irritating neighbour

sansnom

sansnom

sansnom

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14 Feb 2004
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London
fellas

was looking for some advice on how to deal with this absolute ****** of a neighbour during an on-going renovation. Long story short:

-refused to give party wall consent and we didn't want to get into an issue with that so we had to alter our renovation plans. Fine had to be done.
-slyly threatens things like 'falling into dispute' and the ramifications that entails if his 'requests' aren't met including no building work on saturday's (which we happily complied with his demands became ever more absurd
-constantly bothering the builders, shouting at them, harassing them etc
-has demanded that his house be repainted due to the 'dust and debris' from our renovation
-has gone around the neighbourhood telling our new neighbours how disrespectful we are, and how we have 'cowboy builders'

He's basically being as much of a ******* prat as he can possibly be. He never says a word to us when he sees us, other than smiles and acts really normal. Soon as we leave the site, he starts causing trouble.

Now last week, our a portion of our fencing fell down due to some of the ground work and from strong winds. Our builders rebuilt it immediately and though it doesn't exactly look great, it wasn't in great shape to begin with. He's gone and written an email saying how this has 'deeply distressed him' and how 'he expected so much more from accredited builders' etc and he just wants his life to return to 'normal' and that they need to repaint his house, build a new fence, repair and repoint brickwork which he claims was damaged by scaffolding though there is absolutely no damage from it that wasn't already there (I know because I made sure to inspect all of it prior to any work beginning)

He also did his own renovation last year and our new neighbours have told us caused considerable noise pollution, dust, debris, and encrouched on his neighbour's border line without their permission and his renovation lasted 6 months.. ours has been 10 weeks and they'll be done by next Friday. Our builders have been extremely professional, highly recommended and done their job to absolute perfection. He also called building control on us (though he doesn't admit it) and building control signed off everything on our site and even mentioned the work is of a superb standard.

If the fence hadn't fallen i would've continued to laugh and ignore his pathetic communications but i now feel he's using this an excuse to try to get free work and justify his ridiculous claims.

I've basically had enough of him and I want to know what my rights are, and what his rights are. Any ideas how to deal with this epic fool?
 
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Who's fence is it? It should be on the land registry as a 't'. If it's his repair it.

If you haven't performed a delapidation survey do it now.

To be frank it sounds like a load of hot air if he hasn't written formally.
 
maccapacca said:
Who's fence is it? It should be on the land registry as a 't'. If it's his repair it.

If you haven't performed a delapidation survey do it now.

To be frank it sounds like a load of hot air if he hasn't written formally.
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there's no mention of anything about borders on the title deed and the picture which shows the boundary of each property has no details on it either. it only shows road names and graphical illustrations of each plot (no details or wording)
 
Why extend an olive branch?
The bloke sounds like an utter **** and it sounds like hes like this will all the neighbours.
Why does he have OP's email address tho? :/

TBH if hes even threatening "falling into dispute" with regards to impacting house price/sale then surely that's harassment?

So he's threatening this unless you do as he says?
Essentially blackmail?
 
If he never says a word to you when he sees you, who is he complaining to? the builders direct, via email? or to you by email? I suspect you mean the builders, as I personally wouldnt give my neighbour my email address!

I would just do as he does, say nothing to him, just smile and wave, ignore everything else, he is trying to get free work done, dont take it personally, he is just a chancer.
 
I agree. Some people are just awkward eejits no matter what. Give him a big wave and huge smile every time you see him. It'll annoy no end!
 
If your builders will be finished Friday and there's really no harm/damage done aside from the fence then just ignore him for 5 more day and get the fence fixed when all the work is done. Works finished, site tidy, fence fixed. What would he be left to complain about? All he's doing is working himself into a lather, no point you getting cheesed off as well over something that'll be all sorted by next Monday.

His 'distress' line is just angling for some sort of compensation, but even if he took you to court (for what?) he'd find himself laughed back out again.

Chin up fella. Give him a smile and a cheery "Morning!".
 
It was probably because you tried to build on the party wall boundary. When building extensions I think it is fair to keep it fully on your own property. E.g. If you built on the boundary, it means next door can't and would have to build fully on their property if they were to build an extension in the future.
 
~Divine~Wind~ said:
Why extend an olive branch?
The bloke sounds like an utter **** and it sounds like hes like this will all the neighbours.
Why does he have OP's email address tho? :/

TBH if hes even threatening "falling into dispute" with regards to impacting house price/sale then surely that's harassment?

So he's threatening this unless you do as he says?
Essentially blackmail?
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usually two sides to every story...

dust and crap all round his house
vehicles taking all the parking spaces
a lot of noise
grass areas getting messed up
mess / rubbish
OP not letting him know what going on / not being friendly
 
LeeUK said:
It was probably because you tried to build on the party wall boundary. When building extensions I think it is fair to keep it fully on your own property. E.g. If you built on the boundary, it means next door can't and would have to build fully on their property if they were to build an extension in the future.
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This.

If the OP had discussed with neighbour and agreed to fully build on own property, you might have saved yourself a lot of grief.

I used have a very picky neighbour to one side who used to be a minor pain in the bum commenting on every little thing we did.

When I was planning to have our shared fence replaced at my expense, I went round to talk to him about it, even offering to have his side sprayed the same shade of green as the rest of his fences.

I was very taken aback when he turned out to be a thoroughly decent chap who offered to pay half there and then. I have a quick chat now before doing anything along or near our boundary and he's been a superb neighbour since.
 
sansnom said:
If the fence hadn't fallen i would've continued to laugh and ignore his pathetic communications but i now feel he's using this an excuse to try to get free work and justify his ridiculous claims.
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Someone I work with had a very similar issue to you.

Basically if you give an inch with this guy, he'll take a mile.

If the fence is on your land then perhaps suggest that is replaced but I wouldn't do it at his request as he will then think he has the right to dictate to you, but wouldn't be a bad thing to check first.

As others have said, the party wall boundary thing could have been the problem but nothing countless people do with no issue.
 
Terminal_Boy said:
This.

If the OP had discussed with neighbour and agreed to fully build on own property, you might have saved yourself a lot of grief.

I used have a very picky neighbour to one side who used to be a minor pain in the bum commenting on every little thing we did.

When I was planning to have our shared fence replaced at my expense, I went round to talk to him about it, even offering to have his side sprayed the same shade of green as the rest of his fences.

I was very taken aback when he turned out to be a thoroughly decent chap who offered to pay half there and then. I have a quick chat now before doing anything along or near our boundary and he's been a superb neighbour since.
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uh except I haven't built anything on his property or the border fence or our boundary line. As I said, we asked him for party wall sign off and he refused so we had to abandon our plans for an extension and just go for a basic renovation as we didn't want to get into a dispute scenario.

The fence fell down because a) the wall post was rotted b) strong winds c) some minor gardening ground work around the posts and my builders still rebuilt the fence for him without hesitation.
 
LeeUK said:
It was probably because you tried to build on the party wall boundary. When building extensions I think it is fair to keep it fully on your own property. E.g. If you built on the boundary, it means next door can't and would have to build fully on their property if they were to build an extension in the future.
Click to expand...

No building work mate, just some gardening ground work near the fence
 
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