I’ve lived in my house for going on 15 years now. It’s a nice place, quiet street, or it used to be. About 5 years ago, new people moved in next door. Let’s just call them the Millers. Nice enough at first, waving and all that. But then things started to get… messy. On their side, I mean.
See, the fence between our properties has been there forever. It’s an old chain link. Not pretty, but it did the job, sort of. My side is all neat, I got a nice little flower bed and a paved path. Their side, though, it’s like a jungle. Weeds growing through the chain link, big bushes that are practically trees, and they got this huge rose bush that just kept pushing its way onto my property line. Like, literally growing onto my side, making it hard to walk by without getting scratched or having to step around it.
I tried talking to Mrs. Miller about it, real polite like. I said, “Hey, your rose bush is really coming over onto my side, making it hard to walk.” She just smiled and said, “Oh, it’s just so pretty, isn’t it? It grows so well here.” Didn’t offer to trim it or nothing. And the weeds, man, they were just a nightmare. I was constantly pulling their weeds out of my flower bed because they’d just grow right through that old chain link.
I figured, enough is enough. That old chain link wasn’t doing nothing to stop anything. I wanted a nice, solid privacy fence. The kind that looks good and keeps out the mess. So I went over to Mr. Miller and said, “I’m thinking of putting up a new wooden fence. It’ll look real nice, block out all the weeds and stuff. You wanna go halves on it?”
He got all huffy. Said, “We like the chain link. It lets the light in for our plants. And we don’t have the money for a new fence right now.”
I told him, “Look, I’m gonna build it anyway. I’ll put it right on the property line, where the old fence is.” He just shrugged and walked away. So I took that as him saying, “Do what you gotta do. I don’t care, just don’t expect me to pay.” Which is fine by me, I just wanted the fence.
So, I hired a crew. Good guys, knew what they were doing. They came in, pulled out the old chain link. Now, when they were digging the post holes for the new wooden fence, some of the concrete from the posts, and, you know, just a little bit of dirt and roots, ended up on their side. And that rose bush? It was right in the way. It was practically hugging the old chain link, so when we took it down, the bush was just right there. We had to dig up some of its roots to get the posts in correctly. It was unavoidable. You can’t put a fence post through a plant, can you? We had to make sure the fence was straight and strong.
They also had some other plants, little green ones, I don’t even know what they were, but they were basically growing on my side of the property line under the chain link. We had to clear all that out to put the new fence in straight. It wasn’t my fault they planted stuff right on the line. I mean, if you plant something on the property line, you gotta expect that it might get disturbed if someone puts up a fence, right?
Well, the Millers came home and saw the fence going up, and boy, did Mrs. Miller get mad. She started yelling, “What have you done to my roses? You’ve destroyed them! And my prize-winning perennials!” She was pointing at the rose bush, which was looking a little sad with some roots exposed and some branches snapped from the work. And the little green plants were gone, obviously, because they were in the way of the fence.
I tried to explain. “Look, I told you I was putting up a fence. Your plants were on my side of the line, or right up against it. We had to dig to put the posts in. It’s not my fault you didn’t move them when I told you I was going to build it.”
Mr. Miller came out and started saying I was trespassing, destroying their property. Said I should have given them more notice, or made sure their plants were safe. I told him, “I told you I was building it. You didn’t do anything about your plants. That’s on you.”
Now they’re threatening to take me to small claims court for the cost of their “destroyed” garden. They say the fence is too close to their property and that I should have moved it a foot onto my own land so their plants would be safe. But why would I lose a foot of my own property for their plants? That makes no sense. The fence is on the exact property line. That’s where it belongs.
I think I was perfectly reasonable. I told them I was building the fence. It’s on the exact property line. Their plants were either over the line or right up against it. What was I supposed to do? Not build the fence? Let their weeds and messy bushes keep creeping into my neat yard? I don’t think so. I just wanted my yard to look nice and for them to respect the property line, which they weren’t doing.
Am I The Jerk for building a fence on my property line and clearing out plants that were in the way?
Tell me what you think. I just wanted a nice fence and my property respected. It’s my land, after all.
