphasis on the point which supports their claim?
Our current position is that we want to build a fence entirely on our land, not on the boundary and not involve them. Hence normally would not need their permission. However we believe that their laurel hedge is on our property. Its based on a measurement which has no merit in our eyes. So we would need to reclaim that land.
We are only talking a foot or two, and the hedge saplings are young.
Is this unwise, without agreement, to just go ahead given that they dispute the boundary?
So how to progress? I am tempted to trap them, by asking them to confirm that they are basing their boundary on the 150 foot clause in deeds rather than any physical barrier. And keep my powder dry about the approximation clause.
And should I mention Adverse possession? If their garden was indeed 150 foot, and we had overlapped their land. Wouldn't this be ours by adverse possession?
Any advise is gratefully accepted. It seems a simple dispute, which could/should have been sorted out amicably in the ideal world. But as the man said when asked for directions "Well, I wouldn't have started from here!".
My father in law is 93 and very upset that "they are stealing my land". We don't really want to get solicitors involved, both for financial and stress reasons.
But would you advise it?
Has anyone used the legal services of Which magazine? Is that worth the £50 or so?
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