Don Wiss wrote:
On Wed, 26 Jun 2013 16:16:50 -0400, "TomR" wrote:

Here are the two photos that you posted so far:

http://donwiss.com/pictures/misc/BackFence.jpg
http://donwiss.com/pictures/misc/Bac...ceSWCorner.jpg

I assume that you mean that you will be putting up a new fence on
the left side like the new fence that you are now putting up on the
right side. That fence that you are now doing does look good.

I may put a trellis across the back. My landscape designer wants to
mount planters on the wall and a waterfall. I'd be happy with a vine.
The problem is it is too shady for a flowering vine. Being a designer
he wants to do something fancy. I don't want anything that requires
maintenance, as the back yard is the tenant's exclusive space. While
the current ones are using the backyard, I have had tenants that have
put stuff in front of the door to the outside and never stepped foot
out there.

And, you will be putting a new fence on the back to the right of the
fence that your neighbors put up.

Yes.

One thing I did notice in the first picture that I am curious about
is that it looks like there is snow on the ground. Is that snow?
Was there snow there recently or is this a photo of the fence from a
few months back or more?

Actually the fence went in last November.

The reason that I am wondering is that if this is how the back fence
has been for a few months now, it seems a little late to try to undo
what they have done.

It certainly would have been better had I realized this before all
the soil was dumped in there. The problem is after I asked the
workmen to move the fence off my property I assumed they would do as
I asked. To measure I have to recruit someone to help. And I never
bothered.

Okay, so it's a tenant occupied rental property, the back fence has been
there since November, and you may have a simple solution of just putting up
a trellis across the back. Sounds like a plan to me. I would skip the idea
of planters and a waterfall -- nice thought, but not for what you have, and
not what you want in terms of less maintenance.

If I got it straight that the neighbors in the back piled dirt up along
their side of the back fence, then the bottom of that fence will probably
rot and decay fairly soon -- I'm guessing a year or two. And then you can
play the game again of "what to do".

Overall, I think you're all set for now, and you can just go with the
simplest plan -- connect your new short section of back fence to the end of
theirs, consider their hokey fence a free gift, put up the trellis along the
back that you are thinking of adding (a good idea; why didn't I think of
that?), and focus on collecting the rent and moving on to the next
investment property.

Good luck.