To ask If you have terrible neighbours how do you cope?

[Ulysees]

We live in a street with mainly rented houses. We own. They're good solid houses that people were keen to have years ago. Now they're rented out to mainly ok and decent people but some are dreadful.

I thought our new neighbour was ok. They've been there a few months now. They haven't done anything personally but the door is always being almost kicked in, windows broken. Yesterday we had gcs staying and as they were sitting watching a film next door and board (no window now) was being bashed and a man was threatening indoor guy and swearing. I actually phoned the police who came after. This isn't rare either.

We're not young and dh is a lot older. It's so stressful thinking about moving. We have been looking but would need to cash buy. We could sell ours too but obviously that won't be instant.

We're going to talk to the local councilor but doubt there's anything that can be done? Has anyone had success with this sort of thing? I pity anyone else going through it.

Sorry for punctuation. Didn't sleep much 😔

Complain to the person who owns it

It made me ill. Mentally and physically very unwell.
We sold up and moved.

If it’s a renters row, landlords will snap it up from you.

To cope, I worked every available extra shift I could to be out of the house as much as possible and to save for the move.

I fought fire with fire, so the one and only song they played over and over and over and over again so loudly, it bounced ornaments off the shelves, I selected from my own collection a particularly strenuous and satisfyingly intense album and played that even louder.

My front door was especially sticky so when I left for work at 6.30am… it got banged extra hard.

I was at the end of my tether, thank god we sold within 2 days of the sign going up and I think they were evicted soon after.

It took me over a year to settle and not be freaked out by every sound from the street or neighbour once we moved.

It took me over a year to settle and not be freaked out by every sound from the street or neighbour once we moved.

I feel the same as we had a couple of bad neighbours last year. A plumber and his wife. The wife didn't work and would be playing radio at volume or screeching down her phone day and night (personal calls were taken in the front or back garden for some reason) with the other party on speaker phone. They were thick, aggressive and awful.

The house was dilapidated and they'd never have left because the house was so cheap. Thankfully their landlord decided to sell and they couldn't afford to buy it.

I think there is an impact. I was always on edge and it's taken a long time not to be jumpy. I'm not quite there yet.

I feel your pain.
I live in a quiet well established semi rural area . Most of us have been owner occupied for 20+ years. There is a certain etiquette to observe if you are intelligent & reasonable when one moves into a new area. Typically think parking, loud music, keeping your surroundings tidy without litter & generally being considerate. Take a breath and suss out the local beat of the street!

A druggy moved in two doors up to a rented house. It was hell on earth, like a bomb went off within our quiet cul de sac,

In the end he got an ASBO and the landlord kicked him out.

Im sure I had a touch of PTSD afterwards but thankfully all peaceful now.

I’m so sorry you are going through this. I hope you can save up & move out. It’s the only way.

I'm so sorry OP.

We have a problem with one of our neighbours but nothing like you have. I am coping by making notes of dates a d times that he behaves aggressively towards us with the view that eventually we may have to get the police involved. But like you I find it incredibly stressful and makes me anxious in my own home.

I don’t live in a great area, but one house I lived in was really a gamble. Initially ok, next door used to leave their dogs alone all day and they often barked, but I was at work or out and about so wasn’t a huge deal. Then the night after they moved out, the place got broken into (I suspect the previous tenants had let some mates know it was empty). Evidently the landlord saw the place was wrecked, cue weeks upon weeks of renovations starting at 6am every day. When I thought the worst was over, he moved in the roughest family imaginable, constantly screaming and playing loud music. They got up at 1am to start their day and had a karaoke party, all windows open screaming along to the same Ed Sheeran songs. Every. Fucking. Night. Had to move, nearly had a mental breakdown. Vile, vile people, felt so sorry for the kids in that house.

A home is meant to be the ultimate comfort, if it’s making you miserable and you have the means to move then go for it. But research the new area well to avoid future problems.

By thinking I won't be here for ever. It doesn't feel like home.

Next door are horrible. Got arsey with me the second day when I let them know I was going to put a fence up. Anyone could walk from the path, through their open gate into my garden, I had young dcs at the time. Banged on the walls when my dd had tantrums. Smoke so much weed it comes through the vents. They're flippin' weirdos.

Can't do anything as we both own our houses.

We also had awful neighbours. We complained to the landlord and registered a complaint with the police online every time it veered into criminal behaviour (you might not want to do this as you have to reveal it when selling, but we aren’t moving for a while). We also raised it at community meetings with a councillor who was very sympathetic as he lived one street away and could see the chaos. The landlord got so fed up with her he kicked her out and then deliberately selected a very peaceful retired couple to move in.

I saw in the local paper court round up that she is now in prison for racially aggravated assault 😲

I also still over react to every single noise, a year on. I’m forever jumping up to the window if I hear someone. But for us, reporting was the way to go

We are seriously looking to sell up and move. Only considering detached with good fences now. I don’t want tot say to Dh I don’t really want to leave what would otherwise be a cosy perfect home for us. But the thought of having to deal with antisocial, lying, fly tipping, noisy neighbours for the next 30? Years.
Our council and police don’t deal with antisocial behaviour- no funding etc etc. sadly more of them seem to be moving to this street and area in general. It’s like we’ve become the next dumping ground.

Day to day I deal with it by pretending I’m not caring. Superficially this works, but it’s destroying both of us little by little and making me the stereotypical bitter, angry old woman. Meanwhile on with the house search and fingers crossed some mad motor bikers who like to play the drums at 3am want to buy our house.

If they own their house it is impossible to do anything basically

CCTV. Lived next to one of my neighbours for over 20 years and one day she turned into a raving lunatic. She's been that way ever since, even though we used to get on fine. The CCTV was added on the advice of the police as she was keeping a diary of things we'd supposedly done to her (because writing it down made it true). The CCTV meant we were able to prove she was lying. Examples being, she scratched her car with her lawn mower. She reported me for keying her car. I had video evidence of her ramming her lawn mower back and forth between our cars.

I think she's planning to move soon. She's had visitors that seem to be letting agents and estate agents, I really hope I'm right as that will be the dream.

This and in a way it’s even worse when that owners is a scum landlord.

No they don't own. The landlord spent a fortune getting it cleaned after last lot. It'll be rank again.

It's like they're a different species. Unfortunately they breed and it passes on@Ulysees

yes, this is our unfortunate position slum daddy landlord who put his equally scummy adult kids and grandkids in.

Thank you for starting this thread. It’s horrible to know others are in the same boat, but validating in a way. As you do start to think is it just us?

I just didn't cope. I had 2 lots each side and it ruined my mental health. I had an argument with one side about noise once and it helped for a bit but I was selling by then. The other side nothing helped. Our council are useless and she didn't care about the police. I sold at a loss 17 months after moving in.

Just recently both sides have now sold. I do hope it was due to the person I sold to ...

It took me 2 years to recover. It felt like I was going mad. I rented an apartment and even though I was surrounded by alot more people it was much quieter. I'm now detached in a really quiet neighborhood.

I don't get why people are like this. We all have to live together so we all have to be considerate.

We live in a very nice, middle-class road in a quiet area. Our neighbour (wealthy, lives alone) slams their internal doors incessantly. They go in a room, slam. Leave a room, slam. The houses are old, with thick walls, but our pictures move with the force. We have spoken to them, very courteously, but they deny the sound is from them. Our house is semi-detached so it's obvious it is them. The people living on the other side have an extensive collection of power tools which they deploy at every moment of daylight, all weekend, and as he WFH, during the week quite often too. Not all annoying neighbours are scumbag druggies.

Ours seem completely respectable, have decent jobs etc. But they are so unbelievably entitled. Repeatedly damaged our property when carrrying out a loft conversion and couldn't understand why we wouldn't just let them crack on (had we not challenged it and made them rectify it, the joists for the conversion would have been permanently tresspassing into our attic). Have massive trees on their side of the boundary which they regularly get cut back on their side, dropping a large amount of the branches into our garden, damaging our fence and causing the trees to grow disproportionately on to our side (they were about 4ft when they moved in and well maintained - now they're taller than the houses) but when we had them cut back on our side to the boundary they kicked off.

Constantly parking in our spaces - not just allocated spaces but land we actually own. They can't see what the issue is - they had an extra car so why shouldn't they use our land when we were out and why should they have to move it when we get back and want to use our parking space.

Part of me wants to move but I love the area and I had to file for an injunction to stop the attic works and get them to rectify the damage after repeated requests to stop went ignored and I'd have to disclose that to any potential buyers.

I'd forgotten this - after I'd gotten the works stopped to rectify the damage, they carried on with the part of itthat didn't impact our house. Came home one day to discover their builders has installed a rooflight close to the boundary, lifting up our roof tiles and installing part of the roof light on our side.

When I challenged it, they again were bafed as to what the problem was. That's where they want their roof light so we should just agree to part of it being installed on our property. Ummmmmm, no.

We moved. Owned an ex council house. Lovely garden, spacious home. But the neighbours... Christ almighty summers were hideous. Everyone out making loud noises, garden parties at top volume, people lounging about and smoking near our windows. Awful. So we moved. Best decision ever.

Can't you suddenly get a liking for loud rap/punk whatever might annoy them. Leave LOUD on repeat when you go out?

You move. There’s no other option. These people are dysfunctional. Anything you do don’t change that.

I was in your current situation for 10 years, neighbouring properties bought by student let companies. For some reason they always attracted increasingly worse behaved tenants. I had to leave my job because I never got any sleep with parties and fire alarms almost every night, eventually ended up moving as it took a huge toll on my mental health.

It can creep up on you, the mental health toll, still my advice would be as painful as it is, just move sooner than later