The Fence Fiasco

So if you would recall... an earlier post about our miracle fence line (click here to refresh your memory). Well... yeah, it was too good to be true. Brace yourself for what you're about to read...

Two weeks after doing a walk-thru, closing escrow and moving in... we got a knock on the door from the home developer's supervisor.... who informed us that he (taking full responsibility, was that supposed to give us warm fuzzies?) had directed the fence to be built in the wrong place and was going to move it back (within 48 hours) to the original place. Our yard would go from 1200 sq. ft. back to a measly 300 sq ft. (5 x 60 feet). Technically this is all of our property (which we get to pay taxes on, maintain, water, etc.) but we now have an "eavesment" which is roughly 3 times the size of our yard. We were appalled... devastated, MAD, shocked, just for starters. How exactly does this "accident" happen!? He said that the developer couldn't leave the fence there because it would cost too much money to change the city approved plans for the development. I'm thinking, "yeah... well a mistake like this ought to cost someone a lot of money somehow!" What is the compensation for such a mistake?!?!

We got the "knock-at-the-door" on Tuesday and after receiving much sound advice from a family friend, we went to the Fresno City Planning Office Wednesday morning (the developer got no warning that we were doing such a thing). We met with someone who became our advocate and voice when addressing the developer regarding their "mistake." He's a saint. That's all I have to say. In his words..."I've have no problem with your fence." After going back and forth with the developer on what needed to happen to keep the city happy, we got the final word today that "Will" (our answer to many prayers) fought on our behalf with the developer and made the developer give us 1/2 of the (ridiculously large) eavesment to keep inside of our fence. So they will have to move the fence... but at least now... we'll have 600 sq ft... instead of the fragment of a yard at 300 sq ft. Some eavesment was required by the city and was not up for alterations.
We LOVE our new house! It's fabulous and fits our family PERFECTLY!.... but now we say IF we were ever to buy a brand new house again... we will be making sure we ask so many explicit questions (and get documentation) on what is to be built that it might make our heads spin. It's so misleading to walk through a model home (with a MUCH bigger yard) and then trying to envision your home on your lot.... with no visual references (neighbors, fences, etc). Lessons learned.