Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Re: Property line fence

California's statutes on boundary fences date back to the 1872 era and don't provide much guidance for modern urban situations. The law regarding trespasses to land might also cover this situation, but again it is all based on centuries of judges' decisions and is only somewhat helpful here.

Essentially, maintenance of boundary fences is a joint cost item, but the statutes have little or nothing to say about esthetics. The trespass law decisions say if a tree or bush grows on your side of the boundary, but its roots or limbs cross over the boundary, then to that extent there is a trespass and the neighbor can take steps to abate it, if he proceeds in a non-negligent manner (i.e., he can't trim trespassing roots or branches in a way that kills the tree or creates a risk that it will topple in a windstorm.

The law of private nuisance also covers boundary fence issues to a slight extent, e.g., fences over 10' in height are spite fences unless there is a good reason why they're necessary, and are presumed to be private nuisances.

All in all, I think the better way to resolve this problem is not to try to find a legal right you can enforce against the neighbor - that would be expensive, create bad relations, and the result would be dubious at best.

Instead, I suggest either a negotiated compromise or a landscape-design solution. By the latter I mean something like this: create a new fence six inches into your property, using light stakes and plastic mesh deer fance, and train the ivy shoots gwowing on your side over onto the new trellis-fence. Or something like this that suits your topography, growing conditions and taste. The neighbor won't be able to touch this.

Re: Property line fence

If the fence is a true boundary fence, meaning it is on the literal boundary between the properties, then each of you has certain obligations and rights, one of which is the obligation to maintain.

Here, the issue is whether your neighbor has the right to remove vegetation growing up the fence. In general, if the vegation is rooted on his property, he can do with it what he wants, as long as he doesn't cause unreasonable harm to your property in the process. If the vegation is rooted on your property, then he cannot remove it at all, unless the growth is causing unreasonable harm to his property. These are both dicey issues and have caused much litigation between neighbors.

In this case, if your neighbor is removing your ivy, rooted on your property, you can likely obtain an injunction to stop him/her. Short of court action, you might consider a less drastic solution, such as replacing the fence with something more pleasing to the eye.

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