Can I adopt a tiny bit of land at the bottom of my garden (photos attached)

[BG2015]

We've cleared the bottom of our garden and are undecided whether to replace the rotten fence or remove it and fence either side and adopt the 10 x 10 foot no mans land.

Currently it's full of rubbish that next door have thrown over plus tree debris etc.

Next door have incorporated their extra bit into their garden and is a football area for their son ( see picture). They have lived in their house since they were built 15 years ago. The house next to them have also done it. We have been here 5 years. We aren't going to put anything on it just incorporate it into our garden.

There is a large fir tree that would also need to be cut back quite a bit (hesitant to remove it as it gives privacy). We've tried to read up on the law but it's very confusing. My solicitor did mention it when I bought the house but I wasn't totally sure what she meant (messy separation and head not in the right place)

Any advice would be great.

We've similar and if it's got.a.right of.access you'd be required to maintain this for the other houses. Regardless of whether they currently use now or not.

I'm the third house from the road.

After talking to a few people on our estate it appears that it was originally a walk way through to the carp park show home (leading to the very large plot).

Once the estate was completed and the car park was then built on then land became unused and overgrown and many people have incorporated it into their gardens. One person I spoke to says it's unregistered.

So it's not a wildlife corridor or for privacy at all. Whether it's legal who knows.

As others have said, I'd strongly suggest seeking legal advice. I also strongly suspect the answer is no I'm afraid. You've got another house behind that "no man's land", so why should your claim to this land trump one they might also have? If the plot is that tiny it's not worth adding to your garden, it's likely to be a wildlife corridor and your final nail in the coffin is that given the size of that tree from the pictures you posted I'll bet it's under a TPO. In which case you're looking at a huge fine and potential prison sentence for cutting it down. (We were house hunting last year and got put off a couple of properties as they had trees with TPOs in them, it's very hard and costly to do anything to them. All this and I promise it will bring you extra cost and grief if you ever decide to sell. Sorry OP, I know that's not what you want to hear.

As a planner we do see this quite often. I imagine what happened is that the builders only bought the land within which your houses and gardens sit. The narrow strip of land was probably unregistered then so they couldn’t buy it, nor could they legally include it into the new plots (well they could but it adds a lot of red tape) so they built up to the boundary and left the strip alone.

Then over the years your neighbours gardens have ‘crept’ to include the land.

I would say that no one owns it, it’s just a bit of random land that no one owns and if it were me I’d put up a new fence to include it into the garden. I’d just be prepared to take the fence down if challenged in the next 12 years!

Ps you can check on your councils website if the tree has a tpo, it looks like a leylandii though so I doubt it has.

What does the OS map show? It looks like an alleyway from the pic you posted. From what's been discussed it's pretty clear we can't be much more use - you need to either do it and hope for the best or get a solicitor involved.

I'd listen to @Funnyfive

Thank you everyone. We are going to think about it.

To be honest it would add costs to what we want to do so it needs to be thought about.

You can check who owns it for £3 on line, then I would contact the owner and ask if they would sell or give you permission to use it in exchange for you maintaining it. Many of these odd bits are like Ransom strips and whilst people want to keep them they dont want a maintenance / repair bill so sometimes will allow others to use.
The only potential issue is if they come and look they might see what others have done and kick off