Hello, I'm hoping someone can help me work out if this is a reasonable thing for my neighbour to do. I am cross about it but I'm not sure if there's anything legally wrong with it iyswim?
We live in a 1930's semi with its original metal (iron?) guttering which is one long strip from the front of our house to the front of the neighbours.
Yesterday a guy came along and cut the guttering in half at the spot directly between our houses and replaced their half of the guttering with new plastic guttering. I realise this is their right and they can have whatever guttering the like. They replaced the guttering all around the neighbour's house and did the same at the back of our house (cut the guttering in half and replaced their half)
However some things have concerned me here. Firstly we now have an open untreated metal end on our guttering which will be exposed to the elements and unprotected. We had our guttering painted last summer to ensure it was still protected. Secondly they have laid the overhang of the plastic guttering inside our metal guttering for support and, I assume, to make a 'seamless' end. Our neighbours didn't mention that this work was going to be carried out.
Please can I ask where I stand on this? Am I over reacting as I feel as though they have damaged our property by cutting the guttering and leaving it exposed. Would there be an expectation in law that they should make good the place where our guttering now has exposed metal?