Shared property line fences with neighboring HOA

Started by ScottH14 • 6 replies • 2375 views

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ScottH14 (Washington)
Posts: 3

Posted:

Has anyone ever heard of: If a fence is drawn on your plat map....you own it?

Neighboring HOA owners built their own backyard fences 10-15 years before we came in and joined into them. Because those fences were drawn by the surveyor on our plat map, our manager thinks we are 100% responsible for the fence. Survey Companies say fences are drawn if they are there with no implication of ownership.

Our plat map does not have any notes about the fence. Nothing in our governing docs
Seems preposterous to me.

WA state RCW has many laws about sharing fences but the mgr says they don't apply to HOA
She nor her lawyer can provide any legal reference for this opinion.

The individual owners who built the fences probably think they still own 50%
I agree

Thoughts? Laws?

LarryB13 (Arizona)
Posts: 4,099

Posted:

Scott,

Under the circumstances you describe, it sounds like your HOA has no property interest in the fences as there seems to be no separate deed for the property where the fence is and no easement to allow your HOA to put a fence in. If anyone in your HOA has a property interest in the fence it will be the individual lot owners.

Fences normally are erected on one's own property, so the neighboring fences that were built 10-15 years before the other properties were developed should have been built on the neighboring lots. It is unclear, however, how your lots were developed and it may be that the developer put up the fence and built it his own land that later became part of your association.

I am not clear as to how many associations are involved here. You mentioned one one place that there was a "neighboring HOA" but then you said that you "joined into them."

Custom seems to be that a fence wholly on one side of a property line belongs to the owner of that property but one that straddles a property line belongs jointly to both parties.

NpS (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 4,216

Posted:

Thoughts:

1. Your property on your deed is measured in metes and bounds. If the fence is within the metes and bounds of your deed, it's yours.

2. If the plat drawing shows the fence as being on your lot, then the presumption is that it's yours.

3. Things don't always get built according to plan. So the presumption of ownership created by the plat can always be negated by an actual survey. (See 1). Look up "rebuttable presumption"

4. WA shared fence laws seem to deal with allocation of expense more so than ownership. IMO, you can be the 100% owner but get your neighbor to pay half. I would think it's still your fence because it's on your property, but don't know.

5. Your question seems to be a neighbor vs neighbor question. Not sure why the PM is dealing with it as if it's a HOA issue.

Sikubali jukumu. Read all posts at your own risk.

GenoS (Florida)
Posts: 4,276

Posted:

Surveys can also vary. Our HOA was platted, re-platted and then re-platted again in the first couple of years ca. 1989-1991. There was a citrus grove behind the HOA's property. About 10 years ago the grove was leveled and a developer started new construction of an HOA community. They put up a fence, we cut down some trees, a couple of low-grade disputes ensued.

At the end of the day, the new HOA's surveyors located the property line some feet away from where our own surveyors determined it to be years earlier. Reference points in Florida can be transitory in nature, which is never good if you want to survey. Our 1991 plat calls out "permanent monuments" that were anything but. There is no trace of any of them today.

Both HOAs agreed to let sleeping dogs lie since neither wanted to share the cost of hiring a new surveyor to do an "arbitration" type of survey we could both agree on.

LarryB13 (Arizona)
Posts: 4,099

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By NpS on 08/29/2015 11:13 AM
1. Your property on your deed is measured in metes and bounds. If the fence is within the metes and bounds of your deed, it's yours.

Metes and bounds is an archaic form of land description used in some states that were once English colonies. The rest of us use the PLSS, Public Land Survey System, for property descriptions.

See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Land_Survey_System for a short discourse on PLSS.

Also see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metes_and_bounds for a description of metes and bounds.

TimB4 (Tennessee)
Posts: 21,059

Posted:

Scott,

Fence laws vary by State. Typically, if the fence is on the actual property line, the fence is a shared expense. However, there are some exceptions.

If neighbor A wants a fence and neighbor B doesn't want a fence it will be difficult to force neighbor B to pay for half. This is often the case where the fence section is on the property line abutting common area.

If neighbor A thinks the fence needs replaced and neighbor B thinks the fence can last another 5 years (or simply doesn't have the funds), it will be difficult to force neighbor B to pay for half. This actually happened to me. One neighbor had no problem paying for half (of that section of fence) and the other neighbor thought it would last another 5 years or more. Ended up paying for that section by myself.

Keep in mind that if you and your neighbor (even if it is the Association) can't agree on the fence, the only way to force payment is to take them to court. This is typically more expensive then the fence itself. Therefore, unless you want to prove a point for principal sake alone, simply pay for the fence yourself.

JohnC46 (South Carolina)
Posts: 14,265

Posted:

Scott

Assuming the houses you speak of already being there are not part of your association then I say who put the fence up owns it. This could get tricky as if so, then they can do as they wish. Picture tall, ugly, and chain link. Might could be in your association's best interest to get some ownership of the existing fences for "control" reasons.

NpS (Pennsylvania)
Posts: 4,216

Posted:

Quote:

Posted By LarryB13 on 08/29/2015 1:36 PM
Metes and bounds is an archaic form of land description used in some states that were once English colonies. The rest of us use the PLSS, Public Land Survey System, for property descriptions.

Thx Larry. Didn't know I was archaic. I like PLSS much better than what we have.

Sikubali jukumu. Read all posts at your own risk.

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