Neighbours at war - house on market nightmare AIBU & WWUD

[Tutifruity1999]

Backstory
I've been living here 12 years and used to get on quite well with my neighbours who live 5 doors down from me. 5 years ago after I returned to work full time I got another dog to keep my dog company while myself and my partner was at work.

At the time I wasn't aware my new dog was a yapping dog, but I started getting complaints from environmental health noise team. They couldn't tell me who complained so I set up my iPod with a recording app when I went to work.
And both my dogs were barking quite a lot.
My first dog never had barked previously but the new dog was making her bark too. As I live in a semi detached I guessed it was my next door neighbour.

So I got a dog door cat flap installed so the dogs could go out when they pleased.

This seemed to improve things and I never heard anything more until a year later I had two letters from environmental health that two other people had complained.

I phoned the council to discuss things and told them what I had done to combat the problem. I had started working shifts so at that time the dogs were at home from 9-7 six days a week so we arranged for a dog walker to come in twice a day.

Things started getting worse and I was getting letters monthly from environmental health so we set up s video camera to see what was happening and my dogs were at the bottom of my garden barking at the pack of dogs who lived in the garden backing onto mine.

I had problems now as when they were in the house my next door neighbour complained and when they were let out a few of the neighbours complained so I couldn't win. So I was now taking them to a friends mon-fri and they would be left at home only on a Saturday.

Things then got worse and I was getting hand written letters saying shut your f*ing dogs up every Saturday and more letters from the council. As I was coming home one Saturday One of my neighbours came out from 5 doors down who I had previously been friendly with and really had a go at me about it saying things like I was distroying his life.

My point of why I posted
Fast forward to now, it's been a ongoing nightmare with getting shouted at in the street and letters. A relative of mine who owns a house with some land that has died and I have inherited the property and we have spent the last six months doing it up and we will be moving into it soon.

The neighbour who have been verbally abusing me in the street has just sold his house.

Mine has just gone on the market for rent. I haven't got a sign up as I don't want to draw attention to the fact that I am moving with my neighbours but I am using the same agents that he sold his house with.

I had 4 viewings back to back yesterday. I sat in the garden to get out of the way and it seems the verbal neighbours have found out the house is on the market. As soon as my second viewer came round I could hear a high pitched barking dog and loud music blaring from his house. Then his child was playing in the garden screaming. This is from a family who are quiet.

I am certain they are trying to sabotage my viewings. WIBU to go round there and have a word?

I don't know what to do, it was so loud the agent had to go back in the house to discuss feedback as I couldn't hear him.

WWUD?

Maybe they've lost money through house sales falling through because of your dogs and are now giving you a taste of your own medicine.

Stop drip feeding OP!

Seriously, take it on the chin. You've been an absolute arse of a neighbour and you make me glad I rent so I can just leave at reletively short notice, to little cost.

I work nights. If you lived next door to me; I'd have been round within a week to have a chat and after that, I'd have phoned the RSPCA because you clearly aren't a responsible pet owner... You know dogs need walking and stimulation, and someone around so they don't have separation anxiety; but you kept it anyway because YOU wanted it? That's selfish. If you can't give t what it needs; you should give it up, not subject your neighbours to years of hell.

My friend is a SAHM and she sends her DDOG to doggy day care 3x per week to make sure he's getting the exercise and stimulation he needs. It's not exactly expensive.

You sound lazy and thoughtless. I hope your neighbours ruin every single one of your viewings, and you're left as distressed as you made them.

I'm attached to my dog, I could never leave her 9-7, six days a week. Not even with dog walkers. Plus Id never have a dog flap as Id be worried sick incase she escaped even though garden seems dog proof, or if she was taken. Blimey, your neighbours probably hate your dogs so much I wouldn't put it past them to bundle them in the back of a car and drive them for hours and dump them. Id have been seriously tempted if I lived next door to,you.

My Dh recently changed his job so isn't home based any more. I dropped my hours from 3-4 days a week to 2-3 days as I couldn't stand the thought of leaving her. And yes I have a dog walker, and dd is home at 3pm.

I'd love a little dog, but we won't have one because we work full time and it isn't fair on the dog.

It isn't all about you OP.

I wonder if they were moving because of you? I lived next door to noisy neighbours for a couple of years and it was hell. I felt like they stole my enjoyment of my own home. I had to go out to get peace and quiet because I couldn't relax in at home; I was always on edge waiting for the noise to start again.

Yikes, OP, you sound like a horrible neighbour! YABU, in case the rest of the thread hasn't alerted you to the fact by now...

Is it kind to have two dogs that are left at home on their own for such a long periods of time during the week? Can't help but agree with other posters re: doggy daycare

I am more concerned about the fact that you leave two clearly unhappy dogs for hours at a time - bad enough that you had one stuck in the house all day, but to get another one to also be mistreated is just odd. We don't have a dog because we know it would have to be in the house all day on its own sometimes and it just doesn't seem fair. Our neighbours dogs spend all day at the window barking and it is really quite cruel :(

This story makes no sense. I don't believe the updates are real -the home from 2pm, going to a friends etc.

Karma...

Had noisy alsatian puppy/ dog in tinh downstairis flat, for 2 and half years... howled continually from 630am-7pm..
Destroyed my life... I was working from home - couldn't concentrate or even make phone calls or listen to radio..

Worse, it destroyed the life of terminally ill neighbour...

The neighbours denied there was a problem.. As the' dog was always quiet'. Eventually RSPCA involvement.. It stopped..

The neighbours eventually moved... With bad grace... They never did acknkwledge all the harm they did ...complete and utter antisocial arses!

You have been an inconsiderate twat for five years - to your neighbours AND your dogs.
Tell your neighbours you are trying to leave so they can see light at the end of the tunnel.
Apologise for 5 years of hell by all means - but do not expect them to say OK that's alright then, all forgiven.
Whatever retribution they are dishing out to you - suck it up with good grace - you deserve it.
When you DO manage to move, no matter how remote and isolated your new home is DO NOT LEAVE YOUR DOGS ALONE FOR HOURS AT A TIME. It is NOT fair on the dogs. If you cannot do that because of work comittments then rehome them for their sake. Your emotional attachments come a firm second to the welfare of the dogs.

I'm a dog owner, I have six of them, and I'm obsessive about noise. I can't even stand any barking myself, so certainly don't expect neighbours to have to suffer for my choices to own pets. If I had to put up with a neighbour's dog barking for FIVE years I'd go mental. Some people don't deserve to have pets.

We bought an amazing property. We were so happy!
Then the barking started.
It sounds like a fucking kennels.
We love in a subtropical climate but gave to close the windows and doors.
Sorry, you should ave done more.
It's like water torture.

Well, you've given your neighbours 5 years of noise, I hope you can't rent your house out for another 5. Might make you consider how annoying noise can be.

My neighbours from hell have a black lab that barks and runs along the entire boundary fence snarling if we dare to use our own garden. It gets left alone for hours some days and when it is, it doesn't bark - it howls. It's a hateful thing and I love dogs, always have, have even worked with them. At the moment they are dog-sitting a relative's too which is a littermate and just as vicious. My little staffy sits in our garden watching them slavering and snarling along the fence like she thinks they're nuts. It's horrible living next door to this, and feeling you can't use your own garden without some untrained dog making your life a misery.

I think they'll probably throw a street party when you leave, OP. You can't blame them. They are normally quiet and you've heard noise once, and they're at fault? But you have put them through years of torture.

I wish my neighbours would inherit a house and move out.

I really wouldn't have wanted to live next to the OP but I think the nasty replies are uncalled for. I don't understand why some posters have to be quite so aggressive.

I'd love to have a dog but we both work and couldn't give him/her proper care and attention. I hate cruelty to animals and what the OP describes is cruelty. (If indeed all of this really happened).

Kplunk - if you've lived through barking for 9 hours during daylight hours when you've done a night shift, you might feel differently! (But I don't feel I've been aggressive with my posts, I just pointed out how debilitating and exhausting it is. The OP needs to know from someone who has suffered this)

I really hope some other dog owners are reading this thread and getting a wake up call. There really is nothing more annoying than constant barking or being woken up several times a night or early on weekend mornings by someone's dog out in the garden yapping away.
I know several dog owners who are otherwise very nice and considerate, but who meet any complaints about their pet barking with indignation or great surprise that neighbours would be annoyed about such a thing. Some dog owners just genuinely don't seem to get it.

Fundamentally OP you have behaved very selfishly towards both your neighbours and your dogs for a ridiculously long period of time.

You are now being hugely arrogant in a) assuming this can be fixed b) that you are somehow being victimised.

However much your DH's death made any decision more difficult and emotional, you put your attachment to the dog above its welfare and that of your local community and you are facing the consequences of that.

There is little you can do now, apart from a) suck it up and likely accept a lower rental offer on your house b) learn the lesson and make sure you don't repeat the same mistake (though given your posts I think that may be unlikely as you seem totally unwilling to accept how much distress you have caused or any responsibility whatsoever - though I hope I'm wrong in this).

Rousette I find barking dogs extremely irritating and I think their owners incredibly selfish but I still don't think the language and nasty messages directed towards the OP are ok.

I think some of the replies reflect the frustrations and experience of dealing with this issue from the neighbours point of view - especially when confronted with an owner who seems unwilling to address it.