To need to know etiquette ASAP?

[windyfence]

Sorry for the aibu post.
Quick question. Fence between us and neighbours has fallen down. We are not on great terms with them as they’re pretty antisocial, lots of noise and arguments.
He’s just shouted over the fence that he will pop in to talk re getting the fence fixed.
The fence is their fence. We have deeds to show this.
If he asks us to pay half then we don’t need to right?
We are in no financial position to replace a fence that isn’t ours.
They have a big dog that’s not particularly friendly that’s currently bounding round our garden.
What’s the etiquette please?

He should pay, hopefully he’s just going to ask for access while they do the replacement.

Be friendly but don't agree to pay for anything and don't let him try and coerce you into it.

"I don’t care what he replaces it with, as long as it keeps the dogs in their respective gardens"

Good grief!

You know that you can put up your own fence to keep your own dog in, don't you?

I’d offer to pay for some of it just to be nice tbh. You’re both benefitting from the fence

*You’re missing the point. You’re absolutely right that the dogs need to be kept out of each other’s garden. However if neighbour decides he is happy to do this by bringing his dog out on a leash that is fine.

I’ll say again unless the deeds say a fence is a requirement, the only responsibility is maintaining the boundary*

This. He does not have to replace the fence, he just has to keep his dog contained.

If the OP specifically wants a physical boundary between the gardens then their only choices are:

• hope the neighbour also wants one and is willing to pay
• offer to go halves and hope the neighbour agrees
• put a fence up within their own boundary

Agree with Herpes. I've always offered to go halves on things like this. The fence benefits both of you. I always think it's helped me have good relations with neighbours over the years. I always think it make you look miserable and tight if you don't.

I had a neighbour who assumed I was going to go halves on a fence which was his responsibility when he decided he wanted to upgrade what was perfectly functional because he wanted a slightly higher one.

He seemed surprised when I quite bluntly said it was his fence and I wasn’t paying. Think he thought I was joking but said ok when he realised I wasn’t and we’ve been on good terms since. He genuinely hadn’t realised it was his fence and thought a shared boundary meant a shared cost. Your neighbour may be under the same misapprehension.

Gingertam

Totally agree.

My parents paid for half of their fence even though they didn’t need to. I thought they were a bit mad to be honest given they trusted how much they’d been told it cost and also got the rubbish side of the panels on their side. It wasn’t their fence in the deeds, I wouldn’t have offered to pay personally as I wouldn’t in this case.

Everyone knows you pay one side and not the other. He's just being a CF and playing ignorant.

I'd say, "When we moved in I checked the deeds to see which side is our responsibility and it's actually not your side but the other side. So you pay this side but you don't pay your other side, your other neighbour does."

Do not be pushed into it! Suggest a helpful website might be found if he googles uk garden fence law because they all say the same.

Chicken wire for now OP :)

We have the same: fences on one side of our garden are our responsibility to maintain; fences on other side are the neighbor's responsibility to maintain. In the deeds (newish housing estate), and very explicit.

Just be ready to say you're happy to allow access to the fencing company to their jobs properly if necessary and you'll keep your dog on a lead when he's out until it's done. Hopefully, it will be done quickly.

The top part of thefence at the front of our househas blown down, according to the deeds it's our neighbour's however she's an elderly lady with a restricted income, she mentioned getting someone round to quote for it, however it's only the top panels that need replacing (like square trellis) the main fence is fine. DH is off work in a few weeks , so we've told her if it can wait until then he'll do it then and get the panels from B&Q, she's chuffed and has told us to let her know how much to give us, but I know we'll refuse any money offered. She's a lovely woman pretty much housebound other than a few steps out to the garden and money is tight but she always gets DS a little something or puts £10 in a card for his birthday/Christmas and takes our parcels in. I think it's going to cost less than £100 and to us it's worth it to maintain good neighbourly relations.

Oh, and for people who think it's polite and necessary to always go halves in these situations? It's not. And we would get hammered, as we're an 'end' house so no one to go halves with on roughly 2/3s of the fencing around our garden. Neighbors are responsible entirely for the other 1/3.

Look on the bright side, he might just want to talk about a fencing firm needing access to your garden to fix it. You could assume that in a conversation and be awfully surprised if he asked for money

Stand your ground OP. We've just had this. On one side (our fence) is three times as long as NDN on other side. His fence was wobbling all over the place (it's old and rotten and has been repaired/cobbled together a year ago). I told him a couple of panels were about to fall and we had a rose bush close by and didn't want it squashed.

He tried to say... is the rose bush putting undue pressure on the fence..... errrr no, rose bush is like a twig. Then he wonders if it's actually my fence. Ummm NO. We replaced the other side 2 years ago, it's a huge run and cost more than £5K. This is YOUR fence, get it sorted. Yet again, he's cobbled something together but it won't last as it's rotten.

Lionel - How kind of you. What a lovely neighbourly thing to do.

LionelRitchie your post has made me cry (I know, I should get off mumsnet perhaps…). Just lovely to hear about good neighbourly relations and kindness, thank you.

There are two SEPARATE issues:-

1. Maintaining the boundary.

This is his responsibility and he may choose to do this by putting up a fence, the style of which you may or may not like, or not. He could choose to put a piece of string or wire along the boundary so long as it is marked (unless the deeds say it must be a certain type of fence).

1. Keeping the dogs in their own gardens. This is the responsibility of the owners.If only one of you had a dog, that person would be responsible for fencing it in, regardless of who was responsible for maintaining the boundary. As you both own a dog, the most cost-effective way to do this would to share the cost of one suitably secure fence, rather than building a fence each.

I have an 80ft long wall collapsed into my garden, its the responsibility of the neighburs. I told them several years ago it was unstable, they also have a huge hedge which has undermined it and put too much weight on to the wall, They continued to allow their three children to climb on this wall into my garden, they have been very lucky not to have a seriously injured child. My gardebn is trashed, so no I'm not feeling inclined to contribute. I don't expect them to replace it with a wall but a fence is their responsibility

There fence, he pays. Don't let him intimidate you.

We once replaced a panel belonging to twatty neighbours as we didn't want to risk our toddler drowning in their pond and we had waited long enough.

He probably needs access from your side that's all. Ours did when replacing theirs. It was all on their property but they needed someone to support it from the other side so asked to come in our garden. Wasnt any bother.

They should sort it.

This happened with my parents garden during the big 2015 storm. It was the neighbours fence and it fell down, broke in bits and blew all over my parents garden. Neighbours are in their 70's and they paid my dad a decent amount to clear up the mess and dispose of it, and for all the materials to fit a new, stronger one. It's still standing .

Beware we agreed to paying towards fencing and neighbour agreed he owes us thousands that was two years ago.

So the latest is, we’ve got a text message from neighbour. He said he got husbands phone number from other neighbour.
Text says “got your phone number from number 12, please call me wrt fixing the fence”