Vent: The backyard fence dispute that made me read my deed for the first time

Bought my house in Anaheim 8 years ago and never bothered looking at the actual legal description until my neighbor claimed his fence was 2 feet onto my side. Turns out the old chain link fence was exactly on the line, but the new one he put up wasn't. Cost me $300 for a survey to prove it. Anyone else find something weird in their property records after a neighbor fight?

2 comments

2 Comments

oliver_mitchell28d ago

Long Beach guy here. I found an old easement from 1962 that says my neighbor can run a sprinkler line across my side yard. Nobody has used it in like 30 years but its still on the books. My neighbor two houses down tried to claim I built my shed on his side of the line, turns out the original survey from 1958 was off by 18 inches. Spent $500 on a new survey and found out his garage was actually over the line by a foot. Took him six months to fix it cause he had to hire his own guy. Funny how nobody cares about property lines until someone builds something.

robin48928d ago

That bit about nobody caring until someone builds something is spot on. I had a buddy up in Ventura who bought a house with a fence that had been there since like the 70s. He put up a new one a few years back, same exact line, and suddenly the neighbor comes out claiming it was six inches onto his property. Turned into a whole thing, @oliver_mitchell. My friend had to pay for a survey that showed the old fence was actually over on his side by a foot, so the neighbor had basically been gaining free yard space for decades. Neighbor still tried to fight it until his realtor told him to drop it before it hurt the property value for both of them.