Question
Hello, when we bought our house in a new neighborhood the back yard was not sodded.  the developers did a cheap job of grading the lots and instead of leveling out all the properties along the street they made the backyards "stair-stepping"  so my neighbors yard is about 4-5 ft higher than my yard.  the problem with this is that there is water draining out of the hillside and pooling in my yard.  when we put down new sod we figured this would alleviate the problem since the grass would soak it up but it hasnt.  the grass in that area is not rooting very well and is turning yellow and if you walk on that area it is very "sloshy" and muddy and you sink about 3-4 inches into the ground.  is there any way to stop this water from draining out of the hill?  thank you.

Answer
You'll need to speak to the developer to ask that this be alleviated.  You have the right to not run into problems like this, which are clearly a result of their grading job.

There's really not much you can do aside from re-grading or installing drainage.  You shouldn't have to bear the brunt of this in my opinion.

I'd advise making some video of the wet area, and explain on camera what is causing it.  Show as much detail as possible in order to demonstrate that there isn't much question as to the cause.  The whole time, do this under the assumption that the developer will be cooperative.  There's no reason to start it off on an antagonistic note, as they may likely dig in their heels just to make some point.

Send the developer a copy so they'll see what's going on and request a timeline for when they plan to have it done.

That's about all I can advise at this point.  Thankfully it's not like you're dealing with a leaking roof or cracked foundation.  This is something that's just annoying.

Good luck!

-C.J. Brown