Name changed for this as it’s outing!
We’ve lived in our house for over 10 years and are really happy here, area is lovely and it’s perfect for commutes to work and walk to school. So aside from it not being financially viable right now we really don’t want to have to move. Most people on our street are lovely and a mix of owners and renters. We’re semi detached and about 7 years ago house next door was sold to a chap who now rents property out. Current tenants who (couple and two kids) have been there some time now (+3 years) are proving really difficult to live with and we’re getting to the end of our tether.
It started well enough - We popped round to say hi with a welcome card and wine, hellos on the drive that kind of thing but rarely get much back however I realise some people like to keep themselves to themselves, that’s fine. Fairly early on they were loud with kids thundering about the house (we have 1 DC so I get it, that’s what kids do) parents shouting and swearing at the kids loudly and often. Not pleasant but we just hoped as the kids got older things would calm down. This has been going on for a few years now and in the last 12 months has escalated to the kids waking early (5am onward) and for the parents to shriek and yell at them, often with swearing to get back to bed. This happens several mornings in the week and most weekends too and goes on for about an hour. A few months ago we’d had enough of the sleep deprivation and our DC was really being affected by it (she’s 10 now) so I plucked up the courage to pop round for a chat. I deliberately chose a time when the chap wasn’t home and the kids were at school.
She did acknowledge the noise and told me immediately that one DC had been diagnosed as autistic and they thought the 2nd was the same and that this makes their behaviour difficult to control. I can appreciate this must be bloody hard and straight away I felt crap for bringing it up. What she didn’t seem to get was that actually their response was part of the problem. So I know I should have made this point more assertively however I think I felt a bit bad knowing about the kids and the side of me that hates confrontation of any nature wanted to toddle off home! We do at times hear lots of normal pleasant interactions, it’s not always awful but there’s something about that early morning that is slowly making us go mad! There's noise at other times of the day too.
Things got better for a few weeks but then back to normal so a month later I went round again tried to keep it neutral and again she was calm and civil with me and said they were hoping to get carpets in the kids rooms (house is laminate throughout and I think this is a massive contributing factor).
Well it’s not got better, as far as I know no carpets, my DD is regularly tired and in tears at 5.30am and we’re all bad tempered and snappy at each other.
So. What would you do if you were me? We have tried through this to be sympathetic to how hard it is for them to manage. I know they are just a normal family trying to get through the day but I don’t think it’s fair for it to affect us especially DD but I don’t know what we can do? We have the landlords details so could go to him but I’ll just feel like a grass if I do that. Pretty realistic and know I’ll get lots of suggestions to either move or suck it up 😊 but maybe need some perspective as to whether I’m unreasonable or not - feeling to tired to dare post in AIBU!
If you’ve made it this far thank you so much for listening.