AIBU to go into CF neighbours bedroom

[Gardenwoe]

Am I going mad or is my neighbour a CF?

Background: We live in a terraced house, and our bedroom is on the ground floor (recently converted/redone) and a patch of wet appeared near the skirting board on the wall. Couldn’t work out where it’s coming from as we know there are no pipes there, wondered if it might be coming through from next door as they have a disused shower room against that wall. Always got on Ok with neighbours (we have been here for 18 years, they have even longer) so asked if he could take a look his side. There’s so much junk there we couldn’t even get close to where the possible water leak could be coming from, so left it at that and realized we would have to investigate from our side.

So we asked our builder to pop in and take a look at some point. He’s also a close family friend, so when he turned up yesterday just as we were leaving for work, we let him in and left him to it. We knew he was going to have to take the skirting of and make some noise knocking out some of the bricks to try and see if the damp course had been breached.

Our front door was open so the builder could go in and out to his van parked on the drive immediately outside. Cheeky neighbour hears the banging, arrives at the front door, rings the Ring doorbell. No answer. Peers through the open door. Checks up the stairs (townhouse) Then wanders into to hallway…opens bedroom door where builder is working , goes into bedroom and demands to know why he’s making all this noise! (11am btw, not unsociable hours) Builder explained what he was doing, neighbour moaned obviously unhappy and left.

DH went round this morning to ask what he was playing at, entering into our house/bedroom uninvited. On not getting an answer when he knocked on the door he should have turned around and waited for us to get home or rang us. His answer was that we should have let him know we were going to be making noise. (Builder was finished in under an hour)

AIBU in thinking the next time I see his front or back door open I should go round and go into his bedroom?

@Flowers500. If that was the case, the right thing to do was to approach op. Not the builder. They either could have called or waiting until the op was home.
Very rude of the neighbour.

Nah YANBU OP. It is intrusive and rude to enter someone’s home uninvited. And to not only enter the house, look up the stairs, and wander down the hallway but to enter your bedroom!

Yes the noise may have been annoying for the neighbour, but he could see the van on the driveway, the open door from the house leading to the van/driveway, and he knew you were having an issue with damp. Plus most people can recognise the noise of hammering and be able to tell what it is. Also I’d be surprised if he hadn’t looked out the window and seen the builder with tools and rubble. Regardless of whether he’d seen the builder or not, it doesn’t take a genius to work out the hammering noise he’s hearing will be related to the van on the driveway, and the damp issue you’d mentioned you were having. And if it’s 11am that’s definitely not too early - especially if only lasted a short while. If it had gone on all day that would be different but an hour in the middle of the day really isn’t that bad.

Although while YANBU I still wouldn’t go into his house 😉

@Flowers500

More than likely he probably also wanted to talk to the builder to see what was found, as you had raised the issue with him, possibly also see the issue on your wall—as you had wanted to do on his.

Absolutely- the difference being; when we went round to ask if he had any damp patches on his wall, he invited us in to look.

Essentially he just wanted to nosey around. He'd already implied on a few occasions that he wanted to come and look at the work we had done changing the room to a bedroom and we had resisted. (Because we know he's just being nosey)

But ultimately he should have spoken to us - not the builder, if he had a problem.

I didn’t realise it was a rule that you couldn’t speak to your neighbours’ builder about a shared issue that he’s working on? Genuinely— not saying to be shirty, but I wouldn’t consider that to be off or innapropriate in any huge way. If that’s the crux of the offence I think it’s minor and something where we would have to agree to disagree

It’s plain basic manners.

@Comeondoit

I don't see what the neighbour did wrong tbh.

He wanted to know where the noise was coming from, probably sounded like someone was breaking in to his house.

Door was open, no one answering so he investigated. Fair enough I'd say.

Bloody hell! You don’t see what’s wrong about trespassing into a neighbours house at a time when it’s obvious and entirely reasonable that there is building work is going on?

[quote Bargebill19]@Flowers500. If that was the case, the right thing to do was to approach op. Not the builder. They either could have called or waiting until the op was home.
Very rude of the neighbour.[/quote]
But OP wasn't there???

@Comeondoit. They have the op telephone number according to a post. They could have called. Or waited. They chose to be rude.

but to enter your bedroom!

Shock horror!!

A bedroom!

Where there was already a non resident present!!

So I doubt they had the sex toys out on the bed did they?

Of course the offence is not talking to the builder. If this were me and I wanted to speak to the builder, I’d wait until they came out of the house. I can’t imagine thinking it was ok to walk in unless it seemed like an emergency. I don’t understand the argument that having a builder in turns your home into a public space.

That’s nothing OP, my neighbour tricked my landlord into giving him a key, let himself in, searched for keys to the back door and the back gate, let himself and his builders in around the back and then didn’t even bother to tell me. I found out from the workmen. Enraged.

I genuinely am going to have to say this is just different people, different concepts of etiquette. I’m not English but have lived here a long time, would genuinely not consider any of this at all rude. Wouldn’t mind a neighbour disagreeing of course but would be upset if there was such an extreme, “OBVIOUSLY you’re not only wrong but shitting all over human niceness” kind of response

It is a private area. Basic manners say it is not something you should do except a) invited b) an emergency.
This was neither.
Just the same as when you are around someone else’s house for a chat and yea, you don’t go rummaging through their drawers or enter their bedroom whilst ‘looking for the bathroom’
The only people who don’t care about such concepts tend to be burglars. But then locked doors mean nothing to them either. Pretty sure they would also be very upset when the police invade their personal space too. But as you think it’s ok to ignore basic manners and societal norms.. then it’s all good.

[quote Gardenwoe]@Comeondoit Are you my neighbour?

Oh no you can't be - he's currently mowing the lawn, i find that noise an intrusion while I'm trying to MN in peace. Right I'm off into his kitchen via his back door to demand to his wife that he stops right now! [/quote]
Definitely sounds like it 😅

How odd. You went into his house about this issue, but he's not allowed in yours when clearly just looking for a builder.

I had a gardener in and my neighbour walked past my office room and went round the back of my house uninvited to discuss my garden and a quote for his - now that's a CF.

@Tistheseason17
The difference is the op asked the neighbour and we’re invited in.
The neighbour wasn’t invited in nor asked on this occasion. No emergency and they could have called the op via a telephone.
Big difference.

You asked were you entitled to go into his bedroom and poke around? You might be in danger of letting his assume you don't mind people making free and easy with your home. But - almost a bit off topic - did you find out what was causing the damp patch? .

YANBU! Not sure why PPs on here think it’s no big deal. You should be able to have your door wide open without people letting themselves in!

@Bargebill19
I disagree. There was a genuine, connected reason they came round.
It's not like he came round for no reason is it?

@ExD1938

You asked were you entitled to go into his bedroom and poke around? You might be in danger of letting his assume you don't mind people making free and easy with your home. But - almost a bit off topic - did you find out what was causing the damp patch? .

I’ll bite. How does the op ASKING if it’s ok to have a look to see if there is something causing an issue AND being INVITED in to do so equate with being ok for allowing others to be ‘free and easy’ with allowing someone into their own home to explore WITHOUT permission?? That’s a Grand Canyon sized leap of self justification.

I didn’t realise it was a rule that you couldn’t speak to your neighbours’ builder about a shared issue that he’s working on?

I wouldn’t mind my neighbours talking to the builder if it was an issue that affected both of us but they don’t need to go inside. They can knock but if there’s no answer they shouldn’t just walk in and should wait for the builder to come out or the neighbours to come home.

Well I assume you had completed a party wall agreement before commencing work on a party wall? This would have alerted him to all proposed work so I don’t see why he needed to come round?

Of course if you hadn’t done this and were knocking into a party wall without telling him he quite probably wanted to know what was going on and if it was going to affect his house?

@Tistheseason17 yes he did.
A) builders van on drive outside of the door.
So obvious work of some sort was being done.
B) he already knew that the op has a problem with damp and we’re exploring causes, hence the builder.
C) he has the op telephone number so could have used a telephone to contact them.
Instead he chose to enter someone’s private property without asking.

@CovidCorvid

You wouldn’t need part wall agreement for this. If you think that, then you would also need party wall agreement to put up shelving etc.

You seem very invested @Bargebill19
Name changed OP?