Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Caught neighbours using my garden

812 replies

Weird21 · 26/07/2021 23:58

I have a block of flats next to my house and I thought for a while things have been moved in my garden and it seemed a bit weird. I’ve got a lock on the gate and it’s always locked. So over the weekend I’ve installed a small out door camera under my guttering which records the whole back garden.

So I’ve come home tonight after work (I work the late shift) and found two cigarette butts on the path by my seating area. So I checked the camera and the neighbors have climbed my wall and been sitting in my garden from 2pm until 8pm using my seating and table. To say I’m annoyed is an understatement but how to I confront them as they aren’t the friendliest of people at the best of times. So I guess they’ve been doing this since the nice weather began.

Unfortunately it’s not difficult to see i’m out as I have to drive to work and so once my cars not there they obviously know I’m out.

I just don’t know how to approach this as I’m a single woman and just concerned it’ll escalate but I can’t allow this what would you all do? I thought maybe a note through their door asking them to not use it anymore. They haven’t seen the camera but now I wonder how long it’s been going on.

OP posts:
Thread gallery
8
MooseBeTimeForSummer · 27/07/2021 01:07

I’d take screenshots of the video and send them to their housing association.

Yesitsbess · 27/07/2021 01:08

Grease. Car grease. Lots of it on the top of the wall....

Enough4me · 27/07/2021 01:08

A quick and fairly cheap option would be thick toothpaste or vaseline over the top of the wall (whichever blends in best) as they will feel it and it will get on their clothes. Add in a sign, "strong pesticide in use do not touch".

IncessantNameChanger · 27/07/2021 01:16

That's horrible OP. I have no better advice than above.

Someone who worked near our house used to sit behind my car to smoke and left about 100 fag bits behind my car. I poured cooking oil over the wall that sat on then over the next week picked up every fag but and added it to the oily sludge.

They appear to have stopped. I felt guilty to start with, but that passed

WomanStanleyWoman · 27/07/2021 01:17

Cover the top of the wall with broken glass.

Enough4me · 27/07/2021 01:20

Broken glass could injure others as well as them plus pets and wild animals. The anticlimb bumps or nontoxic liquid should work.

Wh0Knew · 27/07/2021 01:24

Double back after going out on Friday and remove whatever they are using to climb over the wall. That way they will not be able to leave before police come!

Namechangeforthisquestion7 · 27/07/2021 01:30

Another vote here for calling the police to report intruders on your property. Followed by barbed wire along the top of the fence. They are the biggest CFs ever!

LizB62A · 27/07/2021 01:31

Chuck water over your chairs every single day before you leave (assuming they'll dry before you want to use them again, of course!)
Definitely anti-climb measures on your wall/fence
Cheeky gits....

nanny3 · 27/07/2021 01:31

put sprinkler on timer aimed at chairs and tables

SongSilkTrainspot · 27/07/2021 01:39

@Yesitsbess

Grease. Car grease. Lots of it on the top of the wall....
I’d do this.
Tavannach · 27/07/2021 01:41

I’d take screenshots of the video and send them to their housing association.

^This. The HA will have had complaints from the other tenants and would probably welcome concrete evidence of anti-social behaviour.
Do you have to wait till Friday to phone the police - won't the video be enough?
Pity you can't borrow a Rottweiler. Or can you?

MuthaFunka61 · 27/07/2021 01:42

@MooseBeTimeForSummer

I’d take screenshots of the video and send them to their housing association.
I second this suggestion. HA's don't take well against anti-social behaviour and goes against many tenancy agreements.
Seesawmummadaw · 27/07/2021 01:44

Move your car but stay in the house (or get a friend to be in your house). Wait until they are comfortable and then open the window and offer them a cup of Earl grey.

blameless · 27/07/2021 01:52

I live in a similar situation - some of the people who live in social housing around my house believe that all property is public property. I have had someone park on my block-paved driveway, claiming it was public off-street parking, feral children have broken fences and gates using them as makeshift ladders.
From experience, unless the Police are having an anti-social behaviour week, they prefer hard evidence of the removal or destruction of property and while fairly uncivilised, the collective intelligence (and experience of what their mate got away with in court) will always give the offenders an edge as they explain that they thought you were due back at any moment and they wanted to offer you a coffee.
If there was a campaign of intimidation against you (ie people deliberately sitting in your chairs, brazenly in front of your CCTV camera, that would be more serious - use a search engine to see if your local council has an Anti-Social Behaviour policy, (search tools on local gov websites are poor) - mine has a Risk Assessment Matrix where matters such as whether you live alone, whether you have few friends locally to rely upon, whether the incidents are increasing or becoming more common and whether this is affecting your physical and/or mental health are all indicators of high risk meaning that the council should move quicker.
How do I know this? A very aggressive neighbour and his children abused my property and when I asked them to stop he came to my front-door to intimidate me. Afterwards, when he realised that he was putting his tenancy at risk, the advice from his friends was to accuse me of ASB. Fortunately, I had evidence but nobody was terribly interested because he hadn't physically attacked me.
Later advice from an official source was that I should have called the police and made sure that I got a CAD (Computer Aided Despatch) number as that will indicate that your report has been added to a database, no number, no record!
Good luck!

LagunaBubbles · 27/07/2021 02:01

I’d take screenshots of the video and send them to their housing association

Best idea yet.

Blondiney · 27/07/2021 02:02

Barbed wire, broken glass and snipers. I’d be fucking livid!

milkyaqua · 27/07/2021 02:03

This is a bit boring, but anyway...

helix-law.co.uk/what-to-do-if-a-neighbour-trespasses-on-your-property/

ElizabethTudor · 27/07/2021 02:22
  • driving away, viewing the camera and then calling the police to report your ‘intruders’
  • sending the footage to the HA
  • and the timed sprinkler
Are all excellent suggestions But I am outraged on your behalf Op, this is cheeky-fuckery entitlement on another level.
Charlize43 · 27/07/2021 02:24

I suppose Robert Dyas doesn't sell land mines...

Gooseysgirl · 27/07/2021 02:28

Wow!! Cheeky little feckers!! I'm very onboard with the idea of removing the ladder while they are sunning themselves...

OlympicProcrastinator · 27/07/2021 02:34

Keep us updated please OP!

GertietheGherkin · 27/07/2021 02:44

Eeee there's some right CFs around, but this is taking CF to a whole new level.

I just can't get over the vision of this family trooping down with a ladder ( a ladder 😂) and climbing over your fence. Then making themselves right at home in your garden 😳

Are any other neighbours seeing this happening?

I'd do what PP have suggested contact the Police and say there are strange people in your garden who shouldn't be there.

They'll have to troop back over their ladder ( I still can't get over that 🤭 ..Excuse the pun) and explain themselves.

LunaNorth · 27/07/2021 03:02

I’m reading this with my mouth open. The cheeky fucking bastards.