So I'm hoping to gather some perspective/advice on this "new" issue we have with our horrendous upstairs neighbour (neighbour A) who i feel is continuing to harass my family. Am I right in that perception of the situation?
We've been living at our (rented) middle floor flat for 18 months. The same age as my son. We can't afford to put down a deposit yet so are continuing to rent in SW London due to where we work etc.
We're aiming to move (buy into) our first home together next year but for now we're staying put as need to save/ give our son stability/ we like the area and are happy in our flat apart from neighbour A.
Our whole block of flats is quite old; the insulation between floors is light and the windows are only singularly glazed so allow in noise from outside.
Our neighbour owns his flat.
For what it's worth, we get on really well with everyone else in our block, including shared Christmas presents/ cards and even a party (which neighbour a wasn't invited to).
Neighbour A has always been very (passive) aggressive to me and my son. He's retired (although 6"4 and still quite physically strong looking), lots of time inside and seems to not enjoy anything, quite frankly.
From the second we moved in (August 2018) he has been openly hostile to me. Considering I was heavily pregnant at that time, he made me feel nervous AF and purposely so I believe.
He knocked the first day we moved in and complained about the noise made by the Emerson/ water boiler which was literally part of the flat and the previous tenants would have dealt with also! So not a new noise.
However, since moving in (to me) he's been physically intimidating, staring at us from his top floor window, waiting in the hallway and staring, repeatedly vandalising our cars, spitting all over our garage AND car, smashing up husbands van lights whilst in car park, ripping off car side mirror (twice), REPEATEDLY banging a pole on the floor underneath my sons cot (often at 4am inc the week my son first started nursery, absolutely scaring the wits out of him!!!), drilling into the floor (we think he must of drillled into a block of wood), standing outside our block of flats at "hometime" aka 5.30, or sitting in the carpark at 5.30 with his car lights on, waiting eugh. parking directly outside our garage and blocking entrance (when the entire car park was free bar 2 spaces), calling me a "crazy lady" on repeat when I'd challenge him as to why he was so hostile with me on many, many occasions he would sit in his car watching us leave for work. And then rev like a total psycho and speed past?! Every day August 18- nov 19 we had an incidence.
A was issued with 2 police notices in 2019; one for assaulting me (long story) and the other for harassing our family. From August 2018 (when my son was born) to November 2019 (when the police harassment notice was given) . Police believe us, have spoken to other neighbours etc and just encouraged us to get a dash cam/ log instances.
We haven't heard from neighbour A in 2 months since last police notice. We (foolishly) thought he might have become reasonable and ... normal? But alas maybe not.
Today we got a call from our estate agents saying neighbour A had sent over a noise complaint to them against us?!
We are baffled here as to our rights / how we can challenge this as it is clearly crap intended to get us pushed out and yet another bullying tactic from neighbour A.
Our son attends nursery 8-5.30 5 days a week, and goes to sleep 6.30-6.30. I would actually LOVE for hours to be reduced at nursery but we just can't at this time. But our son loves nursery anyway and gets slot out of it.
We have fun n games daily 6.30-7.30 when we all leave for the day (as you should surely with a CHILD)? 1 hour every morning but that means breakfast, cuddles and tv/ games. We always make a point of keeping boisterous noises to a minimum.
In addition my husband and I chill once child is in bed, certainly no loud noises from 7pm onwards as it'll
Wake up our son!
I cannot help thinking my neighbour should really understand what noisy neighbours are- we used to live with people that partied from 11pm onward, had mates round at all hours etc and we legit feel like an hour or two of liveable noise a day is NO WAY justified to complain?
Are there any landlords out there or others who have experienced such horrible neighbours?
What would you guys do? Should I contact the police again? I just feel like our neighbour is obsessed with us! Literally even the fact that he's sought out our landlord directly makes me cringe!