Is it ever ok to go retrieve your ball from the neighbours garden without asking?

[Wheresmylist]

Just that … would you be ok with your neighbours that you didn’t know entering your back garden through a gate without asking?

It's the norm where I live to hop over after your own ball.

YYY to this

Your son is rude and needs to be less careless. Of course he needs permission.

My neighbours kids have to wait longer than a fortnight. Any ball that comes over the fence is instantly shredded by my dog.
Doesn't happen very often now as they know they'll lose their ball.

I wouldn't mind but I have good neighbours, watch each others house when we're on holiday, take and return each others bins on bin day, he's turned his security camera slightly in my direction to cover my campervan.
We chat when outside the front of the house not the back because we have high fences (high fences make good neighbours 😂) but if I sneeze in the garden (terrible hayfever) they'll shout "bless you"
Definitely wouldn't mind if they came into my garden without asking

I wouldn’t mind. It’s not like my garden is sacred ground where trespassers will be struck by lightening. It’s their ball, just go get it. The less I’m bothered the better for me.

OP, I don’t know how to vote as it isn’t clear which is which?

If you knew they were away then perhaps.

No, never unless neighbour agreed before hand but even then no as neighbour might be nakid etc

It totally depends on the neighbours. We get on really well with ours and they have specifically said we can come and get a list hall anytime (so the kids do)

Well your update is a totally different situation OP! I wouldn't mind nice kids popping over occasionally (so long as they didn't let the dog out) but adult men would make me feel uncomfortable. Plus I would be pissed off at the noise of them playing footie in the garden ☹️

Hell no, not unless the neighbour said I could. Balls cause damage to plants too, so I’d feel obliged to offer payment for damage.

In my case we have a dog, he’s lovely but he’s huge and has scared people in the past. Personally I would say no for this reason alone, could easily knock a child down and then proceed to lick them (unless we weren’t at home in which case crack on).

My neighbours have taken to sliding the dance panel up to let their 3 year old in our garden to retrieve his balls, which takes him about 5 mins as he just kicks it in the wrong direction to where his mom is standing propping up the fence 🙄 she seems to have the patience a Saint during this. He sometimes starts jumping on our older kids trampoline which doesn't have the netting on anymore like his does. They have never asked permission to do any of this I just assume they are trying not to annoy us, as there are about 3 balls kicked in everyday constantly. He has about 50 balls in his garden and the parents seem to spend all their time retrieving the balls from over a fence every which way.

We had a side alley open to our driveway.

The neighbours always knocked and we'd send them around the back.

Eventually we just told them to go around without knocking!

To be fair to them though it was only ever once in a blue moon and was only ever a beach ball they played with in their pool. It was a genuine accident.

I'd lose my shit over this and have a big knife handy for slashing all balls.

Drip feed!

Bet you're a barrel of laughs to live beside. Were you born middle aged

When we were kids, we knocked to get our ball back. We were told it was fine to get it without knocking first

I’m not putting up with thoughtless kids next door in the name of “being a barrel of laughs”

I think it totally depends on the situation, in general it's not OK. In your situation I feel they should have asked and I would put a lock on the gate.

We have 5ft fences and a small garden so it's easy for the ball to go over. One neighbour has said just go in. The other neighbour is a recluse, he doesn't really talk and won't make eye contact. He did once ask a question about something but we could see he found it hard - that's in 7 years of us living here. He keeps his curtains closed all the time, rarely cuts his grass and doesn't answer the door at all. We put notes through his door to communicate about neighbourly matters but he never responds. I suspect he's on the spectrum. There is no way for us to ask for a ball back from him. I tell the children to play in the other direction. It's gone over about 5 times in 7 years and when it has done I've run into his garden (which doesn't have a gate and he doesn't use) at light speed and then put the ball away for the rest of the day. He's never said anything.

I would say no, unless you had already told them they could do that.

What a silly drip feed OP when it was obvious most would assume you were talking about kids, not strange grown men!!