Official details of garden boundaries

Accomodation, House and Garden
1
So I rent an individual house with garden on 3 sides.. Driveway / parking etc on the other side.

I have doubts around what's mine, what's the neighbours and what's the farmers etc..

One side is a very tall hedge which i maintain on my side, the other side of which is a sort of access path to a big field..

Neighbour on the other side of that path thinks that the *owner of my place used to maintain both sides..

On another side of the garden we have a metal fence which, to me, delimits the boundary of the garden.. Other side of this fence is a 3m stepped block wall down to the field, same field the path goes to.. Our neighbour on the other side again thinks the owner maintained that.. To me it's part of the structure / foundation of the garden / pool etc.

*Complication is that the owner died last year, house moved to family who have never even seen the place, it's a pure investment.. The regie has no idea, they just say i should do everything.. My lease says I should keep the garden maintained.. but i don't know what's mine..

So the question.. Where can I find out what's owned by whom and who's responsible for what..? Is that something the commune knows? Some other authority? Possible to get that detail?

I'd like to know officially before I open any discussion with neighbours or neigies.

## Sorry that ended up long

2
To determine property boundaries:

Here in my village in SZ, one finds property markers in the ground. In the grassy areas these are granite or metal posts set a few cm above the ground, about 10cm square. Along paved areas these are similar stones set into the pavement.

BTW, I've seen some property markers that are simply wooden posts, and on one of those boulder walls the property marker was just red spray paint.

The placement of these markers - at least where they ought to be - can be found on the Katasterplan - marked as a circle along the plan property lines.

The Katasterplan will be available in the Grundbuch. So start by asking at your Gemeinde. And if they are not responsible, they will direct you to whichever Amt is. (It's the Bezirk in our case.)

Sometimes the stones are overgrown and you have to do a fair bit of searching and pruning to find them. If you can't find them, the next step is to ask for (and likely pay for) someone official (Geometer is the title, I think) to come out and determine the property boundaries.

Fences, walls, or hedges may or may not run along property boundaries. In my area, one may place a fence or hedge of up to 120cm on the boundary, but if you want a higher fence, up to 2m, it has to go back 1 meter. (IIRC, or it might be 50cm, too lazy at this time of night to look it up.) So if your fence or hedge is higher than 120cm, chances are that the property extends beyond it - and you should indeed be trimming/weeding on both sides.

(There is a complication if the area is a Quartier... but we'll leave that for now.)

Even if the fence/wall/hedge is on the border, you still might be responsible for maintenance on both sides, with the complication of having to ask your neighbor's permission to come on his land to do said maintenance.

tl;dr: First determine where the property boundaries actually are. If the fences/hedges/walls are on the boundary lines, invite the neighbor in for a glass of wine and discuss who is going to do what going forward. Keep it simple, and go for the win-win.

3
Check the bottom of this page for an idea what they look like, and how the marks relate to the Kataster. I would expect this to work pretty much the same in the Romandie.

4
Meloncollie covers most of this very well. Just to add a few points.

I am attaching * two types of property markers used here in VD for reference, one is a square stone in terre and the other is a metal rod in concrete, both are border markers, you should find them, they limit the terrain. As said, the fencing and or hedge delimiters are likely inside the property line as current VD rules specify that walls etc need to set back a certain distance. Depends if along a road, public space, etc. or not the distance. Your commune may have additional such rules on top of VD rules.

As to hedge, if its indeed planted on your property, you have the obligation to maintain it, both sides, and it has to be to the limit of the neighbours property. This is the VD official rules. I had to look it up recently. Again there may be additional commune rules. If along a public route vs. private property (neighbour), different rules apply. https://prestations.vd.ch/pub/blv-pu...difiante=false

Here's the VD link to plan cadastral where you can find territory official boundaries. https://www.vd.ch/themes/territoire-...lan-cadastral/

*Apologies pictures won't attach.

5
Thanks people.. That gives me something to go on in terms of boundaries, although finding the markers will be quite a challenge.. I've seen loads of those walking around the village but not noticed any around the house, so far..

What's the opinion on who should maintain these boundaries, owner or renter? The hedge i mention is more of a line of trees, more than 3m tall, you know, the pine needle type with elderberry trees growing in-between.. Plus the other wall down to the farmer's field..

To me these fall outside the realm of normal garden maintenance ..

6
I think you need to talk to the owners or the regie . It sounds to me as if they are trying to worm their way out of dealing with the problem .

That said. How much maintenance are you talking about ? Maintain the bottom of that retaining wall and maintaining the other side of the hedge sounds like whacking out the weeds here and there during the summer. You can probably get an electric weed whacker for well under 100 CHF , maybe even 20 CHF for a decent second hand one . Or are they actually expecting you to get on a ladder to prune the conifers in the hedge ? That sounds rather excessive to me.

7
Well this is the question, on what's reasonable.. These conifers are over 3m tall.. (I only moved in a year ago so they were already that tall) .. I bought a very long hedge trimmer and i've maintained my side.. But it really needs a meter off the top to make it maintainable..

Plus the trees, elderberry, those are outside "the boundary fence" but coming right into the garden..

Then the boundary wall.. This has trees growing out of it, I've cut them but they have 6cm wide trunks in the wall, obviously there for many years .. Plus at the bottom of the wall is thorny brambles well established again.. This wall leads around 3m down to a field and supports the garden and the pool essentially. It's structural. It's about 30-40m long, it's big.

I've transformed what I would call the reasonable garden.. I've laid grass, created flower beds, trimmed and whacked everything i can.. It was really pretty poor last year but i think this boundary stuff needs an overhaul.

Everything is a fight with the regie so I'm just trying to get my side in order before I take that on..

8
When we rented it was our responsibility to maintain the hedges on both sides.

We got somebody in to do the large conifer hedge.

One of the first things the owner did when he moved back into the house (He inherited it) was rip up that hedge and replace it with something else.

9
Hi JohnH

Have a quick look at your local GIS browser, I've just tried a random section in the middle of Nyon.

https://map.nyon.ch/theme/amenagemen...ees_cantonales

There are other alternative layers / views available as well.

With this info for your plot, you should be able to find the stone / metal markers, that others have identified for you.

10
Wow I had no idea that even exists! I’ve checking my small village and have found some surprises as to owns what.

11
Good advice. You should also be able to get actual distances from these maps relatively easily. If you can find one of the actual markers, at the street for instance, it will give you a starting point to search for any other markers that might exist.

12
This is very interesting thanks.. Using that, it marks out what is mine.. And according to that, depending on how accurate it is.. The area at the bottom of the wall is not mine.. Neither is the area on the other side of the big hedge.. Although the hedge might be mine unfortunately I appears to be on the border..

What to do now.. hmmm

13
Try your local land registry ( Grundbuchamt, Registre foncier ). You should be able to get an accurate plan of the property with its boundaries. They should also be able to tell you who is responsible for what.

http://www.zbgr.ch/deu/gru_chh.php

You'll also find some general info here:

https://www.weka.ch/themen/bau-immob...vorrichtungen/

14
What is your obligations vs. landlord should be clear from the rental contract.

In case of houses it is not unusual that all garden work is done by the tenant,

Aren't those a bit tricky in the sense if they grow to big/wide that you can no longer cut them back, as all you would be left with is dead wood and no green?

Just search for "GIS browser ". It has many more interesting layers apart from the cadastre plan. Some communes have there own GIS browser which has further information.

15
Surely it is the responsibility of the regie or the owner to inform the tenant of his repsonsibilities.

Surely it shouldn't be the tenant's responsibility to trot off to various offices and wait in line and incur costs just because the people who should know are too incompetent.

16
Yes, you're right. It shouldn't be down to the tenant to find out what his/her responsibilities are. In fact, it should be stated in the contract.

But we live in an increasingly imperfect world, it seems.

17
My contract is a bit ambiguous to me at least, I must maintain the garden, cut hedges, cut grass, water stuff..

BUT I may not modify anything, change the position of anything or cut any trees..The hedge is essentially a row of big trees..

I suspect it's just standard wording..

Plus the issue of the other side of the hedge.. The registry shows the hedge right on the border/boundary, the other side is a jungle.

Again part of the issue is that the owner died, the family have never seen the place, the regie has no clue.. I'm happy to maintain what I need to but I don't really want to pay too much or get into negotiating with the farmer and neighbours.

18
You might want to contact ASLOCA.

19
The hedge and row of tree is your responsibility, the jungle the responsibility of whoever owns that land (unless something in the land registry says otherwise). Trimming the trees is not the same as cutting the trees.

As you now have the plan it should be relatively easily to find the markers and corner stones (apart that they might be completely overgrown). In the Gis browser you can often also overlay an aerial image.

20
Here's a pic.. Might be clearer.. I obfuscated the neighbours places

https://imgur.com/a/XV2ks0W