Home Forums Miscellaneous Topics Rural Living Fence laws?

In Iowa it's the right hand rule. You own, and are responsible for the half on your right looking at the land across the fence.

Unless, it is recorded at the county recorder's office differently.

Here, if the fence is actually ON the boundary line, each party is responsible for half the maintenance and building.

Problem is, they can't/won't enforce it.

Recent length of fence I put up had 5 adjoining landowners.

I didn't even get a dime from any of them. Not even one offered.

SOooo.... I located the survey markers and instructed the fencing crew to keep everything on MY side of the boundary, thus making me the sole owner of said fence.

Here, they cannot legally tie into a fence they don't have interest in legally. They have to set their own braces and corner posts.

Barry, that's pretty much the way it is here. Supposedly, if I were to decide to put up a new line fence, I could force the adjoining landowner to pay half the costs. However, I do not personally know of a situation where this actually happened.

I did the same as you did on the fence that I put up last summer. It was in an old grown up fencerow, and the old existing line fence was still showing in places. We cut as many trees and limbs we needed, and ran the fence on our side of the line. The landowner on the other side would have paid for half the fence had we asked, but he had zero need for a fence, as he crops his side, and we run cattle on our side. So, in that case, I didn't think it right to hit him up for half the costs.

You can’t force someone to pay for a Fence they don’t want...

IF the fence is on the property line and both agree to it... then sure you should both pay for it - just good neighbors and I’ve been there.
I’ve also been where the other person doesn’t have means to pay, or doesn’t want to have a fence at all.... (I had dogs, they like open views)...

SO. ... What if the other guy doesn’t want a fence At all ?

Guess what - it has to be on your property (inside the line) and you have to pay for it ...

People assume it’s a law... Go find a law that says you can force someone to pay for a fence you put up and they don’t need or want...

LOL... we had a professor from california who didn’t want to pay capital gains by a 3 acre farm house plot and immediately he put in a IRON FENCE with stone pillars around his 3 acre farm house he just bought... Do you think he asked the neighbors to pay for half of the fence... BWHAHAHAHA. You guys are funny (ie. Who picks how much that fence you are making the neighbor pay for can cost?)

I'm not sure how the law reads here in AL. I know I've asked neighbors if I could tie into their fence and all were happy to allow me to. I've torn down, cleared, and re-fenced several lines that join neighbors. I simply talked to them and made sure they didn't mind that I was going to do it.....they've all been more than happy that I was.....then I did it. I never thought about asking them to chip in even though the fence is as much use to some of them (that run stock) as it is to me.

Same here... last place I moved into had 10 feet of hedge row between the properties on the back line, 4+ feet sticking through and over the fence between them.

I asked the gal in the back if I could cut it down... As it turned out the lady that lived there was a widow and 83 years old, I asked here if I could clear her side of the fence because it hung over my fence by 4+ feet and I was getting tired of cutting it so I didn’t get hit in the head mowing my side. When it was said and done, she was tickled and said it had been that way since her husband died, and should could not get the mowers to cut down the brush that started... she was really happy.

that’s how life should be...

I just looked it up, and Kentucky law states that if I wanted to, I could sue an adjoining landowner for half the expenses of erecting a fence along the property line. At least that's the way I read it, and have always heard it.

Interesting to see if that law has any teeth in it.

To be honest, I do not know of a case where it's been enforced, and I've had 2 different neighbors put up new fences, and never asked me to help, just as I put one up and didn't ask that guy to help. But......it is on the books, so who knows what would happen if it was tested in court.

I do know that we have some very strict laws here about livestock that gets out and gets on someone else's property, and what the offended landowner can do about it. The same way with someone's dog getting on your property. There is a big stink going on right now in the next county over, where someone's pet German Shepherds got on the neighbors property, where he had cows, and were killed. Supposedly, they were valuable dogs, and the owners have filed a civil suit over the dogs being killed, because they could not file a criminal one.

Bear in mind that different states have differing laws on all of this. .......just like differing courts have differing opinions on what they consider right or wrong.

I have always put a fence up just inside my property line.That way I don't have to screw with neighbors.. I have neighbors on three sides of me. County road on the 4th.These three neighbors moved in after me,and not on volunteered to even help maintain the fence,let alone pay for part of it. One neighbor has neither horses,cows, or pets so he doesn't need a fence.The other two I had to put up and electric wire to keep their horses off my fence.

Colorado law is a fence out state.If you don't want to have neighbor's livestock on your property, you have to fence them out.
Why or how could anyone think that if they wanted to put up a fence, their neighbor had to help pay for it?

Here, if you don't want someone else's livestock on your place, you have to fence them out.

I guess if the neighbors get tired of your cows eating the geraniums in the flower garden and crapping on the back patio, they may want to chip in for half the fence...

Each township / county / state has different ordinances that over take each other... (town over county, county over state, ....up to state level, they you get the goofy federal vs. state (inter-state) stuff...

If I'm reading it right, and I believe I am, it is the responsibility of any livestock owner to keep their stock fenced in........not the responsibility of the adjoining landowner to keep them out. If my cows get out, and get onto a neighbors property that is not fenced off, and do damage, I am not responsible............the first time, but I will be thereafter.

Also, if my stock gets out and does damage to my neighbor, he can attach a lien to my cattle. He can also hold them, if he goes to the trouble of catching them, and make me pay damages before getting them back. A male animal that keeps getting out and getting onto the neighbors property, and breeding the neighbors animals, may be caught and neutered.

Of course, there have been many farmers here accused of purposely allowing the neighbors bull to come onto their land and breed their cows, in order to keep from buying their own bull.

There was a case here where an Amish farmer with a large dairy herd, was not keeping his cattle fenced in, and allowing them to get into his neighbors soybean field. The Amish man was repeatedly warned, and finally the other farm caught several of the cows, took them to market, and sold them in order to pay for the damage. Turned out the bank had a lien on the cows, but the law was on the side of the farmer that sold them because he had documented his damage.

Personally, I have no problem with outcomes like that, as I believe in being responsible for what I own.

Are we talking states that have open range laws and states that do not?

I'm sure that Kentucky does not have an open range law.

I am a township trustee since 82, I've yet to get in on a fence viewing.

True. Kentucky has a law that states that if you harvest timber on your neighbors property, accidently or on purpose, you shall pay himTHREE times the price of what the timber sold for.

I know of an instance here, in which the boundary line fence was old and couldn't bee seen in most places, and one landowner got across the line and harvested a bunch of white oaks on his neighbor. They were what were called veneer quality, and worth a lot money. The man who cut them had to pay over $30,000 dollars to his neighbor.......and here's the kicker...........the neighbor was going to have the trees cut anyway.

In the county where I live the Township Zoning dictates what fencing laws are on the books. The Township were I live is zoned Agriculture One (exclusive ag) and fence division requires non-livestock landowners pay for half on any fence. Many city slickers have bought land and fought it but lost in the end.

I have been a Town Supervisor and a Town Chairman and been in on a few fence divisions and disputes. Many times the Town Board put out bids to install fences and the cost was passed on to a landowner's property taxes.

Not in Colorado,but the livestock owner maybe liable for damages.I think people east of the Mississippi have different slant on things