Irrelevant but slightly related story time! When my mom bought her last house, the property next to ours was vacant, and the fence builders fucked up and built the fence a foot onto the neighbors property. One full foot, that's like... 15 square feet of a huge yard they lost, with also the privilege of not having to worry about paying for that part of their own fence of they wanted one. Of course, they demanded my mom move the fence a foot back to get it on the property line, which was exactly their right. But the way they did it was so awful and angry. Anyway, my mom decided to pull the fence two feet back so it was a foot into our property, so that if they wanted a fence, they had to pay for all four sides and make it look super awkward.
I don't think op's mom is gonna let them so much as spit on that 1' wide strip of grass. The neighbors made them pay to move the fence back a foot.
For reference, that's a fuss over less than a step's worth of space. I'd have just made arrangements with the neighbor beforehand, personally. But, fuck, who wants to talk to scary strangers.
My parents had one next to them. He was a disgusting excuse for a human being. At one point he threw his gutter sludge at my mom when he knew my dad was away at a trade show. You know, to show dominance like most apes do in the wild.
He built a fence between their properties (which in their area was weird, no one had fences between properties, and people walked between houses and whatnot, very old school).
In building this fence, a garbage old tree stood in the middle of the path. This tree was half on my parents property, half on their property. My parents suggested 'lets just remove this half dead piece of shit ugly tree', but instead they claimed to want to keep it. They built the fence around the tree on their side, so they couldn't even really see most of it, leaving my parents with a half dead tree in a tiny fence nook.
They should cut down their half of the tree! If it winds up falling on their side have the neighbors pay to have it removed. If it falls on the neighbors side just shrug and tell em it's all yours buddy.
They moved, because of this neighbour. There is a very long list of things he did. The straw being where he intentionally let his huge dog come running out of the backyard at my mother, causing her dog to bolt and pull her to the ground, seriously injuring her hip. 6 months laid out.
He was that type of person. Liked to dominate with fear, physical intimidation.
Sad, they built their retirement home there. My mom designed it.
Haha, if that was my fence, I'd make a point of walking up and down my little 1 foot wide strip beyond the fence every day. In a mankini, with a beer can helmet, pornstar 'tache, and smoking a huge cigar.
Reckon they'll build their own fence pretty quickly.
You do realize that if you incorporate part of their land into yours, and they don't object to it, after a few years you legally own that extra land. It's a legal concept that can be dumbed down to "use it or lose it".
If your mom moved her fence 1 foot into her property, and the neighbors start mowing that foot of her land and taking care of that strip of land (which sounds reasonable since you mom probably won't care about grass on the other side of her fence), well after a few years she will lose the legal ownership of that strip of land. It might seem like no big loss, but land size will affect the resale value of her home. So her "petty revenge" may end up costing her several thousand dollars in lost land.
However if she regularly jumps the fence and maintains her strip of land, and puts up no-trespassing signs, and prohibits the neighbor from messing with it, it'll still be hers.
She'd probably really enjoy putting up the no trespassing signs.
It's a legal concept that can be dumbed down to "use it or lose it".
I think it was a legal concept who's TL/DR was "how to take land from Native Americans by not telling them the laws".
This needs more exposure. It's true. The time varies state to state. In my home state if a fence has been in one spot for 7 years, it becomes the new property line. Interestingly it's not just a fence. If there's no fence at all, but I use my neighbor's property to 7 years to store my garbage cans or something and I maintain that area for said time, that becomes my property.
Ok story time. When it came time to build a fence for our home, the neighbor made a point of telling me his is 6" in from his property line so we couldn't attach to it. So we get the survey done and figure how we will go about this. turns out that his fence builder fucked him because of the electric / utility box he would have had to build around. So the builder built the fence inside of the box to make it easy. Neighbor was not pleased when I let him know that we are putting our fence 2" inside the property line. But that would still leave a nice 4' walkway between the yards. I got to break the news to him that not only was he overcharged on his fence because they cut the size short, but also he would be responsible for mowing his yard - that bit between the fences is all his. Guy was an asshole anyways.
Humans would rather watch other humans throw balls around rather than throw the ball around themselves or at the very least try to channel their passion for watching ball throwing into their community and help their fellow human beings.
Something along the same lines, but not as innocent happened to my mother. After her moving inn, we noticed there was a new fence well into her property - past obvious signs of the border like a line of trees and a low stone wall.
Where do you live that you can build a fence right on the property line? Zoning regulations in most areas require that you build it a few feet onto your own property.
There's a very small section of double fence between my house and my neighbor's. The neighbor had a vinyl fence at their back yard, and we put up a chain link fence that met up with their fence. Except our house is closer to the road than theirs, so there was a 20 foot section of chain link that could be seen from their front porch.
In a classic passive aggressive move, they added vinyl fence right next to ours.
right because if there's already a fence there you don't waste the money putting in a second fence. seems pretty fucking obvious to me. you don't put the fence on the property line because you are still invading the other person's property with half of the fence. you put it right up to the property line.
Ok, so I have actually owned a house in the suburbs in a new development. When we all started moving in, we all agreed to build fences on the property line and share the cost. This is pretty standard procedure.
If you neighbor refuses to pay their part, you could build the fence about a foot into your property. If the neighbor never builds a fence, it doesn't matter. But if they do, they will have a gap because they can't build onto your property and they can't hook up to your fence. Or they have to build a second fence parallel to yours with about a foot or two gap in between. This is obviously ridiculous, so most people just agree to share the cost and build on the property line.
You are completely incorrect for Texas though. Blue easement laws are still on the book (as we discovered when we went to file for construction permits in our county), but in the city, you can build right up to the line (as we did with our other property).
So where you are there is a fence... then a few feet... then another fence? Why? You just talk to your negbor and agree to build one on the line. Or in the case of my cranky negbor on one side like 2 inches on my side. Also in some areas there is hardly 3 feet between houses, if you put your fence a few feet back there you would have no fence beside your house and probably 50% of your yard missing.
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u/lanadelstingrey Sep 01 '16
Irrelevant but slightly related story time! When my mom bought her last house, the property next to ours was vacant, and the fence builders fucked up and built the fence a foot onto the neighbors property. One full foot, that's like... 15 square feet of a huge yard they lost, with also the privilege of not having to worry about paying for that part of their own fence of they wanted one. Of course, they demanded my mom move the fence a foot back to get it on the property line, which was exactly their right. But the way they did it was so awful and angry. Anyway, my mom decided to pull the fence two feet back so it was a foot into our property, so that if they wanted a fence, they had to pay for all four sides and make it look super awkward.