Boundary issues
Obsurvus understand how sensitive, frequent and life changing a boundary issue can be, read our top tips for boundaries/neighbourly understanding.
- Communication – It is ALWAYS best to talk to your neighbour. Don’t assume motives or actions. If need be, talk it out between yourselves and even with others present who could act in a calming or a devils advocate role.
- If you’re going to do any gardening, construction, painting or maintenance in or around your boundary, make contact with your neighbour to explain why, when, where and what. Taking the time to explain to your neighbour and allowing them to maybe voice an opinion might help you avoid future disputes or disagreements.
- Sit around a table with documents and plans. Talk but do the listening too.
- Don’t assume you can interpret and measure your own property/plans/deeds accurately. Surveyors spend many years studying, working and defining distances. Surveyors measure, it's what we do.
- Get some advice. We can help you, solicitors and the citizens advice bureau can assist. A quick conversation on the phone could clarify factors in minutes.
- Think of the bigger picture. We have seen costs rise very very quickly when a boundary dispute ignites. The costs can be anywhere between a few hundred pounds to many tens of thousands of pounds.
- Get a professional. A chartered surveyor is what you need. Ideally acting on a joint instruction from a solicitor.
- Be prepared for costs, it’s not cheap. Just to initiate a boundary dispute could cost one thousand pounds or more.
- It’s not just your boundary that matters. The boundaries in the surrounding area matter too. It’s no good acting on a single dimension on a plan. These plans weren’t necessarily as built and structures weren’t necessarily built according to plans. Consider the rest of the street, where does your property sit in relation to the properties in the surrounding environment? Are they all shifted in a certain direction, or is your property/street an exception to a common assumption/rule.
- It’s complicated. The more you dig on the subject, the more you’re finding, right?
Talk to Obsurvus about your boundary issues. We are not here to sell you our services, we are here to help.
