Neighbour has started hoarding rubbish in communal parking area - what are my rights?

[thefoxandhound]

Hi - need some advice on my rights re my neighbour's behaviour.

I live in a building that has three flats. I own my flat and have a share of the freehold with two other people that own the other two flats.

The ground floor garden flat is owned by an elderly gentleman and the second floor flat is owned by a guy who lets it out to a young couple. I'm in the first floor flat.

In the last couple of weeks, my downstairs neighbour has started collecting up and hoarding what can only be described as utter rubbish. I'm talking about random old wine bottles, coffee cups, bits of plastic and wood, astroturf offcuts (see pics).

When I asked him about it, he says it's his 'art project' and it's helping him get through lockdown. I have no issue with him doing art, but the guy has a garden, and he could gather all of this up and display it there.

Instead, he's put it all in the corner of the communal parking area where everyone can see it. It's not blocking access for cars or anything, but it's really unsightly, and makes the area and our property look messy, as if someone has been fly-tipping on it.

When I said that he has to move it (or I will), he refused and threatened to call the police if I moved any of it - he got very angry and hung the phone up on me. I'm actually a bit worried about his mental health - he's in his 70s and lives alone, so wondering if everything is getting to him a bit.

Anyway, I've spoken to and emailed the other freeholder (who obviously doesn't live there), and he is ignoring my emails. I get the feeling that he doesn't want to get involved in some kind of neighbourly dispute. The tenants in the upstairs flat agree with me and hate all the rubbish and want it moved (the downstairs neighbour told them that as they're tenants, they have no say!).

I feel that as joint freeholders, we should all have a say in how communal areas are maintained/decorated, and as I haven't agreed to this 'art project', then it should be moved. However, I feel like I need the backing of the other freeholder to make my downstairs neighbour all of this rubbish.

Can anyone offer any advice? (sorry this is so long!)

My brother was a hoarder and he started small, like this gentleman. He made the artistic excuse too! It is a mental illness, and it will just get worse if you don't nip this is the bud, now. Before long he will fill that space with rubbish (but he will never claim it's rubbish, it's either artistic, collectable, valuable scrap or might have a future use). I had to have my brother's flat and garden cleared FOUR times by men with a truck, and it cost thousands.
As you say he has his own garden I would tell him to move the stuff there. He has no right to appropriate a communal space for his sole use. Of course, if he junks up his own garden that will be an eyesore too eventually. I am willing to bet his house is full, which is why he's moved outside.
Incidentally, you know when people put stuff outside their houses for free? My brother just could not resist and he would take it all home. He also liked stuff from roadworks and I was rather taken aback once to find his bedroom full of no entry signs, barriers and cones. As I say, it's a mental illness and sadly he was mentally ill.

@SilverBirchWithout I actually don't have any kids (nor do the upstairs neighbours) - I'm one of those weirdos who likes reading Mumsnet threads despite not having kids... so he won't have bought the trike for us. He might have got it for some of his g/grandchildren, but he should keep it in his garden really.

@Reedwarbler - yes, this is what I'm worried about, so keen to get it nipped in the bud now. Thankfully, his garden is a back garden that can't be seen from the street (although I can see back fence from my window).

@TheLadyOfShallnott

That isn’t art. Not to me.

If Mr Emin snr doesn’t want it shifted, then I’d be on to the fly tipping line.

hehe, yup gotta be Tracey Emin's grandpapa

Our council wouldn't get involved because its private land however environmental health might if you say its attracting rats.

If he wants to keep this stuff it needs to go in his own garden.

@Reedwarbler, my brother is a hoarder. I’m intrigued that yours let you take his possessions away- was that very hard to negotiate?. With my brother each item has to be agreed if it is to be removed- it’s exhausting and frustrating.

thefoxandhound no need to apologise about no children, I’m also one of those weird people too! My DS is very much an adult - I still love Mumsnet.

@whataboutbob the first time I managed to persuade him to part with a lot in exchange for me then helping him keep it clean thereafter. I think he was a bit fed up with it and fancied a fresh start. Despite my help it gradually got bad again. We then offered him furniture from my deceased parent's house, but we had to get the men in to shift the large (useless and broken) stuff he had brought home in the meantime to make room for the new stuff. I gave up on the cleaning. 6 months later he was seriously ill in hospital and somehow social services got involved, and they declared his flat unfit for human habitation! I had to get it cleared while he was still in hospital and he never ever forgave me, saying all his valuable stuff had been thrown away. He never missed an opportunity to mention it and tell me how dreadful I was. I mean, the men who cleared it had to remove the detritus with bloody shovels.
Very sadly he died of cancer within 18 months of this, and after his death, yet again the men came back and cleared the flat for a final time.

@Reedwarbler, what a rollercoaster It’s poignant that the only time it got properly cleared was after your brother died, and sadly I suspect that’ll be the case with my brother. Sadly I think my brother is much in the same league. I have experienced the shame of workmen/ delivery men coming in and instantly turning tail, muttering “ it’s a case for the social” under their breath. He has health issues and I’m concentrating on supporting him as best I can, but I can’t manage more than one hour in his house at a time, it’s just too exhausting and unpleasant. It used to be our parents’ home and it’s been a long journey to this state of tawdriness ever since mum died, dad was basically a hoarder too.

Bin it. Just wait til he goes out, and then lash it.

This reminds me of an XR guy that obviously has mental health issues living in my area. He has a front garden full of junk treasures that he collects from the bins at the back of charity shops.

It includes a fridge and a flashing XR sign and last year about 20 Xmas trees that he had obviously collected when people leave them out for the council.

A year on its kind of become part of the furniture although I'm glad I don't live next to him......

I feel kind of sorry for him, he obviously means no harm and must believe that it looks good bless him but it is literally just rubbish piled up. Is there anyone you could get to come and bin it for you so no-one can pin the blame on you? You could act completely oblivious!

Be careful OP. Read the lease. Do it by the book.

@whataboutbob
And
@Reedwarbler
I'm so sorry for what you've been through with your relatives🙏
Looking back and with the benefit of hindsight, do you think that any interventions could have been made at any point that might have resulted in better outcomes?

That’s a difficult one @Yohoheaveho. I think hoarding can come out of a sense of isolation and loss- for exampl,e bereavement. An inability to accept the transience of relationships and of ones life, which is compensated for by a dysfunctional attachment to objects. I think therefore that therapy, at the right time and before the hoarding gets out of hand, could be beneficial. I have repeatedly urged my brother to go for therapy as frankly both of us could benefit, with the upbringing we had ( I had 2 years of therapy which were helpful), but he tends to bat the idea away.

@Yohoheaveho, whataboutbob has hit the nail on the head with her reasons for hoarding, all of which applied to my brother. He also had major addiction problems, initially with drugs, which he then swapped for alcohol. His dying of cancer was totally unecessary as it was initially treatable and curable but he just ignored it, by which time it had spread - a sort of long game of self neglect. I loved my brother very much, but years of dealing with a hoarding alcoholic has left scars on my psyche.

Thank you @Reedwarbler. I’m sorry about the trauma you suffered managing your brother. It’s ironic that the fears of loss and death which I suspect are lurking in the background for many hoarders cause them to engage in behaviours which do nothing but bring these unavoidable facts of life closer. One of the difficulties of having dependent relatives is the constant moral negotiation going on in the background about how much one should try to take on. Not to mention the frustration, resentment etc. Go easy on yourself, it sounds like you tried your best.

whataboutbob and Reedwarbler, it's generous of you to share, these things are clearly very painful with no clear path through, the hoarder almost builds their own prison:(
I have a relative who has clear animal hoarding tendencies, although I appreciate this should probably be seen as a separate disorder from hoarding of possessions

One guy set up chairs, table and bbq in a visitor’s parking space as he decided that wasn’t ‘communal’. Another tried to turn a communal grass area into a ‘garden’ by installing his own fence and gate, washing line and leaving all his kids’ toys out

he thinks he's in the wild west!

OP, I wonder if contacting your local adult social services team and referring your neighbour as a potentially "vulnerable adult" would be appropriate here, if the other freeholder gets nowhere with him?
It is very odd behaviour and could well be a manifestation of an underlying mental health issue.
The proliferation of the safe distance tape on meter boxes and doorway could also suggest this.
Good luck.

I would say it was an art project and not random hoarding.

Ask him to put it in his own area

Did you make any progress OP?

As a flat dweller, this sort of thing is my worst nightmare.

It does seem to be for art projects. I really don’t see his mental health has anything to do with it. Think Tracey Emin’s bed! Perhaps he’s trying to hide the breeze block wall which looks worse.