Garden and party wall neighbours problems help!!!

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Hi

I really hope anyone can advise us as we have tried everything.

We have the neighbours from help. Old brother and sister and one is a councillor as she likes to tell us!

We wanted to build a conservatory with decking area so applied for householder development. We didn't realise the party wall act existed so dug some soil away to put in a minor retaining wall so we can have a decked area, this is about a foot high, madd from sleepers and goes up toour neighbours existing wall that is in a bad state of repair and falling apart. Hope this makes sense.

Because we didn't know about the party wall act they have been very controlling and got us to change our plans to suit them. They wrote a 2 page complaint letter about the conservatory- generally irrelevant stuff as they won't be able to see it. The planners visited and told us we need planning permission for consrrvatory which is fine. But that the gardening is ok to continue including the sleeper wall.

Our neighbours are extremely unhappy even though we changed our plans and it doesn't affect their wall in any way. They are rude and always watching us. They even complained about the planner and told her they were watching her out the window. So the planner told us the best thing would be to erect a fence which we were planning on doing anyway.

So we wrote a letter to notify neighbours- trying to be nice. They wrote back saying they might sue us for deliberately damaging their wall and trying to hide it with a fence- some of the render has come off but the whole wall is falling off including the capping stones so it wasn't us doing any damage. They have made all sorts of horrible claims. I have offered for us to either:

1. 're render the wall ourselves then erect the fence
2. Give them a bit of time to fix it
3. If they aren't going to let us fix or them fix then we erect the fence anyway

So my actual question is:
Is there anything they can actually do???
I know the fence is ok to put up but I don't want to get into worse conflict as we have 2 young children. Can they sue us for anything??? Would they have a leg to stand on??

We can try the following if you think it's a good idea:

1.Complain to council was she keeps trying to use her position as a councillor to intimidate us

1. Get solicitors involved as step dad is a solicitor
2. Get a surveyor in to help with the party wall problem but ££££ and I'm on maternity and broke. ( conservatory is second hand and self buikd)
3. Tell them to leave us alone and sue us if they want to

This is stressing me out and as I'm at home all the time it's making me really angry having to watch them

You are supposed to get a party wall agreement in place . It is meant to protect both sides, but yes it does mainly benefit surveyors.

Without a party wall agreement in place they can get an injunction for you to stop work until you have one. However, this is costly upfront to them, about £3k.

We were in your neighbours situation. There was no party wall agreement in place. They did a lot if damage which they refuse to pay for. We will have to use them for the money, which is frankly too stressful.

We understand that we are meant to have one but we just didn't know anything about it. The work was very minor and has finished and we did everything they wanted us to do to try to make up for the lack of party wall agreement. It a 1 foot high sleeper wall which butts up at 90 degree to their wall. No foundations as they asked us to attach the closest 3 sleepers to the others so we didn't dig near the foundations of the wall.

Bearing in mind this is fine and we can't turn back time, what would you do?

We didn't do any damage, the wall was already broken and my toddler pulled off the render when I want watching!!

Done even not fine!

And I have offered to fix the wall even though it was already damaged and it isn't even my wall!!! Just to keep the peace

We didn't do any damage... my toddler pulled off the render

So, you did damage the (admittedly already dodgy) wall.

I would take photos to document the state of the wall (it should be obvious it is in a poor state of repair and has been for some time.)

You are at fault here. Saying I didn't know is not an excuse. Your toddler pulling render off is damage.

Perhaps start again with the attitude that you not your neighbours are being unreasonable.

Hmmm ok I just assumed that a 3 year old shouldn't be able to pull part of a wall off.

So if we assume that we did damage the wall- how can we move forward as we have made an offer to fix it, bearing in mind it's a boundary wall and the bit the toddler pulled is on our side of the wall.

And we want to put a fence up to prevent toddler damaging wall further/ being hurt by the wall as it has a bit crack in it as well as preventing the extremely nosey neighbours watching our every move.

Trust me, they won't sue. Legal advice, injunctions etc. cost thousands. The law is not as black and white as you think, we had issues like this with our neighbour and the Party Wall Act actually didn't apply in the end. We were lucky, we got what we wanted eventually - he massively damaged our boundary - and he had to build a very robust retaining wall. We had to go down the legal route to get this, but our fees only amounted to about £1k in the end. You need to be careful about what you offer, as it could be seen as tantamount to accepting liability. You won't be able to keep the peace with people like this, sounds like they have a massive chip on their shoulders.

Have you got pp for the conservatory yet? It is not up to the council to inform you about party walls act and if your foundations will be within a few metres of their house you still need to follow it. I suspect they won't go down the legal route but could make objections which protract the process.

Thanks for your advice, we just want a harmonious relationship for our children's sake that's why we have changed our original plans. But they are out threatening us with everything being ripped out, knowing more than us etc. I wouldn't mind if they did it in a nice way to give us advice but I wish I could upload the letter as it's so rude.

Thankfully the bit of render that has been pulled is at the far end of the wall.

No the conservatory is next to our other neighbours. The old couple could only see it if they were in their garden.

I think you need to be conciliatory. You are in the wrong and they're probably cheesed off because you've bypassed the process. I would go round with a bottle of wine and say you want to start again and come to an agreement, talking through etc. It's probably worth a last try to get on with them.

Are you sure it's their wall and they own that boundary? Check your deeds.

Is your wall attached to theirs (not allowed without permission)? Or just built on your side and butted up against theirs (perfectly legal)?

What sort of council is the woman on? Parish council? County council? In either case there's nothing she could do, if the council discusses your wall she would be required to declare that she's an interested party and leave the room. I'd definitely report her if you can prove she's trying to use her post to intimidate you.

Sorry - YABU

You "didn't know" about the party wall act. You have damaged their wall. You have possibly dug foundations near theirs - this can destabilise and further damage walls - but you don't see it til it slips

You do need planning persmission although you started without it. You obviously did not consult or discuss or advise them of what you were doing. Essentially you just did it and they are the neighbours from hell??

Apologise, be as nice as you can and sort it out legally. Offer to replace or underpin their wall?

Little bit harsh I feel, even The planner who came round said that the is no chance that the work we have done would damage their wall. We didn't dig near their foundations as there isn't really any as it's a less than 1m high garden wall.

As for being consilliatary we have been and tried to discuss face to face and also by letter admitting fault and offering to fix and have changed our plans so it has no impact on their garden wall. However they refuse to open the door and instead write inflammatory letters.

At least the council are more forgiving than you lot!! They have said that we are in the right and have done everything that we possibly could apart from not getting the party wall act before beginning- which was an honest mistake and since realise g we have done everything possible to put it right.

I feel if I could post a picture this thread would have had a very different response

Post a picture then! As you started your work without pp maybe they assumed the worst.

How do you post a pic? Doesn't give me that option

There should be a paperclip or option to upload below the reply box

Option 4 here! This is a storm in a teacup. I'm really surprised by some of the replies here.

What are they actually going to sue you for? What is their loss in this situation? The cost of patching up the render your toddler pulled off?! They'll be laughed out of court. I'm not actually clear on what their problem is at this point. It sounds like you've been more than reasonable.

Ignore that one is/claims to be a councillor (of what?). Doesn't mean a thing.

It's not clear from your description whether the Party Wall Act even applied to the sleeper wall but it would probably have been over the top to follow the Party Wall Act process for it anyway. I wouldn't have and I'm a solicitor!! It's important to realise that the Party Wall Act, even if it applied, wouldn't have stopped you from carrying out the work.

What do your neighbours actually want? I would try to agree with them for the wall to be removed and replaced with a fence. If the wall is in very poor condition I'm not sure a fence will adequately protect you/your toddler. If they can't be reasonable just crack on and put a fence up and stop reading their angry letters.

Some neighbours are just arseholes and it seems like you have them.

You didn't dig out foundations you removed a bit of soil to level out a sleeper. I would film the state of the wall, detailing with commentary how bad it is remembering to say the date at the start.

Then I would get a fence erected on your side of the boundary and go for the maximum height you can. Some people make everything about them, whatever you do must be about them. It is nonsense.

It takes a lot to sue someone. The planning person has said that you have done everything correctly, your neighbours appear to be over-reacting about the party wall act.

As for attaching pics, if you are on a computer ie not your phone there is a "choose file" button under the box where you type.

Just because she is a councillor doesn't mean she has some magic power that prevents you building your conservatory. Clearly planning is applied for, let it take its course.

Have you actually looked into the Party Wall Act? It's not designed to help neighbours prevent others from doing work, so if you have planning permission and the planner has said your work is within limits, they have no official grounds to complain. But you should have had an Act agreement signed, so I would speak to a specialist surveyor asap about how to serve notice on them retrospectively. It will cost you a few hundred quid, but it'll give you peace of mind.

I don't know if you're new to mn but new users can't post pics just in case. Well you can imagine what some new users might post.

Thank you for your responses, this is what I was hoping that there is little they can actually do. So far they have ignored my response suggesting they they or we fix the wall before continuing. We plan to give them a week to reply, then will write a letter stating as they haven't responded they have up to a set date to respond, then we will build the fence anyway.

I am new so that's prob why it won't let me post a picture. Just thought that mums know a lot about this stuff!!

OP I think there are 2 aspects to this - the legal situation and the neighbour situation. The law of these types of situations is not user friendly because it's costly for the aggrieved party so they're unlikely to do anything about it. That doesn't mean you're not in the wrong and they've found the whole thing very stressful. You have failed to get a PWA (and youre supposed to serve the notice 2 months before you start work to give them an opportunity to get advice if they needed it), you didnt get planning permission and you've damaged their wall. So objectively you can see why they're annoyed or stressed. Don't send arsey letters, it will just make everything worse. Speak to them in person.

Secondly from a neighbour point of view - unless you're planning to move, you're going to have to live next to these people for a good few years. It's surely better to be on polite terms than falling out and potentially having conflict in the future.