Name changed for this just so my previous posts don't become identifying.
We live in a old terraced house with an odd shaped garden. Our borders are all 'party' ie shared with neighbours, and this is specified in the deeds. Beyond that though, there isn't much specific information - eg the border markings aren't very exact. We know a fair amount about the previous owners through another neighbour - they had a bad rep in our town for being rich but tight with money, for context.
Our garden is on a hill so it steps down. On the right side is a long wood panel fence. Deeds specify that it was paid for & therefore owned by previous owners of our house - I can imagine they would have done so reluctantly.
Left hand side is an old brick wall. Not in the best condition, and only waist height, so no privacy from the neighbours next door..
Our house was occupied by an elderly lady before us, who didn't use the garden. It was
obvious when we moved in that neighbours on the left didn't like the change re privacy - they lent bits of tat up against the wall to block the view etc. I saw the guy in the garden once and mentioned Id be interested in some way of raising the height if they'd be interested - he said it was a good idea and to let him know.
Covid hit and delayed is looking into it. Finally got a quote - to repoint the wall and put posts and panels on top. Went round to neighbour to ask what they thought (we weren't asking for any money) and neighbour was really arsey with us - saying it was their wall, not ours. Adamant that previous owner (of ours) told them that. I asked him to check his deeds, he wouldn't. Hasn't spoken to us since. I suspect previous owners told him the wall was his so they didn't have to maintain it to be honest!
The thing is, we can't do any work without agreement. An alternative is we dig up our side of the wall garden and put a fence the whole way down. This would mean narrowing our garden by about a foot, as well as losing our 'half' of the wall (and expensive because we'd have to take out a rockery and part of a patio) But it would mean privacy, and not having the neighbours studiously ignore us when both houses are using the gardens (gardens are long but narrow so that's really obvious) But DH is reluctant as then neighbour 'wins' by getting more garden, a nice ledge for the plants and a nice fence.
I don't particularly want to do anything nice for this neighbour but I can't see an alternative. AIBU or is DH? And would anyone know if there's anything we could do to prevent neighbour from essentially redrawing the boundaries if we did this (eg later claiming that the new fence constituted the end of his land?)
Sorry didn't realise it was so long!
TL/DR - should we give up part of our garden for a fence because stupid neighbour won't agree to raising the height of a wall?