Deeply unpleasant neighbour with right of way over our land.

[05884124807521689064216a]

Sorry this is in the wrong topic. Couldn't find a legal section. Any lawyers about, I would appreciate some guidance. Having difficulty finding the right person as it involves mild harassment and a right of way. I've tried to condense but it's clearly not my strong point.

We recently moved into a home accessed by a lane belonging to a farmer. We have access over the farmer's part of the lane and he has right of way over the part of the lane on our land. It's the only way he can access the fields at the end of the lane. The lane ends on our land, with a field. The farmer ceremoniously drives up the lane every Sunday afternoon and reverses slowly back, without acknowledging us. Strange but fine. Beside our home is a cottage belonging to the farmer. It's occupied by a tenant of the farmer who is 'warden'. Technically he also has access over our land because he 'cares' for the land. (He doesn't care for the land, didn't care for the horses there over the winter and never needed to go down this lane until the weather got nice enough for walks, but that's beside the point). This warden seemed over-involved from the start and he's clearly lonely. He generated drama by encouraging us to go into one of the farmer's fields for a walk, then making out we were in trouble because we had done this. There were variations on this theme and we realised it was just drama being generated by someone who likes drama. Eventually we told him we would communicate directly with the farmer in future and we backed off. Then the trouble began.

We have to walk/ drive past his home to get to the road. He allows his dog to intimidate my children (who love dogs so this was quite difficult to achieve), rushes out with weedkiller if we walk down the lane, stands waiting for me at the top if I'm out on my own, throws our wheelie bins over the hedge and eventually blocked the lane completely with his car one night to rant at my partner. Much swearing, vague threats and apparently he has a side we don't want to see and we should feel warned. We haven't dealt with this before in our lives and yes, we felt threatened and worried.

He walks into the trajectory of my car when I drive past and then uses his outrage (because I don't slam the brakes on - why would I when he's not on the path?) to come and rage at us in front of the children as we're getting out of the car. He will 'accidently' swerve his wheelbarrow into our path as I'm walking the children up the lane. It seems mostly a cry for attention. He will now go and stand in our lane to have a smoke, just because he can. It doesn't sound like much and we've established that there's not enough here for police or civil action. Someone has mentioned a 'binding over of the peace' - does that sound like a possibility? We have horses, small children, dogs that could easily be harmed. I'm concerned he'll do something to my children's ponies and break their hearts. We found an elastic band around the neck of our dog the other day that had to be cut off by the vet and while it was probably our own fault, I hadn't seen that elastic band before. It's reached the point where we're quite happy for him to vandalise the wheelie bins if it keeps him occupied but obviously it's escalating because we continue to be a happy family going for walks and not bowing to him as monarch of the lane. I feel extremely stressed knowing he can pop up anywhere on our land and he doesn't stick to the lane, either. There's no point putting up a gate because he can just walk through it, as warden. He has also announced that if we meet his car when we're driving up the lane, we must reverse out onto the main road again if he's more than halfway up it. Sounds fair enough but the opening is on a blind corner that needs a mirror to get out with, even going the right way. I will not be reversing out of it but I'm concerned he'll scare the children and force us to abandon the car in the lane if we do meet him (it hasn't happened yet because he never goes anywhere).

So we're spending a fortune on CCTV, as the police advised, and keeping a harassment diary. We'd like to build a stone wall around the front of our property. It would be around 8 foot high and would border the part of the lane we own (which we're happy to write off for the sake of peace). It would cut off a great view but at this point, the only view we have is this man striding around anyway. I just want it all to stop. We spoke to the farmer to try and resolve this without a result. My partner has a condition that makes him vulnerable to COVID-19 if he's experiencing a flare-up and as these are related to stress, we'd like to move on from this issue as quickly as we can.

My questions:

• If you have right of way over a property for the purposes of caring for the land beyond, can you go there just to loiter and have a smoke?
  
• Is there a legal process whereby a judge could order that the lane be used for the purposes of accessing the land beyond only and not for going back and forth over our land (as he is currently doing)?
  
• Is there any legal reason why we wouldn't be able to build an 8 ft stone wall bordering the land on our own land? There would be no dwelling near it except our own home (and the warden's cottage, which is link detached to our farmhouse).
  
• Minor side issue - is the farmer within his rights to drive a half wild stallion up? He clearly can't get a headcollar on it and just drives it in front of him, at a gallop, from his quadbike. Without a heads up. Did I mention we have young children.
  
  I'll continue to hunt for the right solicitor to help with this but everyone seems to have experience of either right of way or harassment, but not both.
  
  Thanks so much if you have read this far.

[Honeyroar]

To be honest a lot of farmers around here drive everything around on a quad.

[Thisisworsethananticpated]

Appreciate this isn't good advice

[Fanthorpe]

Looking at the Highway Code there are particular rules for horses, including on pathways on private land

‘ It is important to note that references to ‘road’ generally includes footpaths, bridleways and cycle tracks, and many roadways and driveways on private land (including many car parks). In most cases, the law will apply to them but there may be additional rules for particular paths or rights of way.’

It’s splitting hairs though, I’m guessing the horse is classed as livestock if it’s an unbroken stallion.

[Sunnydayshereatlast]

Does he have pigs op?
They like a good body....

[Collaborate]

If you have right of way over a property for the purposes of caring for the land beyond, can you go there just to loiter and have a smoke?

No. A ROW entitles the user to pass and repass. He cannot loiter for a smoke.

Is there a legal process whereby a judge could order that the lane be used for the purposes of accessing the land beyond only and not for going back and forth over our land (as he is currently doing)?

He is not allowed to stray from the lane. Provided he is sticking to the lane there's not much you can do.

Is there any legal reason why we wouldn't be able to build an 8 ft stone wall bordering the land on our own land? There would be no dwelling near it except our own home (and the warden's cottage, which is link detached to our farmhouse).

Planning rules restrict its height to 2m without planning permission.

Minor side issue - is the farmer within his rights to drive a half wild stallion up? He clearly can't get a headcollar on it and just drives it in front of him, at a gallop, from his quadbike. Without a heads up. Did I mention we have young children.

I don't know about this. There may be some equestrian rules but if not he can take the horse down the lane. He still owes a common law duty of care to other users of the lane.

[Pineapple1]

He's obviously alone and sad.

Make friends with him?

Have your partner (a man?) try and find some common likes and bond over it.

If he likes you, he will stop.

I know, I know, why would you want to befriend him after all the nonsense he's done... Well... It may be your ticket to stopping him.

[05884124807521689064216a]

Some answers to the advice given here, for which I'm very grateful. I'm waiting for a call back from our solicitor regarding the easement and what exactly it is. We don't seem to have a record of it but we'd need to have to explained by him anyway. We'll also look into our insurance. We're planning to ask our solicitor about writing to the farmer to point out that any damage their warden does while loitering on our land will be their responsibility, now they are aware there is video evidence of him making threats. As they can't imagine him doing any damage, this might not worry them. They have supporting the warden aligned with protecting the right of way in their minds.

The farming couple are elderly, have known the warden for a long time (he's not old though) and they 'won't hear a word against him'. They aren't interested in maintaining good relations with us at all, possibly because he's told them we tried to kill his dog and trespassed on their land (this was when the warden 'invited' us to go for a walk - he didn't tell them that part and they clearly didn't believe us when we apologised and explained how it had happened). They have no interest in making this go away by creating a second entrance (I'm not even sure they could). As far as they're concerned, the new occupants are 'difficult' and that's that. Which is so far from the truth. We're too busy to be difficult and our previous neighbours have always been very saintly people who we've loved. We're not hard to live beside.

To all those warning against getting heavily involved in all this, thank you. I've taken your words to heart. Whatever we do, we won't spend thousands on this (except for the wall, which we'll build with planning permission and all the right permissions). If the wall and a serious legal letter doesn't work, we'll have to cut our losses. We can't buy for a couple of years anyway. I'd thought there were harassment laws to stop people behaving like this but it seems you have to be decked with a crow bar first.

I suspect the reason that this place was in budget was because the previous owners were distressed sellers....Your family who owns the house needs to sort this and you need to move.

It was valued at roughly the asking price. We chose this house (can't blame family members at all) and had all the appropriate checks done. It's the kind of house you fall in love with or you don't. Our family members are going through a difficult time and we can't add to their troubles, or strain the relational dynamics of a family business we all rely on. The previous owners of this property were tough cookies who took the farmer to court over a squabble about land. They sold up because their family was grown and wanted to build something smaller. The house is several hundred years old and was bought as derelict by the previous owners and restored. There's no reason to think anyone else wanted it. I know nothing about the cottage attached (on the other side of a shed) but it looks like it was maybe a quarter of the original structure. The farmer lives in a farmhouse closer to most of his land. He just has two fields here and the warden has been 'caring' for the land for many, many years.

How did your dash cam get broken? Are you saying that he broke into your car and broke it?

No, not really. It mysteriously snapped in two when I left my old car unlocked overnight. Which I won't do again! The dogs are never in the lane though, we're not that naive. They're in our back garden.

Make friends with him?

I can see that is good advice in a way but now we've seen what he can be like, I doubt there's any way back. Even when he was originally on a brief charm offensive with us, I felt very uncomfortable around him.

HasaDigaEebowai Thanks for the advice and I'm sorry you've had to go through similar. We're also happy to write off our part of the lane (which we weren't attached to anyway and didn't realise we owned!) and just have peace. Just to know there's no threat on our home turf is all I need.

Sometimes someone who seems so blatant and overt in their actions can cower like a scared puppy in the face of a (police) uniform.

He doesn't mind the police and he doesn't mind a solicitor's letter. He has great faith in his powers of persuasion.

fodderbeet

I don't think you know us. We don't want to be cursed at and we don't want people who have made violent threats visiting our property for a smoke. If they're actually passing through to care for land or whatever, fine. The Sunday visits (which we were happy to tolerate) were definitely to make a point. I've lived in the country all my life and no checking went on (nor, sadly, feeding or watering of the livestock in the field beyond). As we thought they would, the visits had tailed off (just when planting began and there was something to look at each week!) and began again on the day coinciding with our phone call asking for some help with the warden. Hard to see how we can both not build a wall and have our children out of harm's way as this leaves the children unable to step outside the front of the house. Perhaps you need to take this up with whoever this is really about. Victim blaming is really not nice.

[makingmammaries]

I personally don’t think you should move.

If you can enclose your land, get a couple of big outdoor dogs. Anatolian shepherds would be ideal. They are gentle with children and animals, and naturally suspicious of strangers to the point that they won’t take food from them. We have two and they scared the bejeezus out of our malicious crazy neighbour, just by being massive.

[snitzelvoncrumb]

I was just going to suggest a well trained guard dog, along with the wall. Once you have surveillance look at taking him to small claims court for payment of damaging your property.

[LucyLikesDiamonds]

Understand if your family members are going through a difficult time, you don’t want to make things worse by adding your current issues but this is serious. Your dc are scared to use the lane, you’re worried for the safety of your family & pets.

Tbh I don’t think a wall and cctv will make things any better, in fact it might antagonise the warden to do even more and if the farmer won’t hear a bad word said about him you’re fighting a losing battle.

[LucyLikesDiamonds]

I wouldn’t have a guard dog. People like the warden would probably use poison, he’s accused OP of using it so I wouldn’t put it past him.

[Everything1sFine]

Getting a guard Dog would have a bigger impact on their loves than moving house! At least if you move it’s over. If you get a guard dog you’ve got a guard dog for a over a decade.

[fodderbeet]

Hard to see how we can both not build a wall and have our children out of harm's way

Really? The only enclosure you can possibly think of is an 8' wall? Are the surrounding fields enclosed with 8' walls? Plant a hedge, put a stockproof fence up, but a garden fence up - plenty of options to enclose 'your land' while allowing free access to the lane. Look around you, what are the other field boundaries? What encloses the farmers bit of the lane? And just out of curiousity, do you ever walk or drive or ride on it? Ignore whatever happens on the lane. Forget that it is 'your land', who cares if an old bloke smokes there for a few minutes, does it really matter?

I feel a bit sorry for the farmer tbh - you've recently moved there and already walked in their fields, fallen out with their long-term tenant, spoken to the police, you dislike him accessing his own land and you've sent a solicitors letter - of course he sees you as 'difficult' - any sane person would!

All you can do is relax about it all and start to enjoy living there or move. If you quit with any feelings of ownership of the lane it seems as if most of your 'troubles' will go. Everyone else has been using it long before you got there and will continue to do so long after you go. That's the nature of land ownership - you just get to look after it for a while ready the next person.

[Hazysummers]

Fodder beat are you serious?!

How on earth have you read this thread and concluded that the OP and her family are at fault?

They didn’t trespass on the land purposefully, the warden told them to knowing it’d get them in trouble. This loon has vandalised their property, potentially harmed their dog (dogs don’t just randomly get elastic bands around their neck) made threats to the OP and her family and all in all sounds unhinged.

The farmer may be pally with the warden but tough, the warden is a deeply unpleasant, sinister person who is causing the OP and her family a lot of discomfort. She’s entitled after all he’s done, to have a grievance against him.

OP,

I would personally want to move but as you’d rather try and stay, I would defo proceed with the CCTV and as another poster suggested, get dummy cameras and real cameras, he won’t know which is which and hopefully if he does try anything, one of the cameras will pick it up.

I’d defo build the wall, or a very high fence with security gates too. I just hope your horses are enclosed with you and not down the lane where he can access them.

[DameFanny]

@fodderbeet - being deliberately led onto someone else's land by someone acting maliciously isn't the same as dancing through a wheat field. And having that same warden intimidate you and make trouble for you isn't the same as 'falling out'. And quitting feelings of ownership over the lane will make fuck all difference if that same malicious warden is on their land and attacking their dog.

Are you being deliberately goady or do you just like blaming victims?

[05884124807521689064216a]

Thank you to those who have suggested a guard dog. I don't think we could manage a puppy/guard dog at this point because we have so little time as it is and it would need to be perfectly trained with children around. I don't think it would be fair to anyone. Our current dogs slot right in because I did the puppy years before having children. But it would have been a reassuring presence!

I think if we can just secure the perimeter, we'll be able to see if this is something we can live with.

Fodderbeet If there's one thing we've learned to do recently, it's not to get emotionally invested in someone's else's issues if they can be ignored. I'm haven't read your latest post and I won't. You have a great day and try a different thread.

[05884124807521689064216a]

Just to clarify, the ponies, paddock, dogs and stables and everything else would be behind the wall and the farmer will be able to continue using the lane without our involvement. If this doesn't work then yes we'll have to move despite what that will do to family dynamics.

[fodderbeet]

Oh quit with the victim blaming bollocks. Most of the issues stem from the use of the lane on their land. If the lane is seen as a public road most of those issues instantly disappear. It's the easy route to less stress - guard dogs would increase stress levels everytime they barked and wouldn't be good to have around children.

And I will always stand by an 8' wall not being the best countryside fence (unless you lived on an estate a couple of hundred years ago). Put a fence/hedge or whatever up that is in keeping with the surrounding area.

[fodderbeet]

Actually, thinking about it - are you quite isolated or is there anyone else nearby that doesn't like dogs? His has 'been poisoned' yours has had an elastic band put around it's neck - you're both blaming each other - could it be someone else?

[fodderbeet]

Ah bit of a cross post there - sorry to see that you've chosen to ignore my posts, but happy to see that you do infact agree that forgetting about the lane is the best way forward.

[allgoodthingsl]

The house isn't 100% right for you if it comes with a dangerous nutbag

[ComeBy]

Walls are really expensive to build.

Won’t he just chuck stuff over?

You have to declare any disputes with neighbours when you sell if it has involved the police.

[FixTheBone]

The 'right of way' is a very vague term, the exact terms will be spelt out in the legal agreement or covenant that is attached to the property deeds.

We have a similar access arrangement and ours clearly says ' to allow the passage of people or motor vehicles for personal transportation to the property..... '

So in our case it is to get from the public road to their boundary or from their boundary to the public road, I have had to make it very clear to them that does not include letting them race their bikes up and down the access road along side our cars etc..

[snitzelvoncrumb]

Look on line, there are bound to be different security devices you can get. You might find one that will alert you if someone is on your property so you can activate a flood light.

[mummmy2017]

Is there any way you could buy a field from the farmer, so you buy his right of way, and the warden no longer gets access to your land?