The neighbours (who are moving out) took a part of the shared fence and don’t seem to be planning on replacing it. What’s the best way to fix this situation. (It was a shared fence between the yard of our social rental housing.)

15 comments

  2. Wait until you have new neighbours. You can suggest a fence, or discuss a choice. They should pay they half and you pay half. The new fence that you place goes on the border line exactly.

    Or: you place a fence, you pay for it completely and put it on your side of the garden. You can do that before you have new neighbours. Do inform them that the fence is yours and they can’t touch it.

    Third option, contact your landlord and let them know what happened. The fence is half their property (and half the neighbours). They may want to place something new, or file a complaint against the people who took the fence.

  3. Maybe they put it on their part of the garden and your new neighbors didn’t want to take it from your old neighbors (overname). Better call the woningcorporatie to be sure.

  4. Social housing? Make it the problem of the housing corporation. They should know who the fence belongs to and what to do.

    ​

    (who takes a fence with them when they move?!??)

  5. This is surprisingly common by the way. Often fences are put in by one party, and because – especially in the context of social housing – this is a pretty hefty expense, an easily removable fence is going to be taken out when the owners move to be put into a new garden.

    You’re going to either have to put in a fence yourself (if you want one) or negotiate with the new neighbors to place a fence and share the costs (and installation).

    This is so common in the Netherlands that Dutch panel fences (aka Dutch fences) are a distinct product category. Dutch fences are removable panels in between hardwood posts.

  6. Usually… the social housing only owns the fences that face the outside.. so the sides that face the uh.. “brandgang” and the streets. The fences between houses are usualy owned by the renters themselves.

  7. Just saw this on /r/mildlyinfuriating and first thing that went through my mind was “sounds like something a Dutch person would do” – and here we are, lol

  8. It belongs to the houseing company even if u buy it and put it in the ground its part op the building/property. Socialhousing propertyborders are 9 out of 10 times without actual propertyborders.

  9. Even if taking half of it is completely their right, why t f would you take the *first* half? That’s just such a dick move

  10. I don’t see a problem. More space for your BBQ and two extra garbage bins 🙂 All for free. ::LOL::

    This happens. Especially when the fence is on the neighbours patch of land – and in case they paid for it… Sometimes both neighbours pay for such a fence, and agree to leave it behind when one of the neighbours decides to move out.

    I did put up my own fence; on my own “halve”. My neighbours didn’t like it (horizontal planks, they wanted to have the planks diagonally aligned), so they put their own fence on their patch too. There are now two fences (back to back).

    All such things (can) happen in The Netherlands. My personal opinion is to just leave the fence when you move. I would feel uncomfortable to take the fence with me (a bit “tokkie”). On the other hand: the price of wood increased drastically…

  13. Volgens mij moet de woningbouwvereniging zorgen voor een afrastering. Ik zou contact met ze opnemen.

  15. Yup, recognise the situation although my neighbours rigged the fence to collapse.
    Luckily I noticed it and was able to prevent it.

    So yes, people can definitely be total jerks about the oddest things.

    I bet they are already involved in a fight with their new neighbours in Julianadorp, a town where they moved to.

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