Monday, April 17, 2017

The Trouble with Fences in Oregon

Fences, moisture and wind don't live well together on the same block.

Or shouldn't.  Not in Oregon.  We get a lot of rain and a lot of windstorms.

And as with everything else, age takes it toll.

A new home owner behind my neighbor to the south came over last week to this block.  He was trying to contact the neighbor next to me, because he lives behind her and the windstorm nearly toppled the back fence they share.  Probably neither one knew whose fence it really was.

He is tearing it down and replacing it.  He hired a guy.

I know who owns the fence behind my place.  The neighbor behind me.  I know that because I found the property monument back there when building my side fence.  A chain link fence ran along the back and side of this property when I moved in, and is the original property line fence.  My brother's worker guy cut part of that chain link off to use on the cat yard, when that was built ten years ago, since behind it was the wood fence, on the neighbor's property.   The chain link, only three feet high, runs behind the house on the north next to me too, and T's off to run up between my yard and the one to the north, to split my yard from dead Jack's property.  But the property monument was two inches this side of the steel post where it Tee'd, so I built the side fence two inches beyong it, into my side.

The properties at the back are offset 8 feet.  The property behind me, in other words, runs 8 feet behind my neighbors property to the north.  The wooden fence out back continues on behind their chain link 8 feet.  Down at the south back of this property, the chain link running at the back of my property goes 8 feet behind a strange section of wood fence that is 8 feet long and in front of it.  That section was likely built by someone in the past who lived here, for some reason.

Anyhow, the back fence behind the chain link is on the property behind me.  A Utah based house flipper had bought that property and why they didn't replace the rotted fence, before selling it, I don't know.  That's flippers for you.   Now a 20 foot section is detached.  The new owners, whom I don't know, have it propped up on their side, propped so it may fall and it will because its completely detached from posts, onto my side.



Bummer when they've just moved in about a month or so ago.

And have small kids.

I've tried to call my brother about what to do but so far, no response.

It's their fence, after all, not mine.  But if it falls onto this place, they will need to do the clean up.   Beyond that, I don't want open space between them and me.  I'm a private person.  I don't want their little kids running around my yard.

Do I have to borrow money and build another fence, I wonder.

They never used to be so expensive to build but they sure are now.

The side fence I built where it attaches into the concrete along the driveway was damaged by the house flippers when they worked on that house.   I wanted my brother to make them pay to repair it, but he never did.  then along came the windstorm.  The fence held, remarkably, but end of this week, a contractor friend, whom I helped with cats, will drill holes through the concrete and pound in T posts and we will secure the wood fence posts to those metal ones.

Also unfortunate, I injured my shoulder, neck, upper back someway when the utility shelving fell apart first of last week.   I've had to do pretty much nothing since then, rest, ice, aleve, all that.  And still this week too.

The lawn grows, and also the weeds, the fence out back is falling, but there's not a thing I can do about it, until my shoulder heals.  Otherwise, I'll have shoulder problems for months.   Sometimes you can't do nothing about nothing.

I'm good with it.   I even turned my phone off last night.   The silence was awesome.  I rarely watch TV in the evening either.  Seems to be nothing on worth watching.  I get the major network stations, with antenna--FOX, ABC, CBS, NBC and PBS but that's it.  It's plenty, especially when there's nothing to watch even on those networks.

For Easter I did exactly nothing too.  When you hurt yourself and can't do anything or help anybody else with their stuff, you find out fast who your friends are.  Kind of a good thing to know.

It's that time of year.  The time of year I rid myself of everything I haven't used in the last year.   I don't like having things sitting around I don't use.   So if its something someone else will use, I give it to a thrift store.  If its junk, its waits for garbage space, which is limited.   My friend stopped by a few days ago, for like three minutes.  She wanted to give me two DVD's and a DVD player even though I already have a DVD player that I rarely use.  I declined although I felt bad doing it.  I know she's cleaning out her garage too.  I just can't pile on more.

She left a book for me to read too that she liked, but she wants it back.  I don't like taking on things that need returned, especially paper product things, that cats can tear up or pee on.  I finally relented and took it.  I don't borrow books or DVD's from the library for the same reason---the cats!

5 comments:

  1. I have had to buy books to replace ones the cats have got to before now.
    I hope your injuries heal quickly. I know you will be itching to do things again.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous4:42 PM

    Interesting that your fences aren't built on property boundaries and that they are not a shared cost between neighbours. Here, although they may have over time moved to one property or the other, it is recognised that both parties are responsible. We even have a fence tribunal to sort out fence disputes.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sure is needed here, although most disputes are quickly resolved without any problems.

      Delete
  3. Darn! I feared that shelf caused injury. Wish I could visit and help you out. ~hugs~ Feel better!

    http://darlamsands.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete

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