87 Wild Neighbor Stories That May Instantly Make Yours Seem Normal (New Pics)

The Nextdoor app is, basically, a private social network that is designed for neighborhoods. It connects you and the people living in your local area so that you can share news, organize events, find services like handypeople and babysitters, get weather, traffic, and safety updates, buy or sell items, ask for reviews from your neighbors, connect with people based on your hobbies and interests, etc. The focus here is on interacting with your local community.

However, like any other socially-oriented digital platform, this app is no stranger to drama, weirdness, infuriating entitlement and narcissism, unexpected moments of kindness, and the like. The top moments—positive, negative, and amusingly confusing—get shared on ‘Best of Nextdoor.’

The mastermind behind the awesome project is Jenn Takahashi from California. Curious about all the different bizarre stories in her own neighborhood, she started building what would become a thriving, buzzing community.

It all started with her friends sending in posts from their own neighborhoods and eventually blossomed into a massive online group that sent her the funniest tips from the ‘Nextdoor’ app.

She officially launched the ‘Best of Nextdoor’ account on Twitter (back then, it was still known as that, not X) in late 2017.

Some of the most star-studded celebs who follow the project’s accounts include former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, model Chrissy Teigen, and actors Angel Kinsey, Rainn Wilson, and Jesse Tyler Ferguson.

“Nextdoor is intended to be a place where people post tips, updates, and concerns about their neighborhoods. It's where you share a photo of your lost cat or alert neighbors of a serial package thief. But anyone who frequents the website or app knows it's also a place where people stir the neighborhood pot by freely griping about the pettiest of things, such as a garden gnome being relocated three feet from its carefully chosen resting spot,” SFGate writes.

Back then, Takahashi, who was living in Glen Park, would log in on Nextdoor after work to get updates about the gnome situation in her neighborhood.

“It would bring me such relief. Whenever I would come home, no matter how crazy a day, it would be refreshing to go on Nextdoor and find this post about someone touching her lawn gnomes. It added levity and always kept things in perspective for me,” Takahashi opened up to SFGate.

“I don't know why, but Nextdoor rocks my world. It's so eye-opening. I'm a curious person by nature.”

For Takahashi, success revolves all around how she makes her followers feel. Namely, how the project makes them laugh.

“Someone recently sent me a video with her entire family around the dinner table cry-laughing while looking at Best of Nextdoor. I realized this is why I do it,” she revealed.

However, the founder of the project doesn’t just post anything on her accounts. One thing that she avoids is dog doo-doo because it is such a common complaint from neighbors everywhere. Another thing that she won’t post anymore about is people asking for their neighbors to, err, join their intimate relationships. “ I feel like anyone who has a Nextdoor account knows how crazy your neighbors really are. Why would you try dating them?"

What’s more, Takahashi refuses to “pots anything that puts a damper on your day.” The rule of thumb is that if it’s not funny, it won’t get featured!

The founder of ‘Best of Nextdoor’ told SFGate that one of her favorite posts of all time was of someone who posted a photo of a “super tall sunflower.” This person was convinced that the flower “was a camera and the neighbor was using it to spy.”

Meanwhile, The Atlantic quips about how ‘Best of Nextdoor’ gives a fascinating insight into the psyche of the United States. The project “reveals a charming cluelessness that pervades America’s communities.

“People in cities can’t seem to tell the difference between a possum and a house cat, for example. In Alabama, someone tried to sell an unopened box of Hot Pockets.”

The ‘Best of Nextdoor’ social media project has become huge since October 2017. On X, formerly Twitter, it boasts 442.2k followers, as well as 74.1k fans on Instagram, and 37k followers on Facebook.

The focus of the project, relatable, funny, and “quality neighborhood drama,” is what keeps people coming back over and over again.

Many of us have had run-ins with genuinely terrible and weird neighbors before, so it is fun and relatable to read about others experiencing the same issues.

On the other hand, we’ve also had truly good, kind, caring, helpful, and supportive neighbors, too, so these stories are relatable on that level, too.

Once you’ve looked through all of these posts and upvoted the ones that entertained you the most, we’d like to hand the discussion over to you, Pandas.

Tell us about your neighbors: who do you love? Who do you hate? Who do you love to hate? Who are the weirdest, most annoying, and unfriendliest people in your local area? On the flip side, who are the most wholesome folks on your block?