AIBU to be upset by my neighbours' huge extension?

[ElfinsMum]

We (family of 5) live in a 30 year old property built on a small site that was originally our neighbour's garden. We bought several years ago from them. At that time, they were doing a renovation on the old cottage as the grandmother had died so that the early 20s DGD and her partner could move in. At the time i was a bit 🤔about it if i'm honest just because my (wealthy as it happens) parents have never and would never give me a house, let alone spend weeks personally slaving over a full blown renovation for me. Since then we have lived perfectly peacefully next door to them.

Now they are doing a large extension. They have bulldozed their whole back garden and the final house will now stretch all the way along our boundary front to back, as well as adding an extra storey to overlook our whole bungalow. The builders literally have to work on our land all day to build it. They have even had to remove a small section of our drive to lay foundations. They have moved out for the duration, i assume back with mum and dad for free. We are stuck here.

I know i am not being unreasonable to worry that their huge new extension will be ugly, dominate our space, reduce our privacy and probably damage the value of our house.

BUT we love living here, love the area, school, public transport, other neighbours etc. Our house is worn and lived in as everyone's is that is 15 years into this parenting caper.

I am aware, as you will now be, that I am being bitter and twisted on the subject. How can i continue to like living in our home? How do i avoid turning into one of THOSE people that has a stupid one-sided vendetta with the neighbours? How do i avoid being resentful that they will have a massive, polished home for the two of them, while we slum it over here with 5 of us in a cottage with one bathroom and a kitchen made of MDF? How do i forgive them for choosing to use every centimetre of their land when they must know it is at our expense?

P.S. The development meets local planning regs to the milimetre so don't bother with planning arguments.

They are being selfish. Are they trying to force you out?

YANBU to be upset but I suspect the answer is just ‘get over it’. You yourself have benefitted from a plot that used to be someone’s garden. Now they’ve decided to use all their garden space too - nothing you can do as you say, it meets planning regs. If it makes you feel any better, our neighbours were planning building-wise a few years ago that really upset me - I thought it was massively going to infringe on us in terms of noise, light and privacy. I even went to a council meeting and spoke against it. It went ahead anyway and now doesn’t bother me at all.

You seem to be bitter about that they are better off in a bigger home and have generous parents,unlike yours? YABU, whatever build they are doing it cant be that bad if its within planning regs, las dont mess around with it, they do consider neighbours and you dont need to even make a complaint their planning office will pick it up.

deal with the unreasonable juvenile envy

@ElfinsMum What's your point? You rolled over at the meeting and now you don't mind anymore?

To be honest you come across as simply jealous. Jealous that someone's family have given them a big house, although you don't know if that's the case or what conditions are attached.

And jealous of that your parents haven't done it for you. After all there was no reason to mention your parents financial situation.

You will always always meet someone better off than you, someone who's got a bigger house, richer parents.

You say you love your house with the MDF kitchen, you say you are slumming it... but you actually own the house, read the threads on here about people who've got shit landlords or living in social housing which isn't up to standard or have kids who will never afford to move out.

Envy is one of the 7 deadly sins for a reason

Presumably when they applied for planning you would have had time to object? The notices are always posted way in advance.

Sorry for drip feed but we're not in the UK and planning regs are less stringent here. There's a lot less protections for neighbours. Yes that does mean we could fight back with our own 2nd storey but we won't because we would rather spend our money on other things.

I do recognise I am unpleasantly envious of them though, you are totally correct.

I agree you just have to get over it if it isn’t breaking any rules.

Not sure I’d let them dig up my driveway or work from my garden though. Surely it will be wrecked?

No. I don't think they thought about us for a single second. DH and I have agreed though that we will wait til it's finished and then we'll discuss as a family if we can live with it or not. We could move but we'd need a bigger mortgage (esp because we'd now get less for the current house), which we haven't financially planned for at all.

I daresay when the neighbours buldozed their garden 30 years ago to build the house you are now in there would have been grumblings too.

I get it. But I think all you can do is grit your teeth. When it's all done you might not notice it as much as you think - it will just become 'them over there' and your new normal. You won't be wrong to be annoyed, but you will be wrong to let it eat away at you.

Yep. Part of our front garden was wrecked on day one. The other two thirds is waiting to be wrecked when they replace the rest of the fence with new metal sheet fencing.

Do you think we could ask for a contribution to landscaping? (= screening off as best we can the back of their house now in our faces from 3 of our bedrooms)

I'd tell them that they need to make good all the damage to the garden. This is not acceptable !

I'm sure that's true @RedTagAlan but that was twenty odd years before us. The LA has a policy of increasing density which basically means infill so hardly any full size blocks exist in our area anymore.

I do understand your envy and to try and help you get over it please recognise that your envy is about material things, you sound like you have real substance in the family you have, something they don’t have. You have invested in raise a family of 5. It’s possible they envy you!!!! Take pride in what you have and what you have achieved. Redefine what success is for yourself.

So is this similar to Ireland where they have relaxed planning for building in gardens because of lack of housing ? Although I think that is for "granny flats" rather than extensions.

Thank you @WizdomE that is helpful. I assume they think they need eleventy billion bedrooms and bathrooms because they want to start a family before realising that babies refuse to sleep in their expensive nursery suites and insist on remaining in with you for bloody years 😂

You were judgemental about this family and their choices long before they built an extension, so why should they have bothered to be considerate of you?

How do i avoid being resentful that they will have a massive, polished home for the two of them, while we slum it over here

I felt exactly like this when our neighbours did a huge extension right to the boundary line. They moved out for 6 months and we lived next door to the work, the noise, the dust, the parking chaos. We had their scaffolding in our garden for 2 weeks that turned into 3 months in the summer.

We got all the inconvenience and they got all the benefit.

But it's done now. We don't really think about it any more. We've just got used to the extension being there.

It's shit but it will pass.

Selfish neighbours never think of anyone but themselves. I have neighbours who are making a rammy every Saturday having friends over til 2am but they don't give it shit that they're disturbing our peace at the weekends. You'll find your neighbours never even factored you into their decision making. As far as they're concerned, they're just living their life.

Did you object when the plans came out. Why are you letting them use your drive. Sounds like you have just agreed to all this and are now complaining 😧 might be time to sell up, even if you like it thete.

Did you have to give permission for that or did they just do it?

I just wouldn’t be letting them. And if you do, yes they should pay to put it all back - that should be a condition

@Randomchat How quickly did the rage die down? And are you still on good terms with them?

I think one of my issues with all this is that I am very self conscious about what other people think of me, to the point that I couldn't do a project like this because i'd be too embarrassed about the neighbours' reaction. There are quite a lot of things i've missed out on in life due to this hyper awareness about what other people will think.

Honestly I would feel exactly the same as you .

Practically - if it is legally your garden, then there’s is absolutely NO way I would allow them access to dig it up to create new foundations.

I would talk to them and deliver a solicitors letter at the same time, stating that if they do any further damage to your garden you will sue and they are not allowed access until they agree £££ compensation for the disruption and damage to your property. Further I would ask for that compensation to cover the cost of landscaping your garden to minimise the feeling of crowded by the new extension. I would not spend that money on landscaping- I would wait until the extension is done, then I would use the cash compensation to cover the cost of moving.