Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Illinois

You can sue them, but whether you win will depend on whether you can show that the land the trees were on was actually your property. Whether you win against the fence company would depend on whether their agent knew the trees were on your property and negligently or purposefully told your neighbor the property boundary was incorrect.

Its always a shame to lose a nice tree. As an initial matter, you are going to have to have a good plat of survey to prevail, to determine whether the tree was actually on your property.

And if your survey says it was yours and your neighbor has a survey that says it was his, then you wind up with a claim against the surveyor(s). It's a never ending tale, but it certainly wasn't neighborly for your neighbor to just go ahead and cut the tree down without even asking if there was nothing near it to suggest it was theirs or yours......And PS if there's no evidence where the tree was, you'll need your neighbor to back you up if it turns out the fence guy was wrong!@!! So take it step by step......and good luck.

The response given is not intended to create, nor does it create an ongoing duty to respond to questions. The response does not form an attorney-client relationship, nor is it intended to be anything other than the educated opinion of the author. It should not be relied upon as legal advice. The response given is based upon the limited facts provided by the person asking the question. To the extent additional or different facts exist, the response might possibly change. Attorney is currently licensed to practice law actively only in the State of Illinois, inactively in Florida. Responses are based solely on Illinois law unless stated otherwise.