Someone IS living next door to me

[Searchingforananswer2023]

House next door converted to a HMO and I posted before as I was worried.

I've been hearing footsteps going up and down the stairs for a while and thought it was my imagination. No windows are open, no lights are ever on there is no sound of a toilet flushing and the bins are never put out.

Just after midnight a car was running outside my house across the drive. I turned on my camera and the door next door opened to accept a takeaway.

I have been off work for a week and have not seen anyone enter or exit.

Unbelievablely strange

It's probably a cannabis farm, all the windows will have blackouts, so people outside don't see the growlights. One person living there to water the plants who fancied a pizza.

The electric and water may be turned off, do you know who was doing the conversion? You could ask them if anyone has moved in if you are worried. You could ask the council who the house belongs to if you don't know, or look it up on land registry and ask the owners. If it's an HMO there should be several people living there if it is genuinely occupied.

I don't see what's odd about your neighbours. So you've not seen them or noticed windows open, that doesn't mean they are doing anything wrong. Nor were they in your garden they answered their own door for a delivery.

You sound very nosy.

Its a ghost. Its the only logical explanation.

How terrible that some non owner occupiers were going to live next door to you, bound to be noisy and troublesome, and now somebody has moved in and actually they’re really quiet. Worrying all right…

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Well I have no idea if my neighbours are in or out most of the time. I live in a terrace and though now the doors are open I hear them more, unless they are actively making noise I couldn’t tell you if they were in or not, and I’m in my own house at night so couldn’t tell you if they have a light on or not.

Why haven’t you confronted them ?

I think OP means that someone in her household is regularly in the garden at night, so they would know if the neighbours were coming in and out

No, I don’t think it is normal. You don’t have to be monitoring your neighbours to realise you never see them. That there are no lights on ever, that bins never are put out and no sounds. Except for a car at midnight. And one delivery.
In a HMO this is even weirder.

Why move the car at midnight ?

What could you do ? Report to police is first line of enquiry.
It is your business as you are living next door. The strangeness of the owners behaviour has made it your business. The owner may not be aware and think the property completely empty. They might be able to explain it perfectly satisfactorily.

But it is odd.

Perhaps they work nights? Or some other odd shift pattern. Or it’s haunted?!?

Um you seem focused on the wrong thing. You have someone coming into your garden at night that you mention in passing and don't ask for advice on but instead post about spying on your neighbours and saying they are weird. You have no idea whether someone is coming and going or has lights on or off so stop trying to work it all out and focus on the real problem of finding out who is coming into your garden at night.

It's not odd to drive a car at midnight or move it....just because someone might not be living the same life as you, doesn't mean they are doing something criminal...nor do they owe you an explanation

Nobody is coming into her garden at midnight - OP means that someone from her household is in the garden until late and would know if the neighbours were coming in/out because of that.

Exactly.

MN is so odd about people who don't live the same life as they do. Lots of people work nights, or shifts, or have caring responsibilities that mean they have to go out at odd times. My dad was an NHS doctor and if he got called in, it was often at weird times of the night.

Perhaps they are vampires who like the occasional pizza.

Well no, driving at midnight may entirely usual for some households.

But collectively, this household seems odd. And for the OP whose business it has become by dint of it being so odd, some sort of resolution is appropriate. And turn out to be a good thing.

It's none of OP's business whatsoever. What's she going to do - ring the police and say "there's someone living next door but I never hear them flush the bog and they never have the lights on"? 🙄

Wtf is this?! It's probably a safe house in by which they're trying not to be noticed I'd hate you to be my neighbour

Resolution for who? The busybody op? These people don't owe her an explanation....

Everyone who says this is normal, where is it normal to never put bins out. If you get takeaways there is going to be rubbish

Maybe it is police staking out the drug house across the road

And if someone parked across my drive I would have a nosey to see who it was

Who is in your garden @Searchingforananswer2023

Stop being a nosey cow maybe?

If my neighbours (who I am on speaking terms with) had not told me they were away and hadn’t put their bins out as normal, I might message them to check okay, as it unusual to not have any rubbish to put out

Thank you. This makes it even weirder. Why is someone in op's garden at night spying on the neighbours.

If they are not bothering you what is the problem?