Property Boundaries

Introduction

The positioning of property boundaries is often difficult to detect and frequently gives rise to disputes and issues between neighbours. This is not helped by the reluctance of the Land Registry to record and register precise boundary positions, although their reasoning for this is quite understandable. It is thought this would likely cause disputes where they do not already exist.

There is no single document that specifies a property's boundaries and the available plans do not show them with precision. All the registered documents for each adjoining property should be read together, and consideration given to Common Law Presumptions where appropriate. In 90% of disputes reading and understanding these documents is all that is required.

General Boundary Rule

Since 1925 (Rule 278 Land Registration Rules 1925) the Land Registry have followed the General Boundary Rule, i.e. boundary positions are not recorded with precision but in a general way only. They are reasonably accurate until one starts to examine the boundary positions in feet and inches. The General Boundary Rule has now been encapsulated in section 60 (1) of the Land Registration Act 2002. Section 60 (1) reads:

Defining a Property's Boundaries

There are several ways to define a property boundary and once this is understood at least you will know what to look for in determining the boundary positions.

Each property has a legal boundary and a physical boundary. The legal boundary is a notional boundary line drawn between the adjoining properties, a line that has no thickness and that is used by Ordnance Survey to denote the division between the properties. The Land Registry will place a red line along the inside perimeter of the legal boundary to illustrate the general extent of the property owned.

The physical boundary is identified by using surface features such as hedgerows, ditches, rivers, fences and walls. Sometimes the physical boundary is described as running along the centre of a ground-based feature, and sometimes as being on its left or right.

Determining Your Boundary Positions

In determining your own boundary positions the exercise is rarely straight forward. Having said that, having access to all of the available documents registered at the Land Registry will provide sufficient information in the vast majority of cases, if you know what to look for, without taking the matter further. Litigation to resolve boundary disputes is very expensive and time-consuming and will in any event begin by looking at the Land Registry documents. Therefore you should always start by obtaining a Boundary Search; in most cases this will save you a lot of money.

If you are reading this guide you will have already obtained these documents from us and will be able to use this guide to assist you.

The following documents need to be looked at: