Shabaz Ashraf and wife Shakira were told to tear apart extension to their £700,000 London home because it was built over two inches too close to their neighbours’ house, reports The Evening Standard.
The Evening Standard writes:
A couple who built on their neighbours’ garden, then told them ‘go to court’ have been ordered to demolish their £80,000 extension and handed £200,000 in legal bills…
The couple estimate they spent £80,000 ripping down a 1970s extension at the back of their house in Ridgeway Gardens, Redbridge, and replacing it with a modern one, only to have the couple next door – former friends Avtar Dhinjan and wife Balvinder – complain that it was millimetres over the boundary…
… Giving his ruling, the judge said: “One of the sad features of the case is that before the parties began building new extensions to the rear of their property, they lived in harmony and were on good terms.
“The defendants say they built the wall in exactly the same position as the previous wall, which was in position for 41 years. I find that that is, to the defendants’ knowledge, wholly untrue…”
The judge said he would make an injunction, directing the Ashrafs to remove their extension wall.
He also told them to reinstate a fencepost they removed and made a declaration that the fence between the two houses belongs to the Dhinjans….’
