Fence/hedge problem.

[storm_rider_]

My neighbors landlord owns the property that backs onto my place and owns her place to. Recently there has been some disagreement between us and it looks like the landlord is looking at developing the back section and putting up fences i think partially to appease the women in the back. My place doesnt have a back or side fence, just her drive and a big hedge along part of it. Our kids play on our bit but sometimes stand on the drive and kids from next door come over to us across the drive to, She has rung the cops on them three times now for thinking they were staring and stuff like that. I have tried resolving it rationally now the hedge/fence thing is about to happen.
The land lord i talked to briefly the other day about a fence on the back and seemed approachable so i'm going to try and track him down and contact him.

Now my question is i bought this place assuming (yeah i know wrong thing to do, lol ) that her drive way and my hedge was the boundary and same with the trees at the back of the house which are all large and established. Now this is one of the main reasons i bought it. There are alot of tuis and other birds that hang about and its all good. A surveyor has now come or atleast someone has and it shows part of what i thought was my land is actually a double drive and the hedge is almost entirely on the other side leaving me pretty much no trees if the bowl everything.

Do they actually have the right to just up root the hedge and is there any standing from when i bought the house two years ago to argue about the width of the drive etc.

Im cool if they want to join a fence to the hedge and put one across the back and take out the big big trees, im more concerned about the hedge and what taking that out will do to my property.

[Tan]

Unfortunately if someone else owns it you have no say. The boundaries can't change without a title change which is expensive, and you may also have to pay them for the extra bit of land.

You will need to appeal to their nice side. Is there some other solution to a fence?

[storm_rider_]

The surveyor and the owner were here today and they were establishing the back boundaries of there section and had a talk with the owner about the hedge and tried to see if we could come to some form of arrangement about it. He said a couple times we need a double drive because back section or shown that way. If it meant i have to pay a bit more rates to keep the hedge then id do that but yeah its not looking good.
He still isnt sure whats happening with the section yet as still no plans drawn. Im pretty sure alot of it is driven to just appease the women that rents the house.

[Ivan McIntosh]

I think you're out of luck with any leverage regarding the hedge...if it's within their land, they can remove it. A tree might be a different story.

However the situation might change if they are considering developing the back section in such a way as to require your consent (to their planned development) to avoid a full resource consent hearing. In that circumstance you might have enough leverage to extract a concession. Doesn't sound, though, like these are happening contemporaneously......and to be honest if the land in front of the hedge is not actually on your title they are unlikely to agree to a solution that continues to make it look as if it is your land.

One query...how long have you lived in the house? Have you effectively exercised possession and control over the area between the hedge and your dwelling during that time?

Regards
Ivan McIntosh

[storm_rider_]

I have owned the house now for a couple years, just over 2 years and up till recently no problems at all regarding the hedge. I did talk to the land agent that sold me the house and they had no idea on the boundaries either other than the guessed one at the back. They did say though when the back section and the house was for sale that quite a few people looked at them and thought about developing them but all come to the same conclusion that it was to expensive to develop easy which i think will be a good thing for me. I have decided i'll put up a fence my side of the boarder at the back and run it into the hedge and hopefully it will slow down or stop anything else that may happen. Worth a try any way

[Ivan McIntosh]

Sure...but there is no reason for you to bear all the cost of the fence.

If you really need a fence on the boundary now, and the hedge isn't anywhere near the boundary, talk to your neighbour about putting one up (ON the boundary, not completely inside your property) and paying half the cost as per the Fencing Act 1978.

On the other hand, if you put it up entirely within your land, the adjoining owner has no say as to what type of fence it is or how high it is (within Council limits), so it's y our call. Just wouldn't like to see you paying the full cost when you didn't have to...