Another boundary issue

jmBuildExt

Hi..., effectively hypothetical as i don't intend doing anything about it...
But we just bought a house - typical semi D in an estate.
The neighbour on the detached side has evidently done some recent enough work (extension etc) and they have re-built the wall between our two houses (obviously, it wasnt mine when they built it). Its about 1.8m high and solid block. and drops down to 1m where the gates are at the side of the 2 houses.
I cant remember the exact dimensions.... (and ive attached crude diagram)
But the wall is about 150mm closer to my house than it is to theirs (thats the main part of the wall if you get me).
The piers then are also on my side meaning I am left with about 650mm where the pier is. The gap on their side is about 900mm.
The margins may seem insignificant, but this affects me in 2 ways.
1. I've been planning building works in parallel, and this is my only access (apart from through the house).
2. Part of the building works is to externally insulate - if we externally insulate the side of the house we wont get a wheely bin down it.


To be honest, i'm not planning on saying anything about it - they came out and welcomed me when i first arrived and seem like nice people. My house was rented previously so maybe they took advantage of the previous owners absence....
Of course - that may well be where the boundary is and they may have done nothing wrong at all. Which brings me to my question.
How would I go about proving it (mainly for my own peace of mind). Are the maps that are used that accurate to notice a difference of 100-150mm. Would it be a given that the boundary in this situation would be 50% of the way between the 2 houses?

There's no evidence on the ground, all the concrete was resurfaced on their side.

Calahonda52

Your starting point is who ever you used to do the legals/pre purchase house survey.
You bought as is so you have no redress against the neighbour?

I assume you are NOT saying that the front garden was rebuilt as well, which would mean a new gate on your side also.
What do other, non extended houses look like?
whose side is the pier on in the other, non extended houses?
For boundary work
http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/2009/act/27/enacted/en/print#part8-chap3

jmBuildExt

Calahonda52 wrote: »

Your starting point is who ever you used to do the legals/pre purchase house survey.
You bought as is so you have no redress against the neighbour?

I assume you are NOT saying that the front garden was rebuilt as well, which would mean a new gate on your side also.
What do other, non extended houses look like?
whose side is the pier on in the other, non extended houses?
For boundary work
http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/2009/act/27/enacted/en/print#part8-chap3

Cheers for that.
Like I say above, I was aware of it before I signed any contracts. And I bought with the intentions of not doing anything about it. (and i still don't intend doing anything about it)
I'm not looking to back date any blame on any professionals.

This is simply for my own pig iron.
The wall was totally rebuilt from front to back, the length of the boundary between the 2 garden walls. There's a square pillar at the front. There are no gates at the front on my side. They have gates on theirs but they are probably as new as everything else.
Its hard to tell what.
wrt to the piers - Im not sure what was there originally. Most of the houses have been updated, estate is almost 50 yrs old. I know on the attached side, there was a wooden fence and the neighbours on that side have also built a new wall (it looks as fresh as the other wall - but different cappings, so prob built at different times)
But ignoring the piers, the wall is still closer on my side.

Anyway....
I was just curious to know if the maps that are used, to define the boundary, are accurate enough to pick up that much of a difference.

What do you hope to achieve from this?

You knew the layout before you bought.

Metric Tensor

You are correct re the accuracy of the maps. Land registry maps in towns are usually at a scale of 1:1000. (There are certain circumstances that are different but for discussions sake we will stick with 1:1000).

At 1:1000 a pencil stroke that is 1mm wide will correspond to an entire metre on the ground. The margins you are talking about 0.1m-0.2m will be 0.1mm-0.2mm on the map!

It would be unusual for the wall to have been built as it currently seems to be so my guess is that the neighbour took advantage at the time of construction.

From your point of view though you bought what you have and had you any issue with it you should have queried it with the vendor when you were buying it. Your best way of dealing with it now is in person with your neighbour.

Hypothetically:
You could, for example, agree with them to knock the wall in order to allow builders to access the back of your house and agree to suffer the full cost of the rebuild yourself. Then when you go to rebuild it you get their permission to rebuild it dead centre.

jmBuildExt

Thanks for reply. You've answered my question.

Metric Tensor wrote: »

Hypothetically:
You could, for example, agree with them to knock the wall in order to allow builders to access the back of your house and agree to suffer the full cost of the rebuild yourself. Then when you go to rebuild it you get their permission to rebuild it dead centre.

I had thought of that alright....
I'm tendering at the moment and have had 5 builders out. Most of them said they could bring stuff through the house. New windows throughout so they will be able to bring diggers etc through the openings. So the builder access thing is solved.
We'll make up for the lack of external insulation by doing what we can internally (although its by the stairs, so has its problems) So we will still be able to get the wheelie bin down it.... and that's all I ever really used the side entrance for in my old house - so it will serve its purpose.

Deleted User wrote:

What do you hope to achieve from this?

This investigation is very important. It determines whether I can justifiably talk about them behing their back or not

Metric Tensor

Metric Tensor wrote: »

Hypothetically:
You could, for example, agree with them to knock the wall in order to allow builders to access the back of your house and agree to suffer the full cost of the rebuild yourself. Then when you go to rebuild it you get their permission to rebuild it dead centre.

Hypothetically: the previous owners could have come to a similar arrangement with the neighbours, and the OP has bought the outcome of that.

Metric Tensor

Yup. That's 100% possible.

In a way it doesn't matter because the OP bought what he bought and knew what was there at the time. Caveat Emptor, etc.

Mellor

Calahonda52 wrote: »

Your starting point is who ever you used to do the legals/pre purchase house survey.
You bought as is so you have no redress against the neighbour?

It's not a used car.
He purchased a title which is a legal entity, not a wall in the garden. The neighbour building on land that isn't his doesn't make it his.
Buying it as-is also includes any boundary encroachment present.

Mellor

jmBuildExt wrote: »

Are the maps that are used that accurate to notice a difference of 100-150mm. Would it be a given that the boundary in this situation would be 50% of the way between the 2 houses?
.

Unfortunately there's unlikely to be a boundary map detailed enough for your purposes. Especially not if it's 50 years ago.
Can't be assumed it was dead centre either. It's worth pointing out that if they did move the wall significantly to your side, they'd have to modify the driveway and path on your side too, not just their own side.

my3cents

Is it possible that the OP "owns" the wall and the wall is built on his property? Even if the neighbors rebuilt the wall it wouldn't make it "their" wall if it they were just rebuilding a wall that was originally the OP's.

Conversely the neighbors may have inadvertently given the OP the wall by building it on his property.

BryanF

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=101816178&postcount=14

Worth a read

Edit: start with section 4b

Edit: you need to prove original boundary line first, did the surveyor pick this up?

mikeymouse

You could have a look at Google street view, I think 2009 is the earliest like this
Or perhaps OSImapviewer 2005 (with a magnifier), or some other
aerial maps.
On another note as 3cents said it could be your wall, built by previous owner.
the fact that the pier(s) is on your side lends credence to this,
but it's unlikely they'd build it from the front drive/garden straight through to the back of the back garden giving away 6ins the complete length.
But you never know maybe that 6ins was paid for
If however the "nice"neighbours moved the boundary it was very cheeky,
and putting the piers on your side was even more cheeky(assuming there are no piers on the their side}
Have a cup of tea with them and say you are having some building work done
and plan on building out on to "your" wall and see what they say.

jmBuildExt

I had looked at old pictures on street view alright... But it was inconclusive due to the angle the picture was taken at...The van would have had to be smack bang in the middle of the side entrance to get a good shot.

However, I had a walk around the estate and I did see a couple of situations where there is one gate noticeably narrower than the other AND it looks close to the original setup - i.e. there was no wall at all in the front garden up as far as the gate. Further... on the maps, although the detail is small, it does look like the boundary line is closer to my house than theirs. And in at least one of the "original looking" examples i've seen in the estate, where the gate is smaller on one side, The line on the map is in a similar position.
So I think I accept they have a larger side entrance than me ... only thing questionable is the big dirty piers on my side...

On my house, The street view pics do show a hedge in the front garden between the 2 drives, then a metre or two of a small wall leading up to the big wall where the gates are.
Cant tell from it if there were piers on my side or not. There's none on the small wall in the front garden... and the gates are closed so cant see into the back....
I'll put this to bed - thanks again for all the replies