Fence Law

There have been discussions in the past here about fencing legalities. While it may be unconstitutional, Nebraska has a new law.
HIT

i wish em luck collecting...once in my 60 years i've had a neighbor help with fence costs and labor...wind up taking care of it myself.

Here's a silly idea, The party that wants the fence pay for, maintain, own it "and" livestock owners are responsible for damages caused by their livestock. Including any damage done to a fence that belongs to the neighbor.

Here in New Mexico we are a fence out state. This has recently come to light as a bunch of west coasters bought a bunch of land next to one of the largest cattle ranches in the area. 54 sections. Just a little place. They were complaining to the rancher about his cattle wandering through their yards. He told them to put up a fence. They were very shocked when they took it to court and were not only told by the judge to build a fence but that they also had to pay the court costs and the lawyer costs of the rancher and then were fined for filing a frivolous law suite. Yea, you go Judge!!!!!
Happy New Year
LarryT

Errin I am betting that you don"t own livestock. You might not even own land either. Here is the deal. I bet that you do have doors on your house???? Who gets the benefits? You get to heat your house and you get to keep people out. Right?? Well a line fence does keep out any livestock from your property, not just the neighbors. It also marks the boundary to show ownership.

You should look up the law in Ohio. My wife is from there and we own some of her family"s land there. In Ohio you WILL maintain a line fence. That fence can only be barb wire if both parties agree in writing. You will be liable for half of the cost of said fence. If you refuse the township trustees will contract to have it built. Plus they can enforce a clearance of twenty feet from the fence. I have seen them have an old fence bulldozed out and a forty foot path cleared for the new fence. Then half of the bill is added to your property tax bill. If you don"t pay it then your land can be sold at sheriff"s sale.

A pretty rich family bought two farms just by my MIL. The bordering farmer started out just asking for a few hundred dollars for fence supplies and that he would use them to repair the entire line fence. The rich dude refused in a very arrogant manner in a very public place. So the farmer went to the trustees. Long story short. The cost to replace the entire line fence on the two farms was over $75,000. Seems that the other landowners decided they needed good line fences with arrogant neighbors.

Neighbor thought he needed a new fence between us last year. It was a decent fence yet, no sagging or broken wires. I told him my half was good enough. There is no livestock on either side, just a boundary fence. He threatened to take me to court siting that I must maintain my half or he can repair or replace it and bill me for it or put a lien on the property if I didn't. My lawyer said to let him take it out if he wanted to. He would be responsible for the replacement being there was a good fence there already. Also, before he can put a lien on the property, he has to go before a judge to explain why and if he looses, he is responsible for my attorney fees plus court costs. Well, he took it out and put it back 6 inches on his side of the property. He never sent a bill. Probably figured out that it might cost him more than the cost of my half of the fence.

Missouri changed theirs a few years ago, if you run livestock you pay for the fence, if your neighbor starts to run livestock against that fence then he gets to buy his half from you. If I remember right, you build the fence then record it at the court house so there is a record when the time comes. Every state has it s own laws.

You really need to read up on Ohio fence law which changed back in 2008.

Much of your info is WRONG

So if you have the adverse posession law, claim that 6" in 15 years time because you are using it unbroken for that period. [you hope]

I wonder if they define a standard fence, one may want 6 wire and barb the other may want 7 and a barb,if they can't agree where do they go{court].But if the standard was 6 and a barb then the person who wanted 7 would have to pay for any deviation from the standard. That is how it works in the burbs here, standard pailing fence is 5'6".

As a Country Lawyer and rural land owner I get a lot of questions about fence laws and adverse posession and boundary disputes etc. , and often I can just refer the folks to our local Township Trustee who by statute handles many of the fencing issues. Its so often an angry dispute among neighbors often where Im friends with BOTH parties so I pretty much stay away from practice in this area.

For sure a person needs to seek local professional advice before he does anything drastic as laws vary stateby state and this is a fairly specialized area of law

God Bless all and Happy New Year

John T The Country Lawyer

I really don't know much about the fence law in SC, though I've always had cows. I think in the late 1800's a fence law was passed which required people to fence in their livestock, which was objected to by small farmers and land renters who had been used to letting their livestock, especially hogs, run loose in the woods often on large plantation owners land. At this time there was no commercial cattle raising, just cotton and some corn. Hogs could roam the woods and fatten on chestnuts(now gone) and acorns. Obviously a problem when they got into a neighbors corn.

I've only rarely shared a fence with a neighbor and if we had cows get out we peacefully got the cows up and fixed the fence. A fence is not considered a boundary line and you don't get adverse possession just because your fence is over on your neighbor's land. For a fence to be your fence it has to be 6 inches over on your propery. AFIK nothing requires a non livestock owning person to put up a boundary fence.

KEH

In Wisconsin a fence has to be good enough to turn cattle. Doesnt matter what it is. Each party is responsible for 50% of the fence. You look at your neighbors property and yours is the right hand half. After a fence has been there for 20 years it cant be moved, no matter what a surveyor says.

Just so folks aren't confused, it generally takes more than the passage of time, even 15 years, to establish adverse possession. Just ask John T.

That sounds right up in N.C. I have a fence 6" off my property line, my neighbor has a fence 6" off his property line and everything is fine no fight, no hassel

All you fellows talking about what you think the law is where you live doesn't make a hill of beans in some other state/local, the law varies all over the place! And it isn't nearly as simple as some posters think. I spent 5 years in various levels of court all the way up to state supreme court over a strip....believe me it is very complex & costly, so you need to just be good neighbors. When it comes to the law & lawyers, there ain't nothing simple.

Interesting to hear all the different schemes, from a legal standpoint. I certainly don't agree with the "fence out" rule- I shouldn't have to spend money to prevent a trespass by your animals on my land. But I can see how it originated, in the big cattle states- it was an early "in your face" to the "nesters" who wanted to fence off what had been open range.

This discussion does point up the fact that laws vary widely by state- and much as nobody wants to pay a lawyer ANYTHING, EVER, you're far better off in the long run to get some advice early on, instead of listening to Uncle Fudd ranting about how it worked in West Virginia.

You don't always need to have an adversarial/confrontational relationship with neighbors, either. I have 12 different neighbors with adjoining property/common fences & only one has ever been a problem.

SD codified law states what a line fence is to be. It says any fence that the 2 parties agree to is legal. If they can't agree then the statute reads as in this link. Just copy and paste to open.

http://legis.state.sd.us/statutes/DisplayStatute.aspx?Type=Statute&Statute=43-23-4

Not taking sides for right or wrong as laws vary around the country.I have been in fencing disagreements with a couple of absentee land owners rather than argue I write a letter to township board requesting fence viewing.Then adjoining land owners will recieve registered letter of fence viewing meeting.Township board members set a date to view the fence in question,measure fence, mark the middle. After township ruling landowners will notified by registered letter of how many wires and how far apart they are, minimum height requirements,post spacing,end post requirements,lastly a time line is set when both parties must have fence in.Both landowners are billed for fence viewing meeting.Land owners that fail to put in fence.Township will put in fence,all costs put on real estate tax bill of failed owner in question.This is what happened in Wisconsin where I live.Fencing laws exist for insurance liability and boundry marking.Scott

I want to clarify that the rancher I spoke of does have perimeter fences in the area of the new subdivision and most of the troubles come from the residents in the subdivision. They want to ride their atv,s and dirt bikes out across the desert and have actually been caught cutting fences to do so. The rancher finally gave up on trying to keep them repaired and when the residents started to complain about his cattle in their yards is when he through the fence out law at them. He could have filed a complaint on the fence cutting as that is still a federal offense but he didn't. I don't blame him one bit for letting the cattle run. These people from the city come out here and want to live in the country and then want to change it so it's like the city they wanted to get away from. Just like a lady from NYC that moved out here and started complaining about the way we do things. Without reservation I asked her why she moved out here. She said that it was because the land was cheep. I then asked her if she liked it. She said no. I then told her to go back to where she came from and leave those of us that love it here alone. She responded with the "I have my rights" line and I responded that so do we. Why is it when someone talks about ones rights they never take into consideration Every Ones Rights and not just their own?