Sometimes the biggest problems come from the smallest measurements.

When a new neighbor challenged a backyard fence and threatened legal action over a minor encroachment, the homeowner chose compliance over compromise.

That decision quietly flipped the power dynamic and left one dog owner deeply regretting her demand.

Keep reading for the full scoop.

New neighbor didn’t like my old fence so I took it down.

About five or six years ago, I built a fence in my backyard.

I talked to my neighbors, and we decided on a good place to build the fence.

These neighbors were both totally fine with a handshake agreement.

We knew an approximate property line based on some survey pins, but were both too cheap to pay for a surveyor.

We shook hands, and I built the fence.

It was a great deal for my neighbors. I paid for everything, built the fence, and all they had to do was give me a thumbs-up when it was done.

That was all well and good — until a new neighbor moved in.

Then, a year later, they sold their house.

That meant I got a new neighbor — more specifically, I got Anne.

Anne was much different from their previous neighbor.

Anne was from the big city. Anne was a realtor. Anne had flipped eight houses in 12 years. Anne loved this new house and planned on staying for a long time.

Anne also had a dog.

This dog was not well behaved at all.

Razzy was a German Shepherd mix that spent most of the day outside while Anne went to work. Razzy was aggressive toward children, animals, insects, and any plants that waved in the breeze.

Razzy also, as Anne once told me, loved to chew on furniture. That’s why Razzy stayed outside so much.

Turns out, Anne wasn’t afraid of bringing in a surveyor.

About six months after Anne moved in, I saw a surveyor walking around my neighborhood, paying special attention to my backyard.

The next day, Anne showed up at my front door with a stack of papers and asked me if I was going to pay her for the nine inches that my fence was encroaching onto her property.

The homeowner tried to reason with her, but she wasn’t having it.

I explained the handshake deal with the last neighbors, but she was having no part of it.

She wanted the fence moved, or she wanted money. No discussions.

Anne was prepared to play dirty, so finally the homeowner complied.

She had spoken to her lawyer friend and was perfectly happy to take me to court over the fence. She told me, “I don’t know how you guys do it out here in the sticks, but where I come from, we follow the rules!”

So, I got rid of the fence.

The homeowner got to work with the removal, but that didn’t get Anne off their tail.

The next day, I unscrewed the horizontal rails from the brackets, stacked the fence panels up against my garage, and pulled up the fence posts with my work van.

About a week later, Anne showed up at my front door again.

She wanted to know when I was going to be building a new fence.

Anne had come to miss this fence.

Turns out, without my portion of the fence, she had not been able to let Razzy out unattended for fear that he would run away, attack something, or get hit by a car.

She also told me she couldn’t keep him in the house all day while she was at work anymore. Her furniture and carpet were all but ruined.

That’s when the homeowner broke the news.

I told her, “Well, Anne, I’m not going to be rebuilding the fence. I don’t want any legal trouble, and the best way to stay out of trouble is to not build near your property.”

The look on her face was priceless.

I thought she was going to cry. She probably did when she got back home.

Anne tried to walk back on everything, but it was too late.

She tried to protest, saying that she really needed the fence back and that she would even help pay for a new one.

She told me how much she loved the style and aesthetic of the old fence. It was just the location that she had a problem with.

I stood firm. There would be no new fence.

She never got a fence.

She tried to come up with her own solution, but nothing worked quite as well.

She made half-hearted attempts to put up some bamboo fencing, but Razzy tore through that stuff like wet newspaper.

Eventually, I sold my place and moved away.

I took the old fence panels with me, and I still look at them every day when I let my dog out in the morning.

Sounds like Anne should have just kept her mouth shut.

What did Reddit think?

Bad neighbors can really drive a potential buyer away.

In any property survey, there’s always a winner and a loser.

This neighbor could have handled things a lot better here.

This redditor shares a similar story.

At the end of the day, Anne learned the hard way that some demands come with consequences.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.