Neighbour painting shared wall - it looks awful!

[Whitehousenotbrick]

I live in a mid terrace cottage with 1 property either side. Neighbours A are a friendly couple who we don’t see/hear much of but are always pleasant when we do. Neighbour B is always having blazing rows or loud dramatic conversations, has a string of visitors who often park over our drive, smokes weed which we can always smell and is generally inconsiderate and unpleasant.

B has a group of lads doing some work on their house and garden - they usually roll a joint before they start then I have to put up with that plus their music and banter all day. However I’ve come home tonight to find they have started to paint the back of the house right up to where it adjoins mine. It looks awful but I guess there’s nothing I can do about that - my main concern is that I don’t want any paint on my side or any other part of the work to affect my property.

Where do I stand on this? I can’t afford to get involved with legal stuff and I don’t want to in case I need to sell but I’m really concerned about it. I have texted neighbour and said so but not sure if I can/should do anything else.

I don't understand why people choose to live in a terrace and then make endless complaints. You're living in extremely close quarters. The walls in terraces are notoriously thin. I hate the smell of weed entirely, gives me a headache, but it has never occurred to me to complain tbh. Why would it? Am I also going to complain when they have a barbecue, or a bonfire, or when she's bleaching the kitchen and the smell wafts over?

I also don't understand why people complain about barking dogs. It's not like the owner can say 'Fido, do be quiet, you're upsetting our nice neighbours.'

I don't understand why people choose to always have beef, basically 🤣 if you leave me alone, I'll leave you alone. That's it. My life is very quiet because of it.

If they own the house, not a lot you can do. If they rent complaint to landlord is about it but be prepared for blowback.

Re the noise, you should ask them to turn it down, also keep a diary of every occasion. If they don't stop after you have politely asked, you can either report to environmental health (don't expect anything to happen) or move.

Wait until they go out and repaint it or move

Most people who live in terraces aren't "choosing" to live in them, they can't afford a detached house (which is the only way to really solve the problem).

Are the houses brick? If so and they haven't used specialist brick paint, the bricks are going to start to crumble over the next few years, which will start to affect your property.

If the rows are that bad you should be calling the police as it happens not doing nothing and slagging them off on Mumsnet.

Suck it up. At least they are maintaing their property. Sounds like you need to get out more.

I always recommend people who need their own space to buy a cottage in the country with trees around the plot.

The colour they paint THEIR OWN wall has nothing to do with you.

@OrchardBlack

theres a huge middle ground where rows and shouting next door happen and are NOT a police issue 🙄

Maybe the paint line looks wonky and terrible because they didn’t want to get too close to your house wall where it joins and didn’t want to cause any damage to your property so they played safe here ?

lol we would if we had money 😂😋

Yeah let me pull that extra 500k out of my back pocket to not have to live in a terraced house.

You can’t repaint someone else’s house….?

Just wanted to say I sympathise OP, I'd be worried too about the paint straying. I live in a terrace with feral, noisy neighbours both sides and it's pretty stressful to say the least.

I would love a detached property but on a single income it looks like a pipe dream.

I think that this is a case of bias because you don't like them. That you would prefer them to be like your other neighbours, who you mentioned, which is telling. I'm cringing a bit that you sent a text about it - but I think you've worked yourself up a bit and we do things like that without thinking of the potential consequences. You felt entitled to say something but I would've asked here and taken the advice not to send it.

My thoughts: 1. You can't control what goes on outside of your own property 2. If you live in a terraced house you have neighbours 3. Other people have their own lives, tastes and standards and that they will differ from yours.

I'm sorry if this is harsh. I used to be a people pleaser and once moved my family because of disgustingly antisocial neighbours. I massively inconvenced my family, sued their landlord (council) for moving costs, won... and vowed to stay here forever if possible. So I have to get on with next door but they don't like me and speak to me like dirt because I'm visibly disabled and they think I have never worked and make comments about how nice it must be to have had a lie in every day or stay at home, when I have been working at home. I've never bothered to correct them. They do passive aggressive things like not mowing a 1inch strip of grass next to my path as their lawn is 1inch over my boundary. It just looks like they did a rubbish job of mowing. They're retired and live in a housing association property so as my brother put it very eloquently - they f*ed their life up somehow. That's tongue in cheek because he's rough as anything but it was pointing out the silliness of their snobbery. They haven't worked and bought a house during times when it was much easier to do so. They may have their reasons but if that's the case they should be less judgmental. I feel like they'd stand there, hands on hips, if I painted my wall 😄 They give me so much anxiety. I don't like them at all but I have to remember my points above and get on with my day. The most important thing to remember is to never ever get caught up in confirmation bias and thinking everything they do is to annoy you.

Ugh... neighbours eh?

How did you get their phone number?

🙄

So if I don't like the colour of your front door I can just paint it when you are out?

Is there not a garden fence or wall separating the houses?