Legal Question in Real Estate Law in New Jersey

Property damage

After our new neighbors moved in to the attached housed next door they asked if the could fix their fence from my side of the property, and we said fine. While working on his fence he wedged himself between my hedges and his fence and the hedges were becoming uprooted, he removed some of the branches, on my property to make room for himself. When I saw what he did I told him that he could work from my side but could not push on the hedges and he just lost his temper and stormed off. Since then he has done some spiteful things, we came back from vacation to find our back patio flooded and covered with gravel and dirt and mulch. We looked over the fence and found that he had a rain downspout running right to the fence ( his property sits higher ) and a small retaining wall on my side was damaged, and my air conditioner compressor is right next to it. So we told his girlfriend what happened and asked them to move it. They did. A few days ago we noticed that he redid his front garden and ran his down spout directly in to my front garden, past his property line and into ours. Our front garden had been flooded and washed into my driveway. we have close to $1000 worth of garden trees and plants that could all be ruined. What can we do?


Asked on 10/22/06, 7:02 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys
John Corbett Corbett Law Firm LLC

Re: Property damage

You could sue. If you do, be sure to include a claim for punitive damages and an injunction to prevent further nonsense. Your neighbor's actions, if you have described them correctly, are clearly intential. Therefore, you are entitled not only to compensatory damages to pay for the cleanup, but also punitive damages to make it hurt enough so that he doesn't do it again.

Punitive damages means that you can't sue in small claims court so you may need a lawyer. This might make the cost of enforcement too high. An alternative is to have a lawyer write a strong letter to your neighbor to say that you know your rights and won't put up with anything further.

Whatever you do, be sure to document things as best you can. Pictures, written estimates, and paid bills speak very loudly should you need them in court.

See also: http://info.corbettlaw.net/lawguru.htm

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Answered on 10/22/06, 10:24 pm


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