Neighbours pressurising friend

[Treaclewell]

His mother had capacity to the end and refused to have anything done on her house, which is all he has inherited, with some money, which will be absorbed by works. It's taken him some time with grieving, and the probate procedure, and she left it intestate. At last he has been thinking about things seriously, and just at this moment, calamity.
Across the road is a man with a family and a nasty landlord, who has upped the rent by three times. So he says. He has consulted EAs, investigated the house on the corner, also affected by probate, and is desperate. He has demanded that my friend, outright owner of his place, vacate it by Christmas, because there's pressure at his end. Judging by Homes under the Hammer, it couldn't be made liveable by June, and that's if desperate man over the road has trades in his family. Which I doubt.
My friend as now back in the state he had been in, but blaming his mother for some aspects of the situation, as well as expecting costs of all his money, and he wouldn't have much of a pension left after dealing with things. The neighbour next door is complaining about a tree over his garden and my friend thinks that's going to cost £20000 - which I and a friend who deals with property assure him it won't.
My friend now thinks they're acting together to drive him out from what has been his home for most of his life. His parents wanted him to be support for his mother when his father left with the demand to do that and "You can't always get what you want." as he went off for what he wanted.
I'm being as much of support as I can, but it's draining. Over the road man is fearing being homeless with his family, but is prepared to make my friend homeless instead. Greedy landlord has some other plan in mind, HMO perhaps, there is at least one in the road.
No matter how much we say that he can't be expelled from ownership as if he's a tenant. He is panicking.
Advice is needed. Shelter for Mr over the road. A skip.

I have long said that. A friend who had an abusive narcissistic hoarder mother had a bidding war for her house as is. But the message hasn't got through yet.
I have really needed to put a diagram in. The terraces go further. #

I’m baffled but invested.

@Treaclewell your posts are unclear.
Is the person pressuring your friend buying the house from him?
If so how far down the process are they and did he list it with an estate agent or has this neighbour just approached him with an offer?
If they haven't exchanged contracts, tell him to list with an estate agent and tell the neighbour the deal is off and to make no further contact with him
If they have exchanged, then tell him to only contact through a solicitor and then your friend has a buffer

Oh well that explains everything

I'm going for the second option @Nourishinghandcream or something similar with a MH problem maybe?

If hes being harassed, report it as harassment.

If he doesn't want to sell, he doesn't have to sell.

Is your friend autistic by any chance? It would be deemed as an aggrevating factor...

Your friend should just put it up for auction, OP. The neighbour can then bid along with anyone else. If your friend doesn't want to sell or doesn't want to sell yet, then he needs to be firm with this idiot man. Renovating it will be far too expensive unless he has the money, time and skills to do it. A builder could do that far more cheaply and quickly and turn it around in no time.

Remind your friend that there are still bills to pay on an empty house - he really is better off just selling it asap.

I am also quite baffled by your original post or why you have both got into such a tailspin about this.

First question, has the probate even gone through yet? If not, it's not your friend's house yet. If not, he can't really do much about anything.

Second, what your friend decides to do about doing up/selling the property is none of the business of the tenant over the road, his impending homelessness is not your friend's problem. "The house is not on the market at this time, you will need to make other arrangements". End of story.

If this guy is going to be a problem, I would suggest installing a camera and extra locks as soon as the probate goes through to prevent him going in and squatting.

Thirdly, why on earth would doing something about an overhanging tree cost £20,000? The neighbour can cut back anything overhanging themselves and put the wood/cuttings over the fence. If this is about a tree surgeon, it's not going to cost £20,000. If it's actually about tree preservation orders or roots undermining foundations, that's a different story.

Fourthly, once he fully takes ownership, he needs to get a valuation on (a) the property now without any work being done, (b) the property done up to basic liveable standard, (c) quote for the work to get it from (a) to (b).

This will inform him about the best course of action in terms of what to do about works and sale. It might be that he is better to sell it as a wreck at auction (like the homes on Homes under the Hammer, where trasdemen buy them and do the work themselves at their own cost) and just get rid of it and get what he can for it in the state that it is in. However, it may be that if he gets the work done he can get the money back with extra from the sale, so it may be worthwhile to do that, and there is no real time pressure to do so.

Fifthly, regardless of the option taken under (4) above, if his mother was a hoarder it seems likely that he will need a house clearance company. He needs to go through the contents and extract anything of value that might be able to sell to help cover costs. Once have dealt with any literal rubbish, there are charities that do this for a fixed amount that they will price - they literally come with a van and take the lot. They will then sell what they can and deal with the disposal of the rest.

Oh fgs, it's not that difficult to understand. Older man being bullied, not that rare either. Sorry to come out with the MN cliche OP, but has he told the police of the harassment?

Well whilst I think I understand the gist, it certainly isn't 100% clear. Your assumption may be correct but until the OP answers the questions asking for clarification - which they seem reluctant to do - it is just an assumption.

Some of the OP's posts are not entirely clear admittedly, but some posters were being really unpleasant rather than just asking for clarification.

Catopia and Winederlust have basically got it. He has probate.
Some of the advice was gone into when his mother was still alive, but no longer there, and she, with capacity, stopped all processes. No plumber, no electrician (that's done). Though she did tell us where her sapphire ring was. It wasn't. But clearance needs to be with care.
All bills are dealt with, post checked weekly or more often.
My parents made sure we knew how to cope with living in a house, and Dad, an accountant, left things easy to deal with. I think my friend's mother deliberately excluded him from anything.

So does your friend want to stay in this house and make it liveable or is he trying to get it ready to sell??
Are you saying that the mother here was a hoarder and there's a complex house clearance to happen as well?
I'm wondering if the pressure being put on him is people complaining about the state of a hoarded house because it's affecting the area (house/rental prices etc) and possibly making neighbours fear about fire risk, collapse etc, rather than because they are trying to get his house Could that be what's going on?

Don't think so, as work has been done on the outside, though it doesn't look like one that's been the equivalent of botoxed - there are some of those, new windows, pebble dash repainted etc.

The lack of diagram is really not what has caused the confusion OP!

The only way I can make this make sense is that your friend inherited his mums Council house tenancy, otherwise why would the renter neighbor think it was an option for his family?

@saschka And for the first time in MN history nobody asked for one 😂

Did your friend perhaps have conversations with this man about the possibility of him buying the property? Otherwise I can't understand why he's just assumed?

The reason people are getting confused by your posts is because at times you seem to imply he isn't selling then you start talking about all the work that needs to be done before he does? If he does want to sell, he doesn't need to spend money he hasn't got bringing it up to standard.

All the reasons the man across the road needs to by the house/shouldn't buy the house are totally irrelevant. Far too much overthinking going on here whilst missing out the one key point: does your friend want to sell this house?

Then it wouldn't have gone through probate.

It's not a council house. Mr-over-the-road has absolutely no reason for assuming it's for sale, let alone that he has any right to demand it by Christmas. (They were initially talking about something of common interest when the conversation took an unexpected swerve.)
The posts about times and costs - I suppose I was thinking about arguments I would use to Mr-over-the-road to show he was wrong to suggest the time frame. My friend certainly got threatening vibes - and he doesn't feel those wrongly.
When I first knew him I thought he imagined them, but then I saw them in operation. And he recently warned a friend (C) about someone (D) muscling in on his charity work. C didn't want to believe my friend and dropped him. Until D succeeded in expelling him from his activity.
So I'll believe he was worried by Mr-over-the-road. However, not a sign of either neighbour yesterday, so perhaps Mr-over-the-road has been advised appropriately.

But what is your friend saying to the man across the road when he's talking about buying the property? Surely if he's said it's not for sale, that would be the end of the conversation? Perhaps he feels uncomfortable and hasn't wanted to shut him down and has now inadvertently given him the idea that it's a possibility. I realise there are many people who like to take advantage but I cannot understand how if he'd told the man he's not selling, why he'd continue acting this way?

There is absolutely no reason to think of excuses and reasons why this man shouldn't buy the house. He just needs to be told it's currently not for sale. End of story.

Seems to have not got the message. Male thing, isn't it, the belief that 'no' means 'try harder'.

OP, you really aren't making things very clear.
It's not a lack of a diagram that was confusing, it's your overly detailed but not actually explaining anything posts.
Are you sure you're not overthinking things here and running with worse case scenarios?

That is what my friend does. It's very difficult.

Does your friend want to live in the house or sell it?
I fear that your vulnerable friend could be taken advantage of by rogue builders if trying to improve the property. My advice would be to sell it as is and move on with his life elsewhere. But not to the man over the road, sell via an estate agent or by auction.