What an A-hole. Guess he can’t afford a saw.
And those damn screws.
While I really dislike painting with a broad brush about any sort of “good ol’ days”…
I think there’s been a huge loss of generalist knowledge since Gen X. Gen X got to grow up with adults familiar with the pre-tech world and where a lot of things could be and needed to be fixed by yourself, and they grew up with the advent of household technology. From mending fences to replacing a capacitor in a electric motor to fixing your own car. Some of that got passed on to the kids by the boomers. I’m not trying to say this kind of knowledge was common, it was just more common. I dunno if millennials got this knowledge dump too, but if you did, you’re on the hook to pass it on as well.
I looked at the fence and couldn’t understand why someone wouldn’t take the ten minutes to trim the bottom off and buy a small box of the correct nails, but then someone could be in the position of never having been taught to think of those things. Maybe it was just laziness.
So, I appeal to my Gen X brethren - peel yourself and your kids away from the screens and find a way to get your collective hands dirty. Change some brake pads. Fix a fence right. Change the spark plug or oil in a mower. Build a raised-bed garden, even a small one, from scratch. Make the kids do the work they can. Trll them why you chose to do what you did, how you chose the parts, what you need to look out for, etc.
It’s better for problem solving skills, planning, and just understanding how things work. Spare everyone the embarrassment of a shitty fence repair job.
He probably decided he didn’t have a way to cut those 45 degree angles and so there was no way to make those boards like the rest.
Cut it off the bottom then?
And use way shorter hardware to affix the boards.
Its crazy how many peeps here cant see there are two separate fences with a no mans land gap between. It’s really weird because Ive seen this on properties more often then I would’ve expected I would.
One of the most common scenarios ive seen this is when neighbor A has a pool and put the required perimeter fence for the pool but not at the property line. Also the pool and fence would be installed first. Then neighbor B put up a fence after and told the cobtractor to run their property line. I say contractor because they do as told by person paying, if it was diy fence by owner theu wouldve talked to neighbor and butted the fences back to back w/ no gap. It’d explain the neighbor not caring about the protruding screw out the back because they’ve never seen a single person between the two fences the entire time they put the fences up.
Other scenarios are quick fix to contain animal till full fence replacing is installed. Or neighbor with bucktooth fence, from the picture angle, looks like they have no sight line to that part of fence from house and said fucked if I care.
You can easily get rid of those nails sticking out with just a hammer.
Hit it from the top. Cover your eyes. Hit it from the bottom. Hit it from the top. Off it flies, good luck finding the broken off piece.
No bolt cutter needed.
Perhaps the neighbor is just going for a taller fence… Over time.
Yes the screw length would be a big concern.
Neighbor is slowly transitioning to better fortifications, barbed wire will come in after the fence is taller /s
As someone with buck teeth, I see no issue.
So they have a hammer but no saw
Why do you even care?
Presumably the fence runs between their property so they have to see it every day. Also those exposed nails could be hazardous to pets or children.
It’s also pretty trivial to cut the boards to length and use appropriate fasteners. Maybe I’m reading too much into this, but I suspect this kind of carelessness is present in other parts of the neighbor’s life. They’ve probably gotten on OP’s nerves before.
Since the photo was taken from the inside, he either went into the neighbors side to take the photo or it’s his fence.
Look at the shorter fence in the foreground. It looks like the space between the two fences is probably a line between the properties, and the neighbor did their fence backwards from what you’re imagining, whereas the foreground fence is oriented the way you’d expect.
Has the same thought
It looks like shit
Edit: Hate HOAs? Me too. But this shit is why they exist. If people never did dumb shit like this I think there’d be fewer of them.
Get your bolt cutters out and solve the nail problem. Apart from that, it’s meh.
But in 20 short years at least the color will match!
What screws?
I read it as “they can’t afford saw and screws”
Yeah, Id be going back out there with a hammer and poking those nails back through the board just enough to make it flush. let the neighbor loose an eye if they want to half ass that.
All I see is a dude who had a limited amount of fucks to give.
Maybe he is slowly upgrading it to a taller fence. Only 328 more to go.
I was just talking to someone who wants to replace their fence. Planks are expensive right now so he is as saying he would do it this way haha
I wish I was lucky enough to be a homeowner complaining about 2 mismatched fenceposts
The 3 inch nails protruding through the rails are much more complaint-worthy than the too-tall pickets.
They don’t even come close to the home owners fence bro
Check where you are, because come on, that’s the whole point of this community
Wait, are we in mildyinfuriatinghomeownerproblems?
I’m more than mildly infuriated I will likely never own a home.
Have you tried looking for a home somewhere undesirable
One of the issues with that is that unless you are WFH, you would very likely have to find another job that is commutable. With local salaries more of less being intertwined with the housing, (see cost of living) the new job would also very likely put you in the same position you started with.
I was thinking Ohio, but sure
Please keep spreading this narrative. Gotta keep housing prices down. Got an awesome price on my new house several years ago.
The main driver of the “I’ll never be able to buy a house” narrative are mortgage interest rates, which are transient. When rates go back down, people will suddenly be able to afford many more options. But yeah, every now and then I look at how much house I could buy in Michigan…
have you looked into the United States department of agricultures direct loan program?
There are things I can relate to, and this is not one of them. Hence my comment
Good news is that many landlords excel at this level of craftsmanship.
I also wish the same for us both. But I’d like to remind you, people who rent can also find themselves complaining about the neighbour’s mismatched fenceposts
I don’t know if you meant for it to come off this way or not, but to me it reads like you’re saying people who own homes shouldn’t complain about small things. Someone else always has it worse. That doesn’t mean those who are better off have no right to complain about things that annoy them (especially on the community made for complaining about mildly infuriating things).
I think it’s the fact OP is calling their neighbor an asshole for fixing their fence in a less than perfect way that really irked me. I get annoyed when privileged people want to play the victim; it’s something I know I should work on, but right now it’s a part of my character.
I get you. Until I noticed the spiked aspect of the new boards I didn’t see the problem. A repaired fence > unrepaired fence. I think it’s great.
nail edit
