We've recently bought & want to move out

[Nextdoor55]

Small village in the middle of nowhere. Non stop issues with small minded neighbours, parking, boundaries, we've already seen a solicitor & had advice about how to move. Thankfully positive.

Asking someone to avoid blocking our garden gate resulted in 3 households ignoring us even though none of them directly involved. It's all people gossiping like school children, judgements & bitching. We're basically shunned by the village. And we've only had issues with one person. It's like a cult.

People grassing us up to local council for adding a fence & other minor "offences". Thankfully ignored.
Been here 11 months & it's been like something out of a folk horror movie. Cannot wait to move & will never live in a village again.
Also, never had these issues before despite living in a variety of homes.
So annoyed at making the mistake of moving here.

Anyone else regretted moving so soon?

I loved watching This Country 😂

Yes! Watch This Country! Great show.

Your neighbours sound like proper charmers!

@Nextdoor55 life is too short. Good luck.

We moved to our village 30+ years ago and love it. It does take at least 20 years before you're no longer "the new people," and you have to be very careful what you say at the school gate as lots of people are related! But if you persevere, join in, give your time to community projects, etc, then you are welcomed and appreciated. I suppose buying a new build (as we did) helps with the neighbour issues as everyone is new to the street, so no hierarchy.

There is always an element of people who think they're 'the village squire'. I had the misfortune to encounter one of these a year or so ago, but I basically gave him short shrift, told him (politely) that what he was complaining about had nothing to do with him and sent him packing with his tail between his legs. I was much applauded by others for my actions.

I'd rather live in a village where people at least bother to speak to you than a town or city where you know no one and spend half your life in a traffic jam. Horses for courses, I suppose.

Not all villages are the same. I live in a Hamlet, we have a stop sign, a pub and a couple of bus stops, not much else. It's less "friendly" than other places I've lived but not unfriendly.

I can’t imagine living somewhere a stop sign is worth mentioning.

This Country was so much like the pit village we lived in for years. Lovely primary school which we stayed for, though. A big distrust of "them private houses" from a lot of residents but that tended to be from the bitter old men that you find anywhere. I live in a small city, now, and while I prefer not being surrounded by people who seem to know my business before I do, there are still plenty of grumpy (and definitely racist) old men who claim to remember when all this were fields.

All this is why I love city living.

OP my new neighbours are fine, they're just young and eager to do what they want to do and one of their parents seems to need busy work and to be involved, not something I'd ever permit my own parents to do even if they'd had the time. So they aren't bad people I don't think, just different and being a bit inconsiderate. The trouble starts when people do stuff without a thought on how it might impact others in their own homes, tunnel vision and a sense of self-entitlement has become more common generally these days I think. Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by stupidity as they say.

But this is your thread and in your situation I think I'd front them out and take the high ground, knock on their door with a bottle of wine (neutral peace offering) and say we seem to have got off to a bad start (bite lip as its their crappy behaviour not yours), we aren't sure what we have done to offend (nothing), we are considering moving (vague, its none of their business where you live) so will be out of your way soon enough but in the meantime it would be best if we could at least talk it over and draw a line under this. That way, you have attempted to resolve the matter and if they kick off or refuse to communicate they look like petty infants and you can stop stressing about what they think either way. Others who are backing this neighbour I'd greet them with a cheery hello every single time I saw them, kill them with kindness. It sounds like you've been unlucky with this particular neighbour, I hope your next one is a diamond.

My Mum moved from one village to another about 3 miles away. She was born in the hamlet between the two so couldn’t have been more local. She was treated with suspicion for years before she was accepted!

My sibling and I got educated and got out. We both live in cities now although mine is tiny. I love being anonymous.

Best of luck on your move OP!

Well, someone has to work in coffee shops full-time.
Many millions so working class jobs, and going to get further or higher qualifications is no guarantee of a higher paying job, if the jobs aren't there in the first place.
Not everyone wants to move to 'the city'.

Some people are happy with their so called "small lives". Those people are about 50% of out country.

I mentioned it because it sums up the place, and didn't want people to get too excited at the mention of the pub. It has a name but that isn't even part of the postal address

I remember when I was dating my dh, we stayed in a village in the Forest of Dean. I commented that everyone looked the same and my dh (who grew up in the area) just pissed himself laughing!

It might be but there's some truth in it. It's debunking this bucolic and frankly very " Escape to the Country" view that people have of villages.

Having been brought up in one for a few years people can be very narrow minded and parochial. We were " incomers and it was very much them and us.

I live very close to the "FOD" and the joke about in breeding is an old chestnut!

We lived semi rural, very small minded folk, who didn’t like incomers one bit, you had to be born and bred to qualify as a local. We now live in a city, quite some distance from where we used to live, neighbours are great, been very welcoming. We all feel very happy and settled. Move asap OP, nothing worse than not liking where you live.

Especially the comment about people working full time in a coffee shop, like having a full time job is such a dreadful thing.

I grew up in a village like this. We started to get an influx of people from cities who would turn up and moan about cow shit on the roads, early morning noise from animals and the smell from farms. They would complain that they couldn’t stomp about all over the countryside and let their dog off the lead in a field full of sheep.
Then moan on that they didn’t feel welcome.

OP we are moving after a short time. We moved due to WFH across the country and it’s been a big mistake, just hasn’t worked out for us. Unfortunately we are losing quite a bit of money as we bought during the peak and now selling in the slump. It’s not worth being unhappy.

Have lived in a large village and cities, loved the village! We’re moving back there. In a town now. Our village was small enough that you’d see people you knew when out and about most days but big enough that not everyone would know your business.

I grew up in a large village and really really hated it.

I thought I suffered from depression until I left but actually I was just depressed in the village.

I didn't like the weird mix of self regard and basic thinking. There was a distrust of outsiders and I did encounter racism and ableism.

I struggled a lot with everyone knowing everyone's business.

I honestly think the best thing to do is sell up and get out OP.

I was born in a village and lived and worked on farms so definitely not a townie.

As an adult I've lived in towns and cities and two villages.
The first village was uber community focused. People would wander in and out of my house and garden and wanted into my life in a way I couldn't bear. Dinner parties every week, marquees up for days on end and a succession of 'events' and everyone knew everyone's business. I was renting whilst doing a job and moved on.

The second village was exactly as you describe @Nextdoor55. We were not welcome. You needed four generations in the church yard before people would treat you as equal. I am not joking when I say that people would turn their heads away from us in the street so as not to have to say hello. I walked out with a smile and my dog every day for two years and for two years people looked away. The same people every day.

The area was very hunting and shooting. You are either in that set or you are not. If you are against that lifestyle then by God don't let people. There are some right thugs, I mean complete bastardy, feral villains associated with that world. (see the treatment Chris Packham has had). We sold and left.

Your class will never dictate your circle or life as much as when you live in a village. That St Georges flag on the pub isn't just for the football. Crime isn't just for inner cities......in one village someone stole our neighbours massive wind turbine!!!

I now live in a small town near a city and it suits me fine. Escape to the Country type shows make my blood run cold with their book swaps in a phone box and acres of land you've no access to and and community run shops and the long, long winters. The isolation, the loneliness, the lack of......anything.

😂 I live in the FOD, I didn't grow up here but my Grandad did and I have lots of family in the church yards. My partner is very definitely Forest and I have checked out his family tree to see that we aren't related 😆.
I grew up in a village and then had to live in fairly big towns in my 20s as I couldn't afford to live in a village where I am from. I hated town life, not knowing my neighbours, never seeing the same people when I went out, no real community.
I've been back to village life for 20 years now and love it. I know all the neighbours, we may not all always get on but arguments are short lived. I can pop round to my local pub and always find someone to chat to and everyone helps each other out. I fully expect everyone to know my business but I don't mind at all.
We are all different and what we want from where we live is different but I do think OP was a bit nasty about villages just because she has found one that isn't right for her.

We lived in a tiny village for about 2 years. Beautiful garden, amazing countryside and some lovely pubs.

But in the first month of moving in, we were visited by the planning person twice because someone (who was allowed to remain anonymous) accused us of cutting down a protected tree (we hadn't) and then accused us of not putting the right windows in. The planning officer acknowledged we were not guilty on both counts.

This happened another 3 times to the point where we had to write a legal letter to the council to tell them that either they had to reveal who was reporting us or we would accuse them of harassment.

In the end we were made to feel so unwelcome that we moved. It was a shame because we loved it there but we knew we weren't welcome! They had a parish council that was run by the in crowd of locals and I suspect it was one of them reporting us but we could never prove it.

thanks for your response. my comment was more about the ones who have generational wealth. they have money through properties, but it's obviously depleting as they have been relying on it for a couple of generations. What I mean is, people who know they'll inherit properties or wealth usually are lazy people... the rest of us spend a good amount of time skilling up, in education, working or running our businesses to create the money to buy the home in the first place. if you don't need to worry about that because you know you'll have money/property coming your way, then these people i usually find to be a bit thick. there's a lot of them in the villages, doing coffee shop jobs or administrative jobs, can't operate technology and usually just dim because they don't spend anytime improving themselves personally or professionally. that's what i meant. I'm sorry but you have no excuse being thick in a developed country. they have generational wealth, but with that comes their generational stupidity.

@penjil i think you misunderstood my post. my post wasn't about poorer people who don't have a choice. I'm also talking about people who don't have health or mental health problems so please don't misread what i'm saying, thanks.

the royal family are a good example: they have generational wealth, but with that comes their generational stupidity.