My neighbours have a paved parking area in front of their house. The land is theirs. I have an easement, written into my deeds, that allows me to park there. My parking right is an equal one, even though I do not own the land.
Without consulting me, they appointed a firm to repave the area (it was in fair condition) and have issued me with a bill for 50%.
Does anyone know what the law states about costs, or know of an example of how costs have been agreed?
I have looked at the Civil Rules and it seems that the situation is not so simple. If this is about land, then each should pay according to their usage. But if it is a residence then the cost falls entirely to the owner.
The situation is odd (as in, is it residence or land?) because my garage sits on the neighbour's land under her terrace which is attached to her house and I need to cross the parking place to get to my garage.(She has an easement over my garage roof, which is essentially her patio and here, my deeds state clearly that I am responsible for the full costs of my roof even though she is the only one who uses it). I would say that since both families did consider the cost issue when the drew up the deeds, as indicated by the reference to roofing costs, then the omission with regard to the costs of parking maintenance was not an oversight.
As it is, I use just under one third of the parking space (that needed to get to my garage) and it is not my land, so have paid one sixth, which seems fair to me. But am I in the wrong?
I would contact the Gemeinde and tell them of the situation. They may be able to help you further. I agree that the whole thing stinks and you shouldn't have to pay something you did not agree to.
My broken record - do not live in Switzerland without legal insurance.
This is exactly the type of situation that a lawyer can help you with. This way you deal with the neighbour on a factual/legal level that leaves the emotion and questions of communication out of the situation.
Then, if you need to escalate the situation into the court system to get a solution your expenses are covered.
Reject the bill in its entirety citing Art. 8 ZGB and insufficient evidence on their part - he who claims shall bear the burden of proof for their claims. Have they proven to you *why* you should pay the bill? Then why are you even considering paying anything? Do not pay even 1/6th or that might in some circumstances be considered an acceptance of their claims. It's on them to do the legal research as to why and how much they can charge you - request them to do that and present their findings to you.
Bullshit fearmonging. Court costs are not that exorbitantly expensive if it comes to that, and then if you lose the court case insurance ain't gonna cover damages you owe your counterparty. Are you an insurance salesman by any chance that you're pushing insurance so hard?
It's a popular advice on this forum but also bullshit. Registered letter in this situation basically achieves nothing and will come off as a hostile move suggesting taking things into formal realm.
Start with a simple email asking them to elaborate on the legal basis of their claim. Be polite, not overly formal, leaving the door wide open for informal pre-court negotiations. If it's just family, remember it's not in their interest to take you to the cleaners right away, they would normally also prefer to settle informally first!
And why exactly does OP need to have a proof of delivery in his current situation? They don't need it yet, it doesn't change anything. Might just make things more awkward as I explained above
If they reply it's good enough proof for court that the original email was delivered
if they ignore you and you still insist you need a proof of delivery, fine, go ahead and waste 6 chuffs on it then
If an email bounces then you are notified. Emails from private individuals that don't mention the common junk filter keywords like "sex, viagra, drugs" etc also generally don't go into junk folders. Email is a lot less troublesome and a lot more reliable than people (usually of an older age demographic) try and make out, with the added benefit of being instantaneous and not needing to wait days for replies.
That's actually not true... Happens once in a while and I have had email both received and sent to others end up there without apparent cause. Unless they reply you cannot know fr sure your email has been read.
Come on legal insurance is really helpful and costs very little. For foreigners here even getting help with the law and writing in proper language form, this is really valuable. I have loved my legal insurance and also recommend it to many.
If you're a litigious person I could see why it can be useful to have one. But swiss aren't very litigious in general and this being a civil law country, the legal system is not overly complicated and doesn't really require lawyers in many cases.
But don't take the insurance for what it's not. For the most part you're basically pre-paying for legal consulations whether you need them or not; if you anticipate you need extensive consulations with lawyers, sure it could be a great deal as lawyers time when you need it on-demand costs a pretty penny here. Come a court case time, they'll also cover your own legal fees. But they definitely won't cover other side's damages and expenses if you lose the case - and that's where the bulk of the costs are usually going to be anyway. You're only insuring a small part of the total costs actually - is it really worth paying $$$/y for that? If you rely on them too much, note that they are likely also going to cancel your cover after your first couple court cases or so, citing you being an unprofitable-to-insure client and good luck getting another legal cover after that - they all ask whether you've been banned by another insurance and will get the hint.
For what it's worth, I do not and cannot receive emails on my private email from private individuals, companies, or people I haven't emailed. Everything goes to junk or is deleted unless its from a "validated source". Especially if its coming from some random server (bluewin, hotmail, gmail).
My work email is even more aggressive.
I was replying to Chuff on the downsides to email. In my situation I would talk to the other person like a human being instead of sending out registered mail or emails. Who the heck even shares their private email with rando's anymore?
My view is that this is a really excessive and counter-productive default policy to have, considering how good and accurate modern spam filters are at removing crud from your inbox. I have no idea why you would need such overly strict rules on incoming mail as at least in my case it would block or delete a ton of legitimate mail.
Not sure the debate about legal insurance is going to do the OP much good. Either they have it or they don't.
One of the problems with buying a property which has easements is often maintenance issues, such as repairs, or in this case, repaving, are not spelled out. If you are going to purchase a property with easements, best to clarify before you buy all the implications.
We have done our utmost to avoid properties with easements as it can get very complicated. Often an agent will ask us why we want to see this information even before we look at a property.
To the OP, if you are a member of the HEV, (homeowner's association) you could contact them for assistance. They can also refer you to a lawyer.
You could well be liable for a share of the costs of the repaving, but unless it is written somewhere, no one can say for sure. Just because you have a right to use something doesn't mean you have to participate in the costs of maintaining it.
In my case, I know already what should arrive in my personal email account based on who knows that email address.
Regarding the workplace emails, as someone responsible for IT related matters, I fully agree that it's unnecessary. I'm fighting the aggressive spam filtering we have in place and it's caused us/me lots of headaches in the past. Especially since it seems somewhat random e.g. if a group is sent an email from someone external, some members will receive it, while others will have it wiped and never delivered, while others will have it quarantined in their spam filter. Absolute madness
But sorry, I don't want to force this thread anymore off topic.
You should check the land registry and any legal documents you have from when you bought the house to confirm whether you are part owner, or just have the right to use the space and either way, what are your obligations on maintenance, renovation etc.