Our driveway on neighboor's property by builder

What is the name of your state? Ohio.

Hi,

I wonder if anyone could give me advice. We just built our house and moved in Feburary. Yesterday, we found out that a small part of our driveway (side entry-3 car)is over neighbor's property line. It was surveyed by the builder - I do not know why they did it now. Of course, this is not our fault, our builder sold and build all the lots around this neighborhood, they should and I believe they did stake the house before they dug. Somehow they did not follow the plot plan.

This neigborhood is also a private one - in that there is no easement regulations so the driveway could be right up to the property line. The characteristics of this area is big house and small lot - that is why this happened.

What can we do in this case to solve the issue? We certainly do not want the builder to destroy our current driveway, the angle of drive way is steep enough already. Could we ask the builder to purchase that small land for us? Or should we trade some spaces with neighbor and we could give them a small part of backyard?

Do we have any say to our builder? The builder only said that they could redo our driveway, but we have to suffer all the incovenince for their mistake. Can we ask for a small compensation? We still rather prefer to trade some spaces with neighbor and they are OK with that too. Any advice welcome!

Contact the builder (you and the neighbor) and inform them that you are giving them 5 days to contact either you or your neighbor with the option of them paying for an attorney to straighten out the mess at their expense. Otherwise, you will Contact a real estate attorney with the neighbor and have the deeds changed to reflect the 'trade' of property, then send the bill to the builder.

Of course, if they don't pay the legal bill you will have to take them to small claims court. Small price to pay.

Follow up

So, you think we can win if we go to small claim court? Is it a slam dunk? Or the builder could argue that they offered reasonable corrective action by offering to redo our driveway?

denofa said:

So, you think we can win if we go to small claim court? Is it a slam dunk? Or the builder could argue that they offered reasonable corrective action by offering to redo our driveway?

Click to expand...

**A: it should never be estimated as a slam dunk in that kind of court.

You are better off first attempting to have the builder "fix" the problem. If you prefer he now fix it legally via a switch of some land, and your neighbor is agreeable, let the builder absorb the legal fees to do this. I'd try that route before small claims.

Send the builder a certifed rrr letter demanding a resolution. Put the burden on them to get their surveyors back and do an as-built survey and proceed from there.