Request from new neighbour

[Amber76]

We are due to move into a new estate in a few weeks. I've being going to baby groups in the area already to get to know people.

I met the neighbour whose garden backs onto ours. She seems very nice and our kids are similar ages. She asked me if it would be okay if her ten year old uses our garden as a shortcut to main estate. She is outside the estate in an older house which doesn't have a footpath outside it on the road. Her child seems lovely and her friends live in the estate.

I was caught off guard at the time and said i didn't mind but when I said it my dh later he said no way - what if child fell over wall? started bringing friends through?, etc. He's right and I'll have to tell her we're not okay with it. How can I do this nicely without causing tension before we even move in?

if you agree, over time - around 12 years, it will become a prescriptive right-of-way for anyone living in her house to use "the path" her daughter has created over and through your garden

This is not true.

I also need a diagram before I can comment.

I bet 99% of posters would not actually be OK with a child walking back and forth through their garden whenever they liked

I wouldn't mind if it saved him a walk but I'd say term time only and no one else.

Hello no. A new build will involve fences/walls up to 6ft. Even if you have a gate out the back and a gate to the front it means you can never lock the gates on the inside. Anyone can walk in and steal garden furniture etc. Yes I know you can steal it over a fence, but carrying it out the door is easier.

I would never be able to relax/do what I wanted if I was always expecting someone could just walk through.

It's not being neighbourly etc, it's being cheeky as anything. I really doubt that all these posters would willingly leave all their gates unlocked for children to walk through their gardens when they're sun bathing, playing with children, sitting with partner having a glass of wine in the evening etc.

Just no.

We have a similar set up and stopped it. People know our garden isn't a right if way, we bought it to be private and checked that no one would use it. Anyone that does gets told. Seeing ransoms or even people I know makes me jump like anything walk past the window

What is the child currently doing?

I wouldn't want anyone walking through my garden every day. It's just a privacy thing.

When I was a child our house and a couple of the others down our street backed on to a field and we had a gate that opened on to it. A neighbour asked if her kid could use our garden as a cut through and, like you, my mum was a bit taken off guard and said yes. It was a bit of a nightmare. They weren't badly behaved but suddenly, it was like our garden wasn't private any more. Her daughter would amble through whenever she felt like it - you'd be sunbathing or gardening or whatever and you'd look up and there she was gawping at you, or we'd be having lunch in doors and we'd look through the patio doors and there would be this kid staring at us. Eventually there was on day where she came in and out across our garden four times in the space of an hour and my mum said enough is enough.

I know it doesn't bother everyone but if you are someone who is quite anxious about privacy, it's no-no.

I would say that the child and her mother have been used to the house being empty and have been using it as a short cut. They now want to continue even thuwith fhsomeone is living there.

Say no. My dad built the tiny estate where he lives, where I grew up. People knew him as the builder, as a neighbour and friend. Cutting through our garden took nearly half a mile of their journeys from the village to home. So they cut through. It was bloody annoying and it took fifteen years or more to stop them. In the end, my dad had to build a wall to block access down the side of the house.

What if you said no and child got knocked down walking the long way round?

That would be the fault of the parents or the driver of the car.

Would you have to keep side gates unlocked all the time?

I would hate someone walking across my garden but then I am a miser.

"It takes a village to raise a child." Funnily enough I only hear this phrase when people want something from you. The rest of the time they don't appreciate your involvement in their child rearing.

Surely the child would have to be climbing over a fence or wall into the garden. Who has a gate into someone else's garden if there is not a right of way?

charlastonchaplin That has not been my experience.

I would hate it. Maybe that makes me mean but the loss of privacy would be unacceptable to me.

I don't understand how this would work in practice. You say your garden backs onto hers. Is there a fence between you and a gate, and how do you get from the back of your house to the front - is there a gate that you will need to leave unlocked to allow access?

I have no need to use the back of my house for access so my back gate is kept more or less permanently locked. I wouldn't want to leave my gate open just so a neighbour could use my garden for access to their own house. It's all very well being neighbourly but by leaving your gate open it means that any Tom Dick or Harry can easily get round the back of your property. Do you mind this?

I am very security conscious and whilst I know that gates can be climbed over there is no point in making it easy for those who may not be as honest as your neighbour. Also there may be a time when you want to keep the gate locked to prevent your children playing out in the road.

We need a diagram.
But my answer would still be no

Why don't you give it a few weeks, before you decide? Saying yes doesn't mean yes forever - and it'll actually be easier to say no if he comes through at inconvenient times/lingers/brings mates.

And on the up side, they'll owe you one. Need a neighbour to keep an eye on your property when you're on holiday? Accept parcels? Come and help you on moving day?! They're the ones to ask!

i'd see how it went - I'd probably ask to make sure they lock the gates/doors behind them. Do you object in principle to the privacy violation or are you worried about random possibilities? If it's all the what ifs, I'd see what materialized and deal with it then.

I dunno, I'm not sure someone hard faced enough to ask someone they barely know, for access through a property they haven't even moved into yet, is thinking in terms of "owing you one", or will quite happily take "no more" once it's an established thing.

Those asking if there is a gate between the houses.... it is a ten year old boy being discussed. Presumably he'll vault the fence, just like he'll do every time his football lands up in their garden.

And just like OP will want her kids, once they're old enough, to be able to retrieve balls from their garden without going round (on the road, as no footpath) to knock on the front door.

What if you said no and child got knocked down walking the long way round?

I'm sorry, but that's a bit absurd. Children walk to school on the pavement every single day of their lives instead of going through other people's private property, and their neighbours are absolutely not responsible if those kids come to any harm. If you refused to give a random child a lift to school every day in your car, it wouldn't be your fault if they got injured in a bus crash.

My sister agreed to something similar. She backs onto a field and the estate runs in an crescent around the field. Children wanting to use the park have a massive walk around the crescent so in a moment of kindness my sister agreed one or two of her friend's children could use her garden as a cut through.

At first it was OK, then it became general knowledge this was an 'approved' shortcut and most of the kids started using it.

My sister still didn't flinch, then toys started going missing from the garden, the gates were being left open and litter was being discarded.

She tried speaking with some of the children/parents but it didn't improve so she locked the gate and her garden is private again.

I'm all for being a positive part of a community but I'd be inclined not to agree to the shortcut, we live in a world of far too much blame and entitlement.

Need a neighbour to keep an eye on your property when you're on holiday? Accept parcels?

They are at the rear and not in a position to do either. No parcel delivery driver is going to drive the apparently long way round the estate to this other house to deliver a parcel on the off chance they are in.

I did a bit more digging on the internet, and found this:

"Another method of acquiring a private right of way is through length of use. This is a fairly well-known method of acquiring a right of way.

Put simply, you can usually acquire a right of way over someone else’s land provided (1) you have been using the right of way with sufficient regularity for a period of at least 20 years, (2) the right of way somehow benefits land you own or of which you are a tenant, and (3) you have not been using the route in secret, by force or because someone has given you permission to use it."