There are all kinds of reasons to end up in disputes with your neighbour over a fence, from whose responsibility it is to repair the fence to who has the right to tear it down and build a new one.
To understand what your rights are, you have to know how to tell if the fence is yours, your neighbour’s, or shared by the two of you. This article will tell you exactly how to determine fence ownership:
The post placement rule is the rule of thumb: If the fence posts are on your side of the property, the fence is probably yours; the opposite is true if the posts are on your neighbour’s side of the property. Posts along the property line? The fence is likely shared between neighbours.
Rules of thumb can help you get through some disputes, but they won’t solve them all. When you and your neighbour cannot agree on who owns a fence, splitting the cost to hire a Manitoba Land Surveyor can help. Land surveyors will establish clear property boundaries by telling you exactly where the property line is - and which side of the line the fence falls on.
The fence belongs to the person on whose property it sits; if it is on the property line, it typically belongs to both property owners.
The Fence Line Act (officially The Boundary Lines and Line Fences Act) is the law in Manitoba that governs who owns a fence, how to treat shared fences, and how to handle disputes between neighbours who cannot agree on who owns the fence.
The Act has a few important pieces of information that are crucial to understanding (and solving) fence disputes:
This aligns with our earlier statement: Surveys are king because they determine which side of the property line a fence is on. Fence-viewers are rarely used in today’s fencing disputes, though they are still available should the need arise.
The Government of Manitoba places property pins (sometimes called survey pins) along property lines - typically on the four corners of the property. These pins are often invisible, but you may be lucky enough to find visible pins on your property.
When you can’t find pins by looking, you can use a metal detector; many of the pins are made of metal. Most people do not have a metal detector on hand, of course, but if you can find one or borrow one from a friend, you can get a better idea of where your property line is before calling a surveyor.
When there is a gate on your fence, it will often have a latch on one side - and not on the other. Though this does not tell you who owns the fence, it is an indicator of who is more likely to own the fence - the person who has access to the mechanism that opens the gate.
Take this with a huge grain of salt; it can help to solve disputes, but it is in no way legally binding.
Where does the fence end? A fence that only straddles two properties may be owned by either property owner or shared; a fence that wraps around a property, on the other hand, is much more likely to be owned by the person whose property it wraps around.
This is, again, not airtight; the only way to know who owns a fence is to hire a surveyor.
Winnipeg has clay soil - incredible for agriculture, not as useful for building structures with strong supports. Our clay shifts a lot, so carefully engineered posts are needed to ensure that the fence won’t move over time. Couple that with the freeze-thaw cycle that causes our soil to shift even more dramatically, and you can end up with disputes over fences that have moved from one property line to one side or another.
The ownership of the fence is determined based on where it was built - not where it shifted to. Though it can be difficult to find, evidence that a fence was built on one side of a property line or another can help solve disputes when the fence has shifted.
There are a lot of ways you can get more information about your fence - and all of them cost money. You can hire a surveyor, pay the City for site maps, tear down the existing fence (if your neighbour insists that the fence is your responsibility) or build a new fence on your property (if the neighbour insists that the fence is theirs).
Do research to determine which of these options works best for your budget and goals. Get quotes, do the math, and find a way to settle the dispute.
The team at Peg City Fence Pros can replace fences or build you a brand-new fence; once you’ve resolved the dispute, call us for fencing Winnipeg residents can rely on.
No. Most property owners opt to have the good side of the fence facing their neighbour because it boosts curb appeal, but the City of Winnipeg’s regulations on fences specifically state that the good side of the fence can face either direction.
Thinking that a fence is yours is not enough. Do not tear down a fence without being absolutely sure that it is yours, or you could face liability charges from your neighbour.
You can build a fence on the property line - the cost for these fences is typically shared between neighbours, and consent is needed from your neighbour to build a fence on the property line. A fence that is on the property line is sometimes called a boundary fence. Fences that are not shared can be built up to and along the property line.
Typically, the costs of building and maintaining fences are shared between the two property owners if the fence is built on the property line. The costs of building and maintaining a fence on your side of the property line are all borne by you.
