Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Re: fence replacement between propery owners

The boundary fence responsibility question comes up frequently on LawGuru and I have answered it at length, to the best of my ability, many times. The basic answer is that California's law on this subject is obsolete and quite ill-defined. There is a couple sentences about it in the Civil Code (section 841) but the concept that you must contribute if you enclose your property on all sides but need not if you don't fully enclose it is maybe appropriate for 19-Century farms and ranches but not for urban settings. I suppose most of Elk Grove is sufficiently urban that enclosing property to keep livestock in or out is not an issue.

However, following the 1872 law (never since amended) strictly, you must contribute half to the fence maintenance if and only if YOUR property is fully enclosed. Otherwise, the Civil Code imposes no obligation on you to share the costs of the boundary fence.

I hasten to add that there may be a local ordinance or even a neighborhood CC&R that provides otherwise.

I think it very unlikely that grading issues on your property would have any effect on the fence situation, although if there have been landslides or something of that sort this would require a different analysis and maybe give a different result, as there is a duty to give your neighbor's land so-called "lateral support."

Your oral agreement to help pay for the fence repairs might be enforceable (and maybe not), but unless a specific sum was agreed upon you wouldn't ever be required to contribute more than a reasonable amount. Enforceability would in turn depend upon definiteness of agreement and if the terms of the supposed oral agreement are too vague and incomplete you would be back to the Civil Code statutory duty, which will probably turn out to be a non-duty.