Building wall between our back garden and neighbors

TetrisLover

Hi,

The fence in the back garden between our house and the neighbors is in terrible shape and after some windy days, the fence is leaning on to their side. We'd like to have the fence replaced by a wall. The length will be around 12 meters and desired height would be 2 meters.

I have couple of questions regarding this:

1. How does replacing fence that is between two houses like this work? Should we expect the neighbors to pitch in towards the cost? The neighboring house is occupied by 6-7 lads from Romania who seem to work in construction. As I understand, the house is rented by them. I had knocked into the neighbor to ask for some help replacing a fence panel that had been done in by gust and one of the lads weren't friendly at all with me given we had called out a gas inspector the year before which resulted in both houses having to have the boiler fixed. I'm guessing these lads would have no interest at all in paying towards it so if the cost isn't mad, we wouldn't mind getting it done ourselves.
2. If we do decide to have builders come out and get it done, do we just need to ask for their permission for the builders to access their side if required to get the wall built? We have a large concrete shed towards the back of our garden right beside the fence so I'm guessing building the fence along the shed will have to be done while the builders are on their side of the garden.
3. Lastly, would anyone have any idea on how much this may cost?

Thank you.

Sleeper12

You need to find out who owns the fence. If it's the neighbors fence then you can't touch it without their permission. If neighbors don't want the wall then you will have to build it on your property rather than the shared property line. It's totally up to the neighbor if he wants to chip in with the cost or not.

First thing I would do is to talk to the neighbor and get their opinion on the fence /wall

tphase

I reckon you'll need to talk to their landlord

SVI40

Find out who the owner of the property is, and go to them.

Calahonda52

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121593199#Comment_121593199

Sleeper, hope 2024 find you well.

This Chapter 3 from the Land And Conveyancing Law Reform Act 2009

sets out the issues here to offer a solution when the neighbours say no to access.

It requires a court order which are quite common, and most folk when they find that saying no will not fly are amenable sans the court order., especially when it is posing a danger, so courts take a dim view of that sort of screwing around.

In any event, the tenants are not the issue here, its the landlord

It does not address cost sharing

https://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/2009/act/27/section/43/enacted/en/html#part8-chap3

TetrisLover

Thanks everyone. I will see if they'll be okay to give me their landlords contact details and take it from there.

Supercell

Our fence blew over last winter and i discussed getting it replaced with a brick wall, with my neighbour but once I got a quotation they baulked at the cost so in the end we just got the blown out panels replaced. Brick walls don't come cheap in my experience, like 4 times the cost of just getting the whole thing replaced with concrete and timber which was another option we looked at (also too expensive for them).

I offered to pay for the concrete and timber fence but they said they didnt want that obligation hanging over them..pride is a factor to consider here... Thread carefully is my advice.