Land/Housing Dispute

[Fudbelty 2788]

Got an interesting situation goin on at the house. Anyone here specialize is land and or housing disputes? Know who does? Just wondering what my options are. PM derka, err I mean PM me if you have a few minutes. Thanks.

[Francisco 2.0 32389]

Take their offer:

 

 

 

[kangsta 50]

what kind of situation? 

[Kennythetiger 9376]

1234

Edited March 3, 2020 by Kennythetiger
1234

[Fudbelty 2788]

Take their offer:
 

 
 

I can get me a mansion with a swimming pool.

[Fudbelty 2788]

what kind of situation? 

 

Possible eviction or would it even fall under that.

 

I’d prefer not putting it all out here that’s why I was trying to get a pm

[Steel Shank 9421]

5 hours ago, kangsta said:

what kind of situation? 

It's a cheating situation
A stealing invitation
To take what's not really ours
To make it through the midnight hours
It's a cheating situation
Just a cheap imitation
Doing what we have to do
When there's no love at home

[TankedBevo 2482]

Bumping this instead of starting a whole new thread. 

Bought an empty lot that's never been built on in inner San Antonio roughly 7 years ago, while we lived in Dallas with the intent of building once we moved back. When we received the survey it said the neighbors on the left side fenceline encroaches 2'6" onto our property. No problem, fences can be moved, or so we thought. Cut to me going out with some stakes this past weekend to measure where the house footprint will be and came to discover it wasn't just a fence that encroaches on the property, but at some point the homeowners had poured a massive concrete slab in which to put the fence on that makes up their side and rear patio. The slab encroaches anywhere from 5' at the front to 2'6" down the left side of the lot. The plans we have call for 5' setbacks from the fence which we no longer have and would have to lose square footage to build at it's current lot size.

What recourse do I have here? The neighbor's family has been living there since the house was constructed in the 40's, but the concrete patio isn't original to the house. It has been there a very long time I assume. They would have to saw out a ton of concrete to make the property line correct. 

The house will likely still be in this family for the foreseeable future so I'm wondering what the best route is to approach so that we get back what we should have while not starting a feud with people with which we are about to be neighbors.

TIA

[Surly Bevo 24908]

If you burn their house down they won't be your neighbors any longer.

In all seriousness, that seems like something you are going to want to talk to a RE Lawyer on in terms of best courses of action.   Unless you are just going to go along to get along you are gonna piss them off.  

[Fudbelty 2788]

what kind of situation? 

Guy left on his own. No eviction needed.

[immamac 42838]

57 minutes ago, TankedBevo said:

Bumping this instead of starting a whole new thread. 

Bought an empty lot that's never been built on in inner San Antonio roughly 7 years ago, while we lived in Dallas with the intent of building once we moved back. When we received the survey it said the neighbors on the left side fenceline encroaches 2'6" onto our property. No problem, fences can be moved, or so we thought. Cut to me going out with some stakes this past weekend to measure where the house footprint will be and came to discover it wasn't just a fence that encroaches on the property, but at some point the homeowners had poured a massive concrete slab in which to put the fence on that makes up their side and rear patio. The slab encroaches anywhere from 5' at the front to 2'6" down the left side of the lot. The plans we have call for 5' setbacks from the fence which we no longer have and would have to lose square footage to build at it's current lot size.

What recourse do I have here? The neighbor's family has been living there since the house was constructed in the 40's, but the concrete patio isn't original to the house. It has been there a very long time I assume. They would have to saw out a ton of concrete to make the property line correct. 

The house will likely still be in this family for the foreseeable future so I'm wondering what the best route is to approach so that we get back what we should have while not starting a feud with people with which we are about to be neighbors.

TIA

Well you can do whatever you want with your slab. If you don’t want it there just remove it. 

in all seriousness tell them you are going to build and it’s going to require some changes since they have been using your property without properly surveying or getting written permission. If they push back then it just gets expensive or shitty. 

[Fudbelty 2788]

For the love that all is holy, don’t respond to any value questions with “bout treefiddy”. Heard it makes things weird

[ROFL BOX 6647]

Surveyors *LOVE* to get paid $ 300 / hour to sit in court vs. $ 175 / hour to stand behind a transit in the field

Buy into a LegalShield plan now.
Wait a month, call your assigned provider.

[TwiceHorn 31440]

7 hours ago, TankedBevo said:

Bumping this instead of starting a whole new thread. 

Bought an empty lot that's never been built on in inner San Antonio roughly 7 years ago, while we lived in Dallas with the intent of building once we moved back. When we received the survey it said the neighbors on the left side fenceline encroaches 2'6" onto our property. No problem, fences can be moved, or so we thought. Cut to me going out with some stakes this past weekend to measure where the house footprint will be and came to discover it wasn't just a fence that encroaches on the property, but at some point the homeowners had poured a massive concrete slab in which to put the fence on that makes up their side and rear patio. The slab encroaches anywhere from 5' at the front to 2'6" down the left side of the lot. The plans we have call for 5' setbacks from the fence which we no longer have and would have to lose square footage to build at it's current lot size.

What recourse do I have here? The neighbor's family has been living there since the house was constructed in the 40's, but the concrete patio isn't original to the house. It has been there a very long time I assume. They would have to saw out a ton of concrete to make the property line correct. 

The house will likely still be in this family for the foreseeable future so I'm wondering what the best route is to approach so that we get back what we should have while not starting a feud with people with which we are about to be neighbors.

TIA

Contact your title insurance on purchase of the lot.  They may have an adverse possession claim on the slab if not the fence.  Title should have to deal with it, not you.

[Stunns38 3460]

A little off-topic but my mom bought a house in Chicago in 1990 which was originally built in 1947. In the 1960s, the original or 2nd owners built an addition. When she closed, it was on the survey and title(so we thought).

11 years later when she sold it, the addition came up as illegal and my mom had to settle with the city even though her it showed up in 1990.

My mom was just too tired to fight so she took a loss. Should have hired a better lawyer or one that wasn’t in bed with the city. Dirty ass City of Chicago. Not a CSB.

[thunderlounge 7815]

7 hours ago, TankedBevo said:

Bumping this instead of starting a whole new thread. 

How set are you on this piece? You could always sell it?

 

ETA: I say this as it could end up as a sore spot between you and the neighbor(s), which may cause an undesirable community situation. Might not be likely, but you never know people these days. Long court battle, they lose, now they’re doing stupid shit you can’t escape. 

Edited January 15 by thunderlounge
ou sux

[TankedBevo 2482]

27 minutes ago, thunderlounge said:

How set are you on this piece? You could always sell it?

 

ETA: I say this as it could end up as a sore spot between you and the neighbor(s), which may cause an undesirable community situation. Might not be likely, but you never know people these days. Long court battle, they lose, now they’re doing stupid shit you can’t escape. 

This is exactly what I'd like to avoid. @TwiceHorn had some good advice as the neighbors house is so old they may be able to claim it as there's anyway. I'll look into that thanks. 

[Dbeasy 15042]

7 hours ago, immamac said:

Well you can do whatever you want with your slab. If you don’t want it there just remove it. 

in all seriousness tell them you are going to build and it’s going to require some changes since they have been using your property without properly surveying or getting written permission. If they push back then it just gets expensive or shitty. 

 

1 hour ago, TwiceHorn said:

Contact your title insurance on purchase of the lot.  They may have an adverse possession claim on the slab if not the fence.  Title should have to deal with it, not you.

As TwiceHorn indicates, you may not be able to do anything you want due to adverse possession. When you contact title, I bet they punt it back to you, saying it was already identified in that title commitment and you chose to buy it anyway.

[TwiceHorn 31440]

21 minutes ago, Dbeasy said:

 

As TwiceHorn indicates, you may not be able to do anything you want due to adverse possession. When you contact title, I bet they punt it back to you, saying it was already identified in that title commitment and you chose to buy it anyway.

Yeah, this is possible.  i misread OP a little bit and thought the fence had only been there 7 years and the slab longer, but it looks like they've been there the same amount of time, so possibly long enough to create an adverse possession problem. https://texas.public.law/statutes/tex._civ._practice_and_remedies_code_section_16.025

And, it appears that the survey id'ed the fence problem and it's probably an exclusion on the title policy, which should have been pointed out to you.  Not sure whether that helps them with regard to the bigger slab encroachment.

[TankedBevo 2482]

So as a follow up, I went out today to take some pictures in case I had to use them in the near future. As it turns out the fence is being held in place by a line of concrete for some reason, rather than individual concrete footings per post. Further inspection, the line of fence concrete is not tied to the patio slab and there's about 2' of either dirt, rocks or garden between it. The only issue, assuming I can legally move the fence back to the property line, is they installed their ac unit right next to the fence so it would have to be moved 2' closer towards their house. 

I'll definitely be looking into whether they'd have an adverse possession claim for sure before taking any more steps. They actually have had the house in the market for a few months before now so I'm not sure how this effects them  vs the new owners should it sell before the property line issue is resolved. 

[Catpfish 618]

Might work to your advantage if you can raise a cloud on title. It'll have to be resolved before they can close and they might be more inclined to work with you.

[TexasEd 8066]

  

@TankedBevo

When the survey for their house gets done and the markers go up you need to point out that you own the fence and they need to move the AC unit off your property.  Also note that you plan to move the fence to the property line.

Heck you can run an orange temporary barrier with T posts right down the property line.

Edited January 18 by TexasEd

[TankedBevo 2482]

11 hours ago, TexasEd said:

  

@TankedBevo

When the survey for their house gets done and the markers go up you need to point out that you own the fence and they need to move the AC unit off your property.  Also note that you plan to move the fence to the property line.

Heck you can run an orange temporary barrier with T posts right down the property line.

Speaking of this, on a whim I decided to contact them to see if they wouldn't mind sharing a copy of their survey with me if they had it. To my surprise they actually emailed it yesterday and it's a brand new survey, done by the same company that did ours. Lo and behold clear as day it shows a bright green outline at the fence with "Fence encroaches on adjacent property" with all the measurements that point it out the same as it shows on our survey. I don't think at this point it would be a surprise to them to let them know I'll be moving the fence to the property boundary, and at least so far they've been pretty cordial towards me. I think, with an added mention that I'll be footing the bill for for a brand new fence (as I was planning on it anyway), I hopefully shouldn't have any issues. 

 

Thanks for everyone's help, and I hope I won't have to come back to this thread unless it's with more positive developments.

Edited January 18 by TankedBevo

[tx 3 putt 76881]

Hire a good lawyer 

[TwiceHorn 31440]

1 hour ago, TankedBevo said:

Speaking of this, on a whim I decided to contact them to see if they wouldn't mind sharing a copy of their survey with me if they had it. To my surprise they actually emailed it yesterday and it's a brand new survey, done by the same company that did ours. Lo and behold clear as day it shows a bright green outline at the fence with "Fence encroaches on adjacent property" with all the measurements that point it out the same as it shows on our survey. I don't think at this point it would be a surprise to them to let them know I'll be moving the fence to the property boundary, and at least so far they've been pretty cordial towards me. I think, with an added mention that I'll be footing the bill for for a brand new fence (as I was planning on it anyway), I hopefully shouldn't have any issues. 

 

Thanks for everyone's help, and I hope I won't have to come back to this thread unless it's with more positive developments.

Sounds like a good resolution if it comes to pass.

Haha this is reminiscent of my first year law school moot court question:  Does adverse possession have to be knowing and intentional?  That is, can an encroaching landowner acquire by adverse possession if they don't know they are encroaching?

That seems to be the case here and I have no idea what is the answer under Texas law.  My recollection is that the knowing requirement was a minority view.

[ROFL BOX 6647]

We are all still hoping to see a pic of the offending concrete emencroachment.

[TexasEd 8066]

On 1/18/2024 at 9:15 AM, TankedBevo said:

Speaking of this, on a whim I decided to contact them to see if they wouldn't mind sharing a copy of their survey with me if they had it. To my surprise they actually emailed it yesterday and it's a brand new survey, done by the same company that did ours. Lo and behold clear as day it shows a bright green outline at the fence with "Fence encroaches on adjacent property" with all the measurements that point it out the same as it shows on our survey. I don't think at this point it would be a surprise to them to let them know I'll be moving the fence to the property boundary, and at least so far they've been pretty cordial towards me. I think, with an added mention that I'll be footing the bill for for a brand new fence (as I was planning on it anyway), I hopefully shouldn't have any issues. 

 

Thanks for everyone's help, and I hope I won't have to come back to this thread unless it's with more positive developments.

Great.  That's what I was hoping.  I hope they take it well and it is all amicable.

[TankedBevo 2482]

12 hours ago, ROFL BOX said:

We are all still hoping to see a pic of the offending concrete emencroachment.

Here's the fence line notes from their survey that match ours for anyone interested. Notice, at the back of the property the actual buildings are encroaching as well but it's minimal to a few inches. Their AC unit is going to have to get moved as well.  I'll let you guys know how the conversation goes with them when the time comes. 

[Mack Tripper 696]

Deleted