Which side of the fence is mine?

The two beliefs that come up on almost every job are both wrong. The first is that you own the boundary on your left, or your right, as you face the house. HM Land Registry addresses it directly: people often think they are responsible for the left or right hand boundary wherever they live, but there is no legal basis for it. The second is that the side carrying the posts and arris rails belongs to the owner. Land Registry Practice Guide 40 is equally blunt, saying there is no legal foundation for such beliefs. Both are habits of the trade, and neither decides anything.

Start with the paperwork, while expecting it to be quiet. The register only records ownership or maintenance of a boundary feature where the deeds lodged for registration specifically dealt with it, and most did not. GOV.UK puts it plainly: in England and Wales there is usually no record of the exact boundary between two properties, or of who owns the hedge, wall, tree or fence between them. The red edging on a title plan will not help either. Land Registry states you cannot treat it as identifying the exact position of a legal boundary or showing who owns a boundary feature, and you should not scale measurements off it.

Where nothing can be established, Land Registry gives the answer that works on site. Where the ownership or responsibility for maintenance of a boundary cannot be determined, that boundary feature is generally best regarded as a party boundary, and any alterations or replacement should only be done with the agreement of the adjoining owners. That is the practical position for most Cheltenham gardens. It also takes the heat out of the argument. If neither of you can prove it, neither of you can act alone, and a shared decision with a shared cost is the sensible route.

Two things are worth remembering before work starts. A covenant in the deeds requiring you to maintain a fence does not by itself make you the owner of it, so responsibility and ownership can sit apart. And a fence is a physical feature that may only coincidentally follow the legal boundary, which is an invisible line with no thickness. If the line itself is in dispute, only a court or the First-tier Tribunal can settle it. We will not adjudicate a boundary for you. What we can do is quote the work and set the fence where you and your neighbour agree it goes.

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