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“Thought She Owned The Street”: 19 Times Neighbors Took Pettiness Too Far
Article created by: Ieva Pečiulytė
“Good fences make good neighbors” is one of those lines that gets thrown around, but sometimes one has to deal with folks next door so entitled that it becomes pretty clear why anyone would want a fence (and perhaps a guard dog) in the first place.
Someone asked “What’s the most petty thing a neighbor has done to you?” and netizens described some of the worst neighbors they’ve ever dealt with. So get comfortable as you scroll through, upvote the truly pettiest and be sure to share your own thoughts and experiences in the comments section down below.
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#1
We were sort of that neighbor a few years ago. We were in the process of building our new house and had everything staked out before any of the groundwork started. I guess our neighbor thought we were too close to their property and had some city official come out to measure and in the process delayed our contractor.
Turns out we were 1 foot further away from their property than necessary and so, without even bothering to ask, our annoyed contractor picked up all the stakes and moved them 1 foot closer to the neighbor.
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#2
It in was 2001, the neighbor wanted me to join an HOA. I had no interest. She contrived all these rules and insisted the neighborhood follow them. She would call the police, city inspectors, and everybody on anyone who didn't follow her rules. She finally got me a warning from the city on my house needing paint. In her vision she wanted earth tones and encouraged me to change the color of my house from a light powder blue, to a tan. I painted the house PURPLE. I sold it as a purple house.
#3
Had a weird neighbor. Friendly at first but slowly got colder and colder. They had the same landlord as us.
We were going to have a neighbors back yard party with us, the neighbors on both sides and the neighbors across the alley. Only the weird neighbor declined. Everyone was bringin something, beer from across the alley, sides from most of the others. We were hosting so it was our job to grill some brats and host in the back yard. Had the charcoal grill fired up and put some store bought wood chips on at the end to give the sausages a smokey flavor. I'm stepping out of the kitchen with a big tray of raw meat when a firefighter pokes his head over the back gate.
Firefighter: "Hi, we've had a smoke complaint that you are burning trash or yard waste?"
Me: "God I hope not, I'm not that bad of a cook."
Firefighter: "May I come in and look at your fire?"
Me: "Uh, ok, let me put down this tray."
I let the guy in, he looks at our charcoal grill.
Firefighter: "Did you put anything other than charcoal and lighter fluid in this?"
Me: "Yeah, some of these wood chips from the grocery store."
Firefighter: "I hate to say this, but the city has an ordinance against any organic matter other than charcoal in grills."
Everyone: "What."
Firefighter: "Yeah, it's a dumb law and almost never comes up unless you are really burning yard waste or if you have a neighbor who has it in for you. I won't give you a citation, but I do have to stand here and watch to make sure the fire is completely extinguished before I go."
Me: "So I can't grill these dogs?"
Firefighter: "I'm afraid not."
I proceed to take the tray of raw meat into the house, pop them in the oven to broil and come out to hose down my grill until the whole thing is cold and wet. The firefighter left with an apology and thanked me for not getting mad at him for the bad news. Only one person within six houses wasn't there and I don't think any of my guests called the FD on our own party.
#4
Growing up, we had a neighbor with an immaculate lawn and home. He kept it that way by flicking his cigarette butts over the fence and into our yard. To him, we were just white trash.
One day, my mom picked up ALL the butts from our yard and flung them back into his yard. Problem solved. He never did it again.
#5
Lived in a condo with concrete walls and high ceilings that had small gaps in top that allowed sound to pass through.
Cue new neighbor moving in, they have really nice furniture and seem okay.
Group of “friends” stay over and party pretty late during the weekend. No big deal, we like to party too.
Next week another group of “friends” stay over. No issue. She complains that our dogs bark too much. Understandable, as our rescue barks whenever someone is near our front door. I get dog collars to help ease the situation.
Then another group of “friends” stay over and decide to sing at all hours of the night and make noise during the weekday.
This happens 3-5x more times.
I sign up for AirBnB for an upcoming trip. Decided to look at who is hosting an AirBnB in our complex.
Surprise, surprise. Neighbor’s so-called “friends” are actually guests.
I threaten to report her if she didn’t get her guests in check after they took our parking space (people will want to shoot you for their spot).
She bitched me out, so I sent her AirBnB posting to the HOA. No more “friends” and she moved out and sold the condo within a month.
#6
Bought and moved into a condo and the previous owners apparently did not like cleaning. My third floor deck was green and growing things so went to my downstairs neighbors to let them know I wanted to power wash (note: nothing in condo bylaws prohibits this). First neighbor says of course, do whatever I need. But neighbor below me pitches a royal fit: how dare I inconvenience her? She’d have to move her furniture inside! Decks get dirty, that’s just how it goes. So I talk to the office (as does she) and she whines enough to get them to say no power washing but I can use a garden hose and scrub brush and (important later) soap. Well what would’ve been a 15 min power wash becomes an all day cleaning extravaganza of green soapy grossness going down to her deck. But is the neighbor satisfied? Oh no. She did not realize SOAP would be part of the deal. She is not pleased and come Monday morning is complaining to the office again. Thankfully they told her to shove it.
Runner up prize goes to the unknown neighbor who ran to the office as I was moving in to tell on me for having a doormat, which is, as I later learned, prohibited.
#7
Not me, but what the woman who did live in our house did to her neighbors.
We moved into a house up a long shared driveway. Our neighbors are an elderly couple and she has dementia. Sometimes she doesn't know where she is or what she is doing.
The new neighbor came over one sunday night to ask if he could put his wheely bin in the end of the drive so the rubbish truck could back up the drive to empty it as it would save him trying to move it to the road. I said that was no issue .
Turns out the old resident had her lawyers send the elderly couple a cease and desist letter over putting the rubbish bin in the driveway the first week after she moved in. No knock on the door and ask to stop or talking to them. Straight to get the lawyer involved.
We also found out she got upset about the neighbor with dementia wandering onto her driveway. Remembering she had dementia and didn't know what she was doing. So she put a chain across the driveway to stop her wandering into her property.
The chain was fitted and hung at about 8 inches off the ground and the first time the elderly lady wandered over she tripped on it and fell face first onto the drive, knocking several teeth out and breaking her hip. She spent some time in hospital and before she even got out of hospital,the elderly neighbor had a knock on the door from the police with a trespass notice............
All the neighbors were ecstatic when she left and we moved in. I met the woman once and she seemed Ok. But what sort of piece of s**t acts like that towards neighbors?
#8
I was at this neighbourhood treasure hunt when I was around 11. It was in a big park with lot of trees and rocks, parking lot and a community centre next to it. Me and my neighbours kid both figured out final clue and sprinted towards the finish, only for me to 'accidentally' bumped by his dad and fall.
Still salty about it till this day.
#9
I'm currently in a battle with my neighbor because he cut a bunch of old growth trees (older than the entire neighborhood by a good 50 years) down and moved in an absolutely hideous house, which is a huge issue because while we're not an HOA, we are a "community character" neighborhood and there is an expectation that new builds at least attempt to look like existing homes in the neighborhood.
It turns out that he had no permit to remove the trees and that the building permit he had was invalid. There was a zoning hearing and the city council asked me to testify at it. I testified with facts, that he didn't have a valid permit and that while there needs to be a 6' encroachment between houses, right now there's only a 4.5' encroachment, and that if he adds a porch like he wanted to, his new house would actually encroach onto our property line and basically be up against my kitchen window.
When they opened it up to public comment, almost fifty of my neighbors testified that the house doesn't meet standards. At the end, the council moved to immediately revoke his dodgy building permit, which is something that hasn't been done in 45 years. He's now left with a little under a week to move that house back to its original lot or submit major design changes.
In addition to threatening to sue everyone who spoke out against him, he now posted on social media that he's been asking the public for "dirt" on me and my husband. Thank God that his post has only had five comments and they're all telling him to either stop or that we're decent people.
I'm still half-expecting to wake up on Monday and find my tires slashed.
#10
Our neighbors CONSTANTLY complained for like 2 years about a tree in the back yard that looked like it was going to fall. They threatened to sue us if it did. Thing is, the tree was clearly on their property. Like by 5 feet.
Then one day during a strong storm, a huge, seemingly strong & healthy tree, smack dab in the middle of their front yard blows over onto their house. We went over the next day and helped them cut it up & remove it. They could barely make eye contact with us & never said thank you. They did shut up about the other tree though, that’s still standing to this day.
#11
We had a small dirt driveway in front of our lawn, which was shaded by our giant tree. The neighbors liked to park there because they always had people over and apparently it was too difficult for them to park near their house. When I got my horse trailer (gooseneck, so think loong) it was a lot easier for me to park in the front so I could just load up and go. One day I come out and see that my tire is slashed on the trailer. I looked up and they were laughing.
Joke was on them. They thought I could buy a new tire. Buuuut I couldn't, so that trailer didn't move for months until I could.
#12
About 10 years ago had a neighbor scream at me because I accidentally went on to his property a little bit when I was mowing the lawn. A grown man yelling at a 11 year old over a bit of cut grass...
#13
My college roommate and I had an ant problem. They got all over the trash bin, so we moved it from the garage to the yard in front of the house. Our neighbor left us a note saying it was unsightly and to please remove it. I handled the situation by putting a sticky Christmas bow on top of it to make it look nicer. My roommate was horrified (by me) and took it off. She then explained to the neighbor why we had it outside.
I'm not sure which one of us was pettiest - me or the neighbor.
#14
My upstairs neighbor (in an apartment) was peeved that I contacted the office about him and his loud wife. I had no contact with them directly. So this grown man waited until I took my 15 year old, blind, dying of cancer dog outside to relieve himself, and he came out to loudly bark and growl at my dog to scare him since he couldn’t see. Luckily, my dog didn’t care, but what a petty thing to do.
#15
We had our lot assessed and they put stakes in the ground on the property line. She pulled them up and moved them two inches over. It was very noticeable because they also made a small spray painted line along the stakes. I guess she didn’t think we would notice that the stakes were no longer on the line.
#16
Mine was a downstairs neighbor and they would constantly switch the drier plug to our outlet to charge our unit for drying their clothes.
#17
He's salty about a land survey that was done decades before I moved in. We have a decent neighborly relationship in general, but when I moved in he tried to convince me that a whole section of my yard was his. Fortunately, the previous owner had warned me he might try this.
Now we rent the house out. Every time a new tenant moves in, he walks the property with them and tries to move the property line again. Very petty, and so consistent!
#18
Last summer our neighbor complained that our maple tree (the only tree in our entire yard) was dying and he contacted his insurance company to make sure we'd have to pay damages if it ever fell over onto his garage. We had an expert out and it was dying so we sadly chose to have it cut down. During this fall he got his leaf blower out every single day and blew the leaves from his yard into ours even though new have now have no trees.
Jokes on him, we just signed a contract for a fence. For our dog, not out of pettiness. But it's a nice bonus.
#19
When I was a kid, my brother and I were playing catch in the yard. Our ball ended up in the neighbor’s yard (nowhere near the house like 5 feet into his grass) and I went to get it. He comes running outside yelling saying “If I ever see you on my grass again, I’m calling the cops.” No kidding. The whole get off my yard kid thing.
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