A YOUNG homeowner has sparked a fierce debate after trying to get her new neighbour to pay for their fence.
Bekah, from Manchester, and her partner, Ian, bought the house a few months ago and were excited to become homeowners.
Bekah and Ian had bought the house with no fence[/caption]
But the house had been left derelict for at least a decade and needed plenty of work done.
In a recent clip, Bekah revealed she was hosting family in the garden to take a sneak peek of what the house was like.
Bekah wanted the garden to look somewhat acceptable for her guests so decided to get cracking with sorting it out, including getting some fencing up.
In the clip, she said: “I’ve been begging my boyfriend since we moved in to get fence panels so we can finally not be able to see the hoarding neighbour’s garden.
“And everyone was agreeing with him that we shouldn’t ask for them to pay half because it just causes awkwardness.”
However, Bekah had other ideas as she explained that the fence wasn’t there when they moved in.
“The people next to us would have known that the house had sold and they hadn’t made any effort to clean up their back garden,” she added.
Bekah and Ian got to work clearing the garden, noting lots of shrubbery had to be cleared to get the new panels fitted.
While she had barely met the new neighbours, she did admit they came out to offer to help.
She said: “Halfway through they did come out and offer to help and I thought ‘oh that’s really nice.’ But Ian was being the classic British person and was like no it’s fine.
“And I was like ‘oh guys would you actually be able to carry some of the shrubbery for us? They took one bit of shrubbery and I was expecting them to come back.
“I went back around to see where they’d gone. They must have either gone round and gone in the front door or just gone out to the pub or something.”
While Bekah revealed they hadn’t asked their neighbour to pay half yet, it seemed after that situation she was more eager to.
She added: “I’m thinking I’m going to. They’ve got a really expensive car and I just think it’s a little bit cheeky.”
The clip soon went viral on her TikTok account @renovationstyled with over 520k views and 18k likes.
People were quick to take to the comments to share their thoughts, with many saying Bekah should leave it alone.
The Top Five Reasons Neighbours Squabble
One study by Compare the Market revealed the top reason British neighbour’s argue
- Broken fences – top of the board was broken fences and whose responsibility it was to fix it
- Parking: one of the leading drivers of neighbour disputes, with 54.1 per cent of people having issues with people parking in front of their house, parking bay or driveway
- Trees – complaints about a neighbour’s tree cracking your garden path was also common with nearly half of participants finding it frustrating
- Bin wars – outdoor bin etiquette continues to ignite the most furious debates between neighbours
- Nosy Neighbours – some people have their eyes and ears at the ready to have a peek causing problems for others
SOCIAL MEDIA REACTS
One person wrote: “Never understood this going halves on a fence thing. If you want it, you pay for it.”
Another commented: “You can’t really send a bill after. If you wanted to go halves maybe ask before? They should pay half really but sending a random bill wouldn’t be ideal.”
“You can’t ask them to pay after the fact, that’s just not on,” penned a third.
Meanwhile a fourth said: “It’s the done thing to ask and get agreement before doing the work (mostly because we cannot expect our neighbours to work to our financial and building timelines on a whim as we don’t know their situations).
“Now the work is done, I would still ask, but if they say no, I’d just leave it and move on, because it isn’t worth burning the bridges and potentially having an ongoing conflict with your neighbours.”
“You want a new fence, you pay, simple as that. Looks like you were having it if they paid or not. Them having an expensive car is nothing to do with it,” claimed a fifth.
Someone else added: “Ngl if my neighbour put a new fence up, then came to my door asking for half of the money they’d be told where to go.”