Batshit Neighbours - how would you respond to this message?

[carolinesfrog]

This message is from the neighbours of a rental property my Mum has.

Neighbours HATE the tenants, who are perfectly lovely people. Neighbours like to complain a lot. Neighbours have sent this message.

How would you reply?!

Check whether the tenant is running a business, and whether it's the kind of business that can be run from a residential property - some can, some can't.

If the tenant is entitled to run a business from home, then your neighbour can't dictate how many visitors she has. Nobody has actually hit his car and driven away, and they wouldn't have hit his gabion cage if he hadn't put it there with no real reason. If someone does hit his car and drive away, it's not the landlord's fault just because the offender happened to be visiting the tenant.

Are the rock on your mother's property too?

I would ask for them to be moved so they are entirely on your neighbours land. Then they are less likely to driven into.

Have you asked the tenants if they are running a business at the house? Have you had a search on google to see if the address comes up for a business?

this....from your diagram, unless there is an area of jointly owned land, it looks like the cage of rocks is partly on your mother's property. If the land is jointly owned between the two houses, then both will have right of way and the gabion should not be there at all. While there is no responsibility on your mum to police her tenants but she may like to take steps to ensure that batshit neighbourisn't encraoching on your mum's land.

I'd suggest they move their cage full of stones to ensure they dont get sued by anyone who damages their car on it.

I don't suppose they thought they'd bought a property next to a business. (If it is a business - obviously need to check that out). Even if it's all perfectly legal it may be very annoying, especially if neighbours are retired or work from home. Bit like having a bunch of students moving in next door - they might not be doing anything unlawful, but doesn't mean you can grumble about it!

Exactly this. All the comments on here about whether the tenant has permission to run a business from home are completely irrelevant.

It could be something like a sports massage or hairdressers though. Hardly a huge issue. There's no difference between someone visiting me for a massage and someone visiting for a cup of tea/playdate. in fact someone coming round with their kids would be more intrusive if they play loudly in the garden!

Sounds like the neighbours are a pain. I'd simply respond and say I will look into it. I assume you know the nature of the business so you know that it's not intrusive and/or loud.

Hitting a cage of rocks isn't careless driving. What is it doing there? I'd be hitting it deliberately if it was in the way and I had a car I didn't care about very much!

Is the drive a shared drive which is private property?

I would instal a camera to view the cars parked if there is a worry this may become a bigger issue

As other have stated is there a business being run from the property or is it that the tenants just have a lot of deliveries?

Even a brothel wouldn't disturb me working at home!

This - it’s hardly a batshit message.

And you / your mother would be mildly batshit to ignore as it raises fair points

I guess several things need to happen

Your mum needs to check if they are running a business and how that impacts insurances, rents, mortgages etc

As for responding, they may have a point if a car has just hit something of theirs, maybe send back

'Thanks for the informing me'

If someone hits their car, it's between them and the driver. It's that simple.

Whether they ought to be running a business is a totally different issue, and they're not even asking about that.

It's got nothing to do with you. If you want to respond with anything, just tell them they'll have to take it up with the driver, if anything happens, just like they would if their car was hit in the street.

There are certainly issues if running a business from a residential property, where clients visit the home, relating not only to the need for public liability insurance but council tax & business rates (if part of the building is used only for the business then this will apply); and planning permission is needed for some functions, not least due to the likely increase in traffic and parking issues, but also to ensure no nuisance or caused to neighbours.

I am a permanent homeworker, see no clients, and just work from a spare bedroom on a computer. I even had to inform my insurers and the council tax people about this when we moved here.

This isn’t a message to be dismissed.

Unless your mum's tenant has opened a mcdonalds drive through/gun shop, I think it is a batshit message.

The summary is: "We are worried that your tenant's guests will hit our cars on the shared drive, so we put a box of rocks in the way (which is nothing like the size/shape/visibility of a car) and someone HAS hit it. You see! What are you going to do about it? Yours, people who have far too much time looking out the windows."

P.s. obviously the mum/agent should check about the business thing, but that's nothing to do with the neighbour.

Yep. I bet that rock cage is too low to be easily seen in a rear view mirror.

My insurance is less because I park on a drive than when I had to park on the street. Presumably they think the chance of it being hit on your own drive is small! (Or stolen, though I can't see why it couldn't be stolen from my drive just as easily really). However parking on a shared drive increases risk, and a drive shared with a business even more so.

I have a shared drive and neither me or the neighbours are allowed to put anything on it without the others agreement so if the gabion is on a truly shared driveway then it shouldn't be there at all without your mums agreement.

If its a shared access drive up to two privately owned driveways then the stones need to be on their driveway alone.

If a driver has hit their rocks they need to take it up with them - nothing to do with your mum

I definitely think you should report the tenants to the council and wreck their livelihood. Inflict as much stress as possible. Make them understand that being a tenant means being a second class citizen.

Then evict them because they can’t pay their rent. Yes, that sounds like a good plan🙄.

Eh? What’s batshit about the message? If my neighbours ran a business and one of their clients damaged a Gabion cage (they’re quite expensive caged stone walls) then I’d be pretty pissed off too and concerned they might cause more damage.

Neighbour sounds like a bit of an arse, tbh. And if the tenants are otherwise good tenants, I wouldn't be inclined to get involved. Good tenants are worth keeping!

Damage to the gabion is between him and the driver of the car, not really the tenant or your mum. And I'd be wondering if the gabion has been placed in such a way as to make it difficult for people to get on and off the drive of your mum's house, OP. A friend has that sort of drive, where the first part is shared and it then splits into 2, and they're not allowed to put anything on the shared section.

Running a business from a residential address can be a planning issue (there was a memorable parking thread on here some years ago, where a neighbour was running a dog grooming business from home, and that was dealt with as a breach of planning permission by the council).

I'd be minded to suggest he takes it up with the appropriate authorities, and leave him to work out how to go about it. It's not your mum's problem.

Should your mum be a landlord if she can’t deal with a neighbour complaint without running to you and MN?
She could at least take her role serious enough to join a landlords forum.

I think there are several issues here:

• Tenant potentially running a business (there are issues with this in terms of whether the council allows it and if they have the insurance in place and also issues from your mum’s perspective in terms of whether she has the right insurance, mortgage, contracts etc, in place- and whether she wants to be renting out a residential place to someone using it as a place of business as potential for greater risks).


• Tenant being cavalier about neighbour’s property and tenant’s guests’ (or clients’) behaviour. (So it is between the neighbour and whoever damaged their property, but you probably dont’ want a tenant, however lovely they’ve been, who doesn’t try to get guests or clients to be decent to those in the neighbourhood - they probably won’t be decent to your mum’s property either.


• The neighbour’s placing of the stone cage - is that a shared drive with right of way for both houses for cars passing over? Has neighbour placed it so it’s half on your mum’s property? I can understand why neighbour’s done it if there are a lot of cars that seem to have been cavalier about damage, but your mum needs to make sure her property rights aren’t at risk from this action.

I wouldn’t believe they’re running a business until you have proof. NDN sounds an absolute busybody and clearly dislikes neighbours. Also not reasonable at all to assume people will hit his car and drive off. What a weirdo.