Gardening the Property Line

When I first bought my house about half the backyard (of a 1/3 acre lot) was overgrown plants, ivy (particularly poison ivy) and what not. We’ve cleared this out all the way to the back which borders on a neighbors fence, so that looks pretty set. I’m in the process of clearing out the sides although there are no fences there. Notably there’s also a slight slope so I tend to get water from my neighbor’s yard (and my other neighbor from mine, I expect).

Any ideas for good things to plant/landscape along the property line that would do a good job absorbing as much water as possible?

You might want to google “rain garden” and check out some plans. Seems like it might be a good fit for your situation

Am I wrong in understanding that’s more about protecting the storm drains rather than absorbing the water itself? I mean all for protecting the storm drains but mainly trying to avoid having pooled water on my grass (while also still having most of my backyard be grass).

Rain gardens do reduce runoff into storm drains and clean the water a bit, but they also reduce water pooling in your yard by giving it a low place to go instead.

You could just build a french drain under your yard, The water from uphill neighbor goes into the pipe and flows to downhill neighbor. You put grass right on top of it.

Gunnera is a plant that loves to be drenched in water. They’re also cool and gigantic.