Complain About Your Neighbors Thread

Parent Cafe
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Whether for good or for bad, I think we can keep this thread going. :wink:

I thought something that is not the “Say It” thread because sometimes we want some feedback.

And I’ll start. Cause I’m feisty today.

Our next door neighbor is an older couple (early 80’s). He is apparently a very successful business man - still works as far as I know and as far as he has said. His wife has health issues and is not mobile. They have a lot of help at the house for her - hired workers as well as the couple’s daughters. They actually had a terrible fire at their house May 2022 - we bought our house August 2023 so the house was under reconstruction at that time.

They are nice enough people.

But here is my complaint. They CONSTANTLY have people working on their house - especially the outside. They have a very nice home but we are not talking million dollar home. (Nor is mine!) Over the summer they have had countless yard workers doing various things - bushes don’t need trimmed every two weeks! They had someone rebuilt a deck and add another deck nearer the water - but they don’t use their yard. That is not my business of course. But what is bothersome is that they seem to hire LOTS of sketchy people. People who make comments to me as I’m swimming in my pool. Guys who are doing yard work in a bathing suit bottom only - and they are 70 and not fit. Guys yelling at each other. Keeping their dog in a truck all day with the dog barking. SO.MANY.STORIES. I could tell!

Today, the start of Labor Day weekend - an expected beautiful weekend and a holiday weekend - often the last of summer they had a roofing crew show up. As far as I know, roofs don’t take a day on a 3500 sq ft house. I’m almost certain the roof was replaced after the fire! Roofing itself is loud. The men are yelling. Playing loud music. Do not have safety equipment on. Is this what we have to deal with all holiday weekend? He tends to hire people who always come on off times - weekends, evenings - so side jobs after other jobs (not dissing the people, they are trying to make a living)

Am I wrong in thinking that MAYBE you tell your neighbor when you’re going to have roofers for a few days? I mean our driveways are very close. Houses are decently close. Fences don’t matter when you’re on a roof. Am I going to have men staring at me when I’m sunning or swimming? I know that may sound a little selfish but again, not a one day thing, AND it’s a holiday weekend! We were suppose to have guests over - it didn’t pan out.

Not a first world problem of course. I am someone who uses my yard ALL.THE.TIME. I let me neighbor know when we are going to have any outside work done that will include people walking in front and back, making a lot of noise, that kind of thing.

I’ll survive but I feel annoyed! (Whew, got that out).

Feel free to add your neighbor gribes. I’m sure we will all be reading. :slight_smile:

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Our neighbors across the street have always been thorns in our side. I literally will not go out to the mailbox if I see them outside. They are cantankerous and negative. One time DH cleared their driveway after a snowstorm while they were out of a town, and when they returned, the man said, “Please don’t ever do that again” with no explanation. ?!? And when our private road had just a “fund” instead of a real association, when we all wanted to start saving for the eventual road paving, they had their attorney write us a letter that stated if we tried to collect funds, they would sue us. WTH? So when we finally paved the road, the 13 houses had to split the $180,000 cost because there was no money in the bank. EVERY road association meeting, they cause issues. I love our house and neighborhood, except for these people.

I kept trying to be nice to them. At one point, they owed a few hundred dollars to the fund (something to do with their lack of contributions to the fund, as I recall), and I told them they could pay over a few months if they wanted. He wrote back angrily - “We would never stiff anybody in this neighborhood nor do we need budgeting advice!” Well, OK, then. I won’t try to be nice to them again.

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I need to knock on wood, because we are currently doing OK. But we finally went down to the police station after Memorial Day weekend asking if there was anymore they could do about ours. It took a couple of weeks for them to get back to us, but the officer was SO helpful and concerned - unlike the one we talked to at the station.

We have a long lot - 300’ long. So our side neighbor’s lot actually is only across the back part of our property. They have a pool that is roughly 150’ from our back door. This couple moved in roughly 8 years ago. Almost every weekend they’d be having parties at the pool. All day, all night with loud music blaring. As the night wears on and they get drunker, the cursing and shouting starts. In the beginning we’d call the police to shut it down at 10pm, later we’d move it to 9pm as per the noise ordinance. Occasionally, we would find beer cans in the yard, but not often. Sometimes other neighbors would call. Once they went away for the weekend and left their poor dog outside. S/he barked and cried the entire time. Somebody called Animal Control for that one. And note this neighborhood behind us is referred to as the “Old Money” neighborhood.

So Memorial Day weekend, it started up Saturday at 1pm. The music was so loud, that we could hear the lyrics clearly inside our house with the doors/windows shut. At 9pm, we called the police. And this was when H was working weekends and had to be up at 4am too
 Sunday, same thing, same volume. They stopped the music at 9pm, but then they shot off a bunch of fireworks to end the night. We had bottle rocket debris in our yard. Monday, same thing
.

The policeman said he was going to hand deliver a copy of the noise ordinance to them, and tell them that they would be charged the next time. And they have records of all the people who have called over the years and all of the patrolmen have been warned that this is a “house of nuisance.”

Since then, it’s been great! They still enjoy the pool and and it can get a bit noisy, but nothing like it was. I shouldn’t be able to sing along to their lyrics while trying to watch TV in my house. Even the 911 operator could tell what song was playing when H called!

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We won the “neighbor lottery” and have neighbors - including one with whom we share a driveway - who are generally friendly and considerate. We have developers who are building houses on adjacent lots, however, who are decidedly less than considerate. Are they also covered by this thread?

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We have been fairly lucky but there is an older couple across the street that are giant PIAs. Every year there is a block party on our street. Every year we put notices up all over to alert people to move their cars before the barricades go up. The first few years of the block party this couple would make everybody take down the barricades so they could leave their house. Mind you they could literally park 25 yards down the street and exit without problem. The coordinator of the block party started hand delivering the notice to their mailbox, giving them the benefit of the doubt that they did not read the signs or their email. That’s hasn’t made any difference. Every single year they come and go multiple times and expect people to move the barricades for them. block party is tomorrow and I would bet money that it’s gonna happen again. And before anybody asks, yes, they are older, but they are both very able-bodied and we see them walking around all over the place.

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Glad that is partly resolved! Pool season will be done soon!

We sure could have a thread about great neighbors as well. We have a wonderful neighbor on our other side that I just love and we are very good neighbors reciprocally!

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We have lived in our house almost 40 years. We have been lucky with neighbors. However, a house near us - and within our view - has been falling into disrepair over the past several years. We knew that the couple was struggling with health issues, and one of the neighbors would mow every so often for them to help out. The woman died during Covid, and the man’s relatives came by once in a blue moon.

Last month, a dumpster appeared in the driveway. It was eventually filled with junk from inside the house. We thought maybe he was moving elsewhere - but we found out that he died suddenly. No will 
 and his D decided to take over the house. There is still a rather hefty amount owed on the mortgage, and she announced to a neighbor that she figured she has two years before the bank figures out that her dad died & manages to evict her. So I guess that means she doesn’t plan to pay on the mortgage, and it certainly appears that she doesn’t care about the outside of the house. And now 
 she is bringing her friends from her old neighborhood to the house. A neighbor has seen guns pointed out the window. This is not an area that experiences this sort of thing 
 plenty of my neighbors have guns, but they’re for hunting deer.

H & I aren’t directly affected, but knowing that they are nearby, we feel the need to be more careful than usual.

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Absolutely! I consider everyone living a few houses up our street neighbors. Not just the ones that share property lines with us.

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When we bought House2, our current house, we knew it was in dire needs of some repairs. The siding had to be replaced all over because parts were rotted. Siders can be very noisy with their nail guns! So when I ran into one of the neighbors while getting mail, I apologized in advance for the upcoming disturbances. He just shrugged and said something like, “Oh no worries! We are glad you are moving in and the short term rental is gone. The parties some of the renters had there were epic! Loud enough to wake up a corpse.” Ugh. I debated if we should keep the carpet and just clean it, but after that, I decided that new carpet and paint would be a wiser choice. :laughing:

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[Grammar pedant activated]

My neighbor doesn’t have a thread

[Grammar pedant deactivated]

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Haha OMG I’ll bite. So our former back yard neighbor was a super nice guy, single, late 40’s. But he was an alcoholic who would go one these weekend benders in the summer mostly and blast music and sing at the top of his lungs. But they were usually only like 48 hours and maybe 3 times a year. He lost the house and it was purchased by a local contractor company who flipped it and now rents it out to his subcontractors. There are easily 6 or 8 people in this small 2 BR Cape. And they have FOUR happy dogs who bark constantly and sound like they are killing each other. They bark for 1-2 hours in the yard in the morning and then like 2-3 hours from 3-7 PM. It is awful. We have complained to the animal control, the police, etc. Nothing has been done and it has been two years now. It sucks.

Our neighbors to our left have three kids, two boys ages 8 and 10 who fight constantly, then someone is always crying and screaming. It is constant. They also terrorize their younger sister who is constantly screaming and crying., The parents are those “gentle parenting” types who don’t set limits. We have a family across the street with a 5 and 3 year old- two girls both tantrum daily. Also the “gentle parenting” types. I seriously need to move to a 55+ retirement community in a few years :face_with_spiral_eyes:

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We did too. Our neighbors are great. Maybe we should split off a “we won the neighbor lottery” thread.

Just to give one example. A number of years ago (back when I worked full time) I got back from a business trip very late at night, tired and exhausted. I discovered that a tree, entirely on my property, due to a snow storm had fallen across the driveway blocking the driveway. The neighbor had brought out his chainsaw and cut off a piece of the tree’s trunk large enough to clear the driveway and dragged it to the side. This meant that there was a tree on both sides of the driveway, but with the driveway clear. This also meant that the plow was able to get through (we have a long driveway). I drove to my garage, got a good night’s sleep, and dealt with the rest of it the next day.

At one point but in the summer the same neighbor and I were fixing some cracks in our shared driveway (not quite the same area where the tree had fallen). As we were just about done, his wife came out with Cambodian treats for us to eat, plus water (it was hot). Yes, this particular neighbor is an immigrant from Cambodia.

Another neighbor has a daughter just slightly older than my older daughter. Since we moved here when she was 1, they have known each other a long time. My daughter was recently the maid of honor at the neighbor’s daughter’s wedding, and we all attended and had a great time.

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We have a house next door to us that every year has new tenants (we have decided that the builder who owns it must be renting it to local families as their house is being renovated). There were families that played loud music and others that blocked our driveway but the last one constantly put me on edge. They had two absolutely adorable French Bulldogs that would wonder onto our property all the time. They would join my husband as he bbq’d and we would constantly worry that someone would take them. One time the larger of the pair fell over the retaining wall on one side of their property and was hanging over the edge and crying for about 30 minutes and no one noticed until I went to their door and told them. Poor babies.

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@abasket roofers on a holiday weekend? Weird times? I hate to speculate but to me that sounds like off book roofers working for cash. Roofers do work when the weather is good so you never know. I would never recommend that because off book contractors don’t have insurance but that’s me.

I’ve talked about the lack of our HOA enforcement in my neighborhood. This year seems a bit better with the campers in the driveway.

My immediate neighbors are great!

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Check with your planning/zoning folks to see if there is a max number of unrelated people allowed to be in a single family dwelling. Our limit is 3. I doubt our police would know this.

I know because of when our immediate next door neighbor was being used as a frat house/football team house for a few years. That issue was WAY WORSE than the pool issue above, but I’ve talked about that before. The downside is that it can be hard to prove if they aren’t renting it legally, and it can take time. But eventually the scummy owner felt enough pressure and sold it. It is now operating as an Airbnb which is HEAVEN compared to what used to go on.

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So far, I’m knocking on wood because even though a few houses on our street have changed ownership, the new folks are ok. One does get on my nerves periodically when his landscaping company starts playing a concerto for two leaf blowers and a hedge trimmer on a Friday afternoon. We just retreat to our back deck because it faces the forest, as far from the noisy tools as possible. Said neighbor’s landscaper also used to blow leaves onto our driveway which goes along his backyard. I was furious once when they completely covered our driveway with debris after we cleared it! Went to the neighbors and complained. They were apologetic but apparently said nothing to the crew. So the next time the crew was doing this, I marched through the bushes and told them to go blow the crud off our driveway. Turns out, the guys had no idea it was someone’s driveway behind those bushes! Of course they did not do anything about our driveway, so I took our electric blower, turned it to hurricane speed, and returned the debris to the neighbor’s lawn through the bushes. :slight_smile:

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I think this is likely a “bingo “! Now it’s true that today is just Friday so technically not the weekend but I would gamble to bet that most of his workers are similar scenarios. I think also it’s a possibility that some of the workers doing jobs are people with some (minor?) run ins with the law (he told my husband I. So many word once) that his church encourages people to hire out. Again ok, but please don’t comment to me when I’m swimming in my pool, yell out to me as I’m walking the dog, and please cover up a bit when you’re doing the yardwork!

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Our neighbors take a “natural” approach to landscaping. They have several large trees in their yard that shed copious amount of leaves every fall. We don’t have many trees and H mulches the leaves and the city picks up the majority. Neighbor just lets the leaves pile up. H offered to mulch them, but they declined as they wanted to compost them. Well, we could mulch them and add them to the compost pile. No, they would take care of it. So they blow all the leaves into the pile. Wind then pushes all of the leaves from the pile into our yard. Argh. Last weekend they went somewhere and left their dog in the backyard, where he barked incessantly for two plus hours. At that point, visiting D noticed that they had a camera trained on our driveway! Not sure how to approach that. One time the dog escaped the fenced yard and I returned him. I didn’t say anything to them at the time, but then the wife asked me what I was doing in their yard! Uh, returning your dog. The usual Sunday afternoon activity is for one of the parents to go into the driveway with their son and bounce a basketball back and forth. There are basketball courts across the street - where he might meet some neighborhood kids!

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Thank you– is there a way to remove the misplaced apostrophe in the title? I will stifle mnyself from saying more.

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Anyone can edit a title, so I did. For future reference, just click on the title and you can edit it.