Neighbours and parking hell - I've contacted the landlord

[ValsCupcakes]

I live in a square, and about half of those houses are owned and rented out by landlords. I own mine and so do the other half. A woman and her teenage daughter moved in a few months ago. She is divorced and their son lives with her XH. They have upset most people in the time since they arrived, which was in May. There are allocated parking spaces and they don't use them. They just nick everyone else's. They've been heard yelling at a neighbour over parking and calling him a cunt, parking across exits and blocking people in and parking outside others' houses. They have two cars and the daughter who doesn't work has just passed her test and got this Fiat, so the car barely moves, she just dumps it. It was abandoned (literally, it was shocking parking) outside my house last night when I got home after a very long shift at 10pm so I had to park somewhere down the street and get piss wet through walking back to my house and piss wet through walking to the car this morning too. It was left outside someone else's house for about a week last week.

If it is still there when I get home tonight I am going to knock on their door and ask them to shift it and not use my space again. They do have spaces, they just need to use them. I have already messaged the landlord (who gave another neighbour permission to pass on his number) and told him this, and that I will contact him again if they give me a load of abuse.

Am I doing the right thing and if not what would you advise? They've upset at least six separate houses in less than six months!

It’s also an inference

Oh ffs!

Drop them a note thanking them for parking in your space as you had a car nicked recently and you think the thieves may come back. Let them know you will be parking in their more hidden space.

Can you block them in?

I would also check with the council/police about their abusive/intimidating behaviour. Keep a record of such behaviour, as if it forms a pattern, I believe it can be reported and followed up on.

Unless it's a private road and/or you own the space outside your house then your neighbours aren't actually doing anything wrong.

Do you own the space?

It has already been heavily covered that she does, its literally her land that she owns the title deed too.

Sadly there are people like this everywhere.They are what my Nan used to call a bit of a "lot"! Nothing to do with renting.Her NND used to play loud music, throw rubbish n her garden,and generally be obnoxious. Homeowners!

If the rent is being paid, not many landlords would evict over a parking dispute.

I appreciate the context because you just know that some folk are going to do exactly what they want.

In fairness, if a stranger comes to your street and parks outside your house as it is not clearly allocated, I can sort of understand why they do it - they will just assume you are being entitled to want to park outside your home (whereas everyone has a right) because they do not know about the allocated parking. That does not excuse the tenant and her family though, although in fairness, has her landlord told her.

I would nip over with a map of the allocated parking, making it clear this is by Deed and not I bagsies the spot outside my house. I would phrase it as telling her where her spots are so she knows for her convenience - check with the landlord if she does in fact have them first though.

And then I would get a professional to come and mark out your allocated parking with appropriate signage and stick penalty notice signs up and avail yourself of the details of a local tow truck company. Once she has to pay she will think twice but signage has to be up to facilitate this I believe.

If you don’t want to mark your spaces for the security reasons mentioned upthread, all you can do is to continue to bug the landlord relentlessly. Was there an agency sign posted when the house was up for rent? I would bug them relentlessly too. Your property (including the parking space you own) is on your deeds, which means it’s not a free-for-all for anyone to use.

But as there also appear to be complaints of, currently, low level ASB, there will be landlords who might prefer to evict.

That's a fair point - but it's only the same as houses with drives, where it's obvious which house the drive belongs to and that, if there's no car parked there, they either don't have a car or are away.

It muddies the waters somewhat because of all of the people in neighbourhoods up and down the country who claim that it is 'their' space, purely by virtue of the fact that it's their closest/preferred space and they expect to have exclusive rights to it through nothing more than habit of use, rather than actually having deeds that declare that they do legally own/have exclusive rights to use that actual space.

We have a horrible neighbour who likes to claim that he actually owns the section of road (just standard residential street) outside his house - but then, even if that were true, he then freely parks on what would (under his own mad logic) supposedly belong to other people on the street, and then tells them off if they or their visitors use that space. He actually has his own double drive and two cars in the household, so he never needs to park on the street, but he just likes making unnecessary trouble and himself deeply unpopular as a hobby.

He claims that everybody hates him because of his religion/ethnicity; we couldn't care less about that (it's not even obvious) - we dislike him because he is an arrogant, selfish, antisocial arse.

If the spaces are allocated, is their signage to that effect? I can see why you wouldn't want your house numbers on the spaces for security, but the spaces at the flats on my road are numbered but the number doesn't relate directly to the house number ie there's signs saying allocated spaces, then each is coded, residents know their code eg g1, g2 and so on. Without the signage it's just parking on my street!

Surely there must be somewhere on the market a bollard that you can lower or raise remotely with an individual sensor from inside the car? Assuming the landlord gave permission for one to be installed (and they don't cost an absolute fortune), of course.

Perhaps you are unaware of the Mumsnet rule that we cannot consider a parking issue unless we have a diagram. :)

They do cost a lot, and that's before installation.

Perhaps you're unaware of clicking "See all" next to OP's post.

I had a similar problem, I bought a cone from Amazon and stuck a sign on it saying "Reserved for number 6"

They still don't care, but they're too lazy to move the cone so they park in someone else's spot. Once your neighbours see it they'll buy their own cones and only your annoying neighbour's space will be left to park in.

If they’ve lived there 6 months and the bays aren’t numbered how are they supposed to know that you have been parking there for 12 years? This sounds like one of those fake TikToks where someone bangs on a car window telling the new residents that it’s their space and they own their home whereas the person in the space rents making them less entitled.
If there’s a space in the close what difference does it make which space you use.

There is a diagram, but it's a terrible one.

Sorry OP but it is.

Otherwise YANBU, of course!

You're right. I profusely apologize for my lame attempt at humor.

I thought that. And the complaining about sweating but then saying “piss wet” repeatedly 😂

I once jumped into the back of a car that had pulled into park on my drive - the woman went berserk and started screaming aggressively at me. I said “oh I thought you were my taxi, why else would you be parked on my drive” - after more screaming (she was nuts) she sped off down the road. I genuinely did think it was my taxi, bizarre for someone to park by your door otherwise! Maybe jump in her car next time she pulls in and say “but if the car’s not for me why are you outside my house.

This is exactly my point - OP keeps saying the neighbours have been told by other neighbours but we see that very issue being complained about all the time on here - people wanting to claim the spot in front of their own house and being mad with neighbours who don’t respect that.

Unless these parking bays are marked clearly in some way as privately owned spaces there’s no way for the new neighbours to know that it’s not just people trying to ‘claim’ a communal space.