Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Virginia
I live in Virginia and we cut down a tree we thought to be ours. My neighbor says it is their tree and hired a survey company to conduct a survey of the property lines. If it turns out it was my neighbors tree, what kind of legal penalty am I facing? The reason we cut the tree down was it was loosing branches on a daily bases, branches of all sizes. Many of the long side branches, which were substantial in size, were not living, were over our driveway and the tree was leaning in a way that if it were to fall it would land on our house. The final straw was one day when we came home from work we found a dead squirrel on the ground with a large branch on top of the animal. The branch couldn't support the weight of the dead squirrel.
1 Answer from Attorneys
If it's the neighbor's tree and s/he maintains that it had value, then you will likely need to negotiate some sort of settlement with this neighbor
that is agreeable to the two of you.