Ask Your Question

a giant tree fell in my neighbors front yard. after a few months he eventually cut it into logs but then just left them there in a big pile. they're still sitting there more than a year later!

My neighbor has a stay-at-home type job, so he apparently has all the time in the world to devote to his yard. During spring and summer, he cuts his yard no less often than every other day.

He also keeps it perfectly watered and fertilized - it really is perfect grass and I commend him for his dedication, but it frustrates me because it makes my OK-looking yard look trashy by comparison and I don't want to spend 45 minutes every other day mowing/caring for my lawn.

Dandelions!!!! Fields of dandelions!

When it snowed several months back, my son went out early in the day and shoveled the snow and put down a sheet of ice to melt away the remaining snow. He did a great job. When the neighbor went out later that day he began brushing the snow he had on his steps onto mine. I looked out of my front window in disbelief because I couldn't believe he had the gall to do this after my son cleared our steps. We have attached properties which makes it just a tad challenging to keep snow on your side of your property while shoveling or brushing the snow off the steps. But it's not impossible. My son kindly went out and asked him not to brush the snow from his steps onto our steps. This solved the problem but I thought it was just common sense not to do it in the first place. We wouldn't have done this to them.

The neighbor that joins my yard in the back always leaves junk in back of his garage -bricks, metal parts, scrap wood, basketballs, tarps, etc. He can't see it because he lives in front of his garage, but I have to look at it. Plus, our yard is downhill from his yard so his trash is always rollling down against our fence. If I ask him about it, he gets all bent out of shape and thinks that I am crazy. I put up a tall bamboo fence so I don't have to look it but junk still rolls down against the fence.

My neighbors have planted vine type plants all over their backyard 'for privacy'. They NEVER cut them or try to keep them under control. They have this trumpet vine the has grown under their fence (underground) and we have to keep going out and pulling up the feelers that have grown into OUR backyard and sprung up. I am SO tired of it!

Losing all of my trees in a storm, yet still having to rake leaves every falll from neighbors' trees!
Roots from neighboring trees infiltrating my yard and slab and driveway!
Weeds from neighbors/ HOA who don't treat the lawn/ common area while we have monthly service to keep our lawn weed free!

One of my neighbors uns his sprinkle system EVERY DAY for a couple of hours and has flooded my lawn and killed a good deal of the grass - when I asked him to stop this incessant watering, he reported he didn't know how to change it without turning off the system altogether. He refused my help with the controller. Sigh.

The people acorss the street have LOTS of trees in their yard and never rake the leaves - therefore they all end up in my yard! I finally had to hire a service to keep up with them. Now the people across the street have stopped doing anything with their yard,including picking up papers and trash - it is becomming a real eyesore. I work diligently inmy yard to keep it neat, but these lazy folks are really ruining the neighborhood.

My neighbors don't know anything about plants. I think it's great to not have a "lawn" but my neighbors have ivy, vinca, hellebores, and monkey grass. All are exotic invasives and work their way into everyone else's yard.
Worse, they don't cut back the monkey grass along the sidewalk. So your nice wide sidewalks narrow to about 18" in front of their house, it makes the whole street look uninviting to walkers. .

We live in a subdivision without fences, although everyone knows where their property lines are. That is, everyone except kids. Our neighbor's kids routinely play in the creek in our backyard (their backyard faces a different direction), trample the flowers I've planted around the base of our trees, and leave their toys in our grass.

Hi Angie: Encouraging people to say things about their neighbors o your site is not worthy of Angies List. WE really do not need more sites that create things for people to be mean to each other. And I do not think this is worthy of the Angies List I have known. You should remove this from your site. Thanks.

Hey, glad to hear we aren't the only ones with a crazy neighbor. Ours thinks she is the neighborhood mayor. Our driveway is on the property line. She has put landscape stones on that line, up against our driveway. When it rains this causes water to pond on our driveway. This is probably illegal, but who wants to spend the money on lawyers and court fees!

The house west of us has been a rental as long as we'ver lived here (33 years) it's in a constant state of disrepair. Our house sits on a slioght hill, so our "view" is enitrely this backyard. We share a LONG common fenceline with this house and have endured over the years: 6-10 dogs living there at one time (no one cleans up after them) grass and weeds so tall they are a fire hazard, it was a METH HOUSE for years (couldn't get the city to do anything) kids who threw rock imbedded snowballs at our windows, kids who SHOT at our dog with a BB gun, trailers full of trash parked in the back yard...oh, the list is endless. I certainly consider the fact that I can't be in my own backyard a "landscaping problem". I have a vegetable garden back there, otherwise we don't use the backyard. We've replaced the common fence 3 times, now we will replace it a fourth time this summer with one as high and strong as we can. If I was in a position to move, I would. All becasue of this house alone. (Ironically the house next door to them has won several city beautification awards..it's so gorgeous and well kept.

My neighbor has two large maple trees by the fence that gives wonderful shade for his house but 70% of the leaves fall in our yard that WE have to clean up every year. He doesn't offer to help clean them up with his power mower either. The only other tree we have in our yard doesn't lose it's leaves (Monkey Tree) so none of the leaves we have to clean up are ours.

We had a big storm in October, with a lot of tree damage. Had to call a landscape company to come and chip and take away lots of debris. However, our neighbor on our front side has left all of her large trees that fell down lying there. The scene is a total eyesore and we must see it every time we walk out of the front door. She doesn't really see the mess as it is in her backyard but we do!

In response to DPOLICAN above, I'm happy that Angie's List posted this question. I don't think it's encouraging people to be mean or focus on mean people. I specifically read through all the posts, because as a new homeowner, I wanted to see if we might be doing any of the annoying habits unintentionally and then correct ourselves if so. I think this question actually makes us all a little more aware of how to be good or better neighbors! Cheers~

Our neighbor has a beautifully manicured lawn that is always brilliant green, regardless of the weather...BUT after a good rain, all the weakened earthworms depart his lawn and drown on the concrete sidewalk, since he has put SOOO many chemicals on his lawn. This happens no where else in the neighborhood. He is basically making such a shallow, dense root mat, dependant on artifical watering and fertilizer feeding, without air pockets and natural paths for the water to drain down and spongy soil to hold mositure, that the earthworms can't burrow deep and they simply have to flee -- and then die!

This chemical/sprinkling route is a short-term fix that will have huge long-term consequences when his entire lawn eventaully streeses out and dies altogether. He might as well lay down astro-turf! At least then he wouldn't be sending excess nitrogren into the Chesapeake Bay with huge consequences!

Also those who make "turle mounds" at the base of their trees (also called "mulch volcanoes") are settting up their trees to fail. Often those trees' roots surface beyond the mulch, desperately seeking moisture to survive. More than 3" deep mulch limits the amount of water that can get down to plant roots. Thick mulch against the bark of the trees sets the bark up for rotting -- no mulch should be against the tree bark or plant stems.

Seek info from your local Master Gardeners and Cooperative Extenion Service -- who have nothing to gain by selling you anything, and have researched-based knowledge of best management practices.

My neighbor could win the prize for this. He collects and stores rusty junk on the edge of his property and mine sometimes even leaning on my fence. He used to keep it on my property until I put the fence up which made him show his evil side for the longest. He even used to put his trash like left over stews and dog hair on my property. After the fence he still blows his leaves over to my yard. He tries his darndest to blow as much through the chain links and the rest gets blown around and up. He insist on riding his very loud mower twice a week during summers and starts mowing at 9:30pm or later. He waits until I have my windows open and starts his fires that always blow directly towards my house. And his trash is not yard debris, it is household and rubber and wires,etc. Lastly, I think, is that he is constantly watching me and my home. He has even set up his lounge chairs toward my home to sit and watch. Sometimes he is hiding behind his shed watching or listening; funny but he still smokes while he's hiding so I smell him and know he's there. The good news is that I moved even though I still own the place. But he is bored now.

Pratically my whole neighborhood drives me nutty! We have neighbors that keep their kid's play junk in the front yard but their backyard is empty; another neighbor had his window knocked out and it's been boarded up for almost two years now - maybe I should start a collection for him; another neighbor piles leaves in their front yard and when the wind blows they blow onto my driveway. And my personal favorite, religious icons ... all of the religions have congregated on my cul-del-sac, you can find the Blessed Mother, Chinese talisman, Budda, dragons, amulets, and Mezuzah. Maybe I'll hang a pentacle in my tree to ensure everyone is represented.

I am just grateful to live in my neighborhood after the one I moved from. We are all very quiet and boring. Yes, I have to rake leaves that come from other trees..but I love the beauty these majestic oaks add to our street. Just keep your yard free of trash & debris, and mow it during the growing season..I at least give credit for effort :-)

I live in Florida, where my neighbors both have very tall pine trees, while I have none. The pinecones drop on my yard as much, if not more than their own. They are huge, and very sharp, so you have to wear gloves to pick them up. I have a veggie garden and ornamental garden which are now pelted with pinecone rockets!! Very annoying!!

What continues to drive us crazy is the 6-foot concrete wall our neighbor erected years ago. We wanted a wood fence, would have gone 50/50 to pay for it, but no. Since it had to be concrete or nothing, we didn't contribute a dime.
The wall casts a shadow on part of our yard which has cut off sunlight and killed flower beds. Where the shadow falls, we've lost a lot of choices. Slowly, vines are growing on it and the wall looks better.
Worst part is for them, though. We live near the ocean and the neighborhood has a mildew problem, and the wall shades an entire side of their house, built less than a yard away from the house. Therefore, no light, cooler, damper, nothing grows, only dirt. I can only imagine the mold problem they have now. It could have been avoided.

Their windchimes. They're up year round and we have to have white noise machines to sleep.

I like my neighbors for the most part but I don't like it when they don't control their weeds along our property lines. Their weeds eventually migrate into my beautiful lawn that I maintain myself. I would like to buy them a gallon of Round-Up...Over a year ago my neighbor across the street started a driveway next to his house to park his motor home and still hasn't finished the job. Don't start a project unless you have the time and money to finish it.

I hope the people who read these postings learn something if it applies to them. Don't buy a home if you cannot maintain it, it's not fair to drop the value of the surrounding homes because you are too lazy to care for your home - rent an apartment instead.

My neighbors aren't "getting under my skin". They are the nicest young family but, it astounds me the "decor" they put outside to make it look "more better". I understand that "good" is a matter of personal opinion and taste but, the real killer is, he's an architect!

They bought the house two years ago and the it has the oldest and the moldest pine fence. The fence does nothing to keep their two young boys in and I would have thought, that would have been the first project they did so mother didn't have to constantly supervise and chase them.

Our neighbors on the one side light their back yard up like it's a stadium at night with these crazy flood lights!! They even light up part of our back yard and shine into our house and I can see itfrom our bed room at night. They did move them slightly so it's not as bad anymore but still pretty annoying...we don't want to make a big deal out of it as we want to get along with them (and otherwise do!!) and really don't have anything else to complain about, but those flood lights really annoy me (they're also the only ones in the neighborhood who feel it necessary to light up their back yard like that!!). Waste of energy, too!!

I live in a neighborhood that has restrictions forbidding fences, sheds, trucks unless kept in a garage and structures closer than ten feet to the side of a property. Unfortunately, the original developer who drew up those restrictions is no longer with us. The restrictions leave it up to residents to enforce them. There has been no such enforcement, so the neighborhood is full of fences, sheds and trucks. The people who live behind me have erected a 6 foot high fence that looks like Harford County has placed a branch of the Detention Center behind me. There also is a huge shed placed two feet behind my property line. I have been trying to fight this in Circuit Court, but that is a rather sad story also.

Most of our neighbors are wonderful at maintaining their yards, just a few households think it's OK to put plastic flowers in planters and pots in their front yards, but it's offensive and no one has the heart to tell them. The other very inconsiderate practice by some are wind chimes.....they not only make dogs bark because it hurts their ears, but people with hearing aids are sensitive to them also. I don't have a dog or a hearing aid .....they just plain get on my nerves when I'm trying to sit quiet and listen to the birds or read a book in my own backyard and all I get is a constant shrill noise. What get's me is that they hang these things in their backyard but they never go out there. I suggest that a little forethought when doing something outside your home as to how it may affect those around you.....ie put your windchime (or any other noise such as TV, music etc.) inside your home and turn on the fan, that way you can enjoy it.

Pejay

The thing that drives me nuts is windchimes. I cannot allow my dog to bark at all hours but windchimes can make noise, yes it is noise, at all hours.

I really, really hate it when our neighbor, who only mowed his lawn (in PA, where the grass does grow a lot) a total of like 3 or 4 times all last summer, blows the long, thick grass, over into our yard (which I mow every week). The grass lays in my yard and kills my grass if I don't mow it back over into their yard. You would think after me doing that every time, they would get the message, but nope!

We also have a neighbor on the other side that has a black walnut tree that really produced A LOT of walnuts last year and they made a big mess everywhere! So do his apple trees, but I just kicked the apples & walnuts over to the fence line so they weren't all over the yard. My husband kicked them over into his yard though!

My neighbor's yard is a never ending cement pouring project which is hard to describe in words. I'm told by other neighbors that he has been working on it for 12 years and no one really knows what the goal is other than to build more cement walls and dig ditches. For at least 4 years, he has had tons of dirt piled up against my fence which has caused my fence to lean. In his front yard, he built a cement "raised planter" by mixing and pouring one bag at a time. This planter looks horrible and I told him that I would have problems selling my house because of it. I finally paid for a survey which revealed that a 16 foot length of his 3 foot tall cement wall was over on my property by as much as 7 inches in some places. I then got a quote to cut the wall and told him I would pay for about 20% of the cost, but only if it was done by that contractor within the next month. He agreed. My plan was to plant self-pruning thuja emerald trees to eventually hide the wall after they grew. Soon after I planted the trees, the city told my neighbor his front-yard construction was in violation of code and he had 20 days to remove it. I wish they had done this sooner.

Great question Angie! My pet pieve is my neighbor throwing his junk (oil bottles, his old sewer pipes, car parts, and the list goes on!) into my yard. We finally got a survey done to mark off our land and as we knew he was polluting our property. We decided to string bright orange tape along the trees to 'show' him where 'his' property is. None of the other neighbors can see it and it has worked well! When they fully behave we will remove the tape.
Also wind chimes and barking dogs!

Total eye sore! Scrap, junk cars, dilapidated buildings, trash! Absolutely disgusting what's even more repulsive is that codes does NOTHING about it! I wish I had the problem of a compulsive gardener!

Neither of my neighbors fertilize, so their weeds,especially creeping charlie which I am now at war with, have made their way into my yard.

I am not a fanatic about my lawn, but creeping charlie does just that...creeps until it has taken over huge hunks of lawn, and you don't know where it began because it is long, long stems of low growing weeds. Ugh!

my neighbor uses his front yard like normal people use their back yard. in the summer he puts up a crappy above ground pool. he also uses his front yard ,the part across the sidewalk close to the street, to grow pumpkins and has it staked and wired off. This looks so getto and we live in a nice neighborhood. i dont get it!

My neighbor down the alley has a mature "Tree of Paradise." The person who named the tree must have really had a sarcastic personality. This tree prolifically produces enough seed and suckers to invade all the backyards down the alley. Most of my neighbors are not aware that the little stand of trees in their backyard is an extremely invasive (not to mention, stinky) species until the trees are big enough to produce their own suckers. I spent all last summer trying to get rid of them in my yard, but it is a systemic problem.

My neighbor had a medium sized wading pool they set up right next to the fence line. With summer over they emptied it but let is sit collapsed all winter and I am guessing it was ruined. The following summer they bought a new, larger pool, this they set up in the middle of the backyard (thank goodness enough childrens toys against the fence line already!) So, the old pool sat collecting water and growing mosquitos all summer long, not to mention it seemed a magnet for more junk. We have not had mosquitos as bad as last summer. I did not want to go out after the sun started going down. The middle of winter and they finally decided the pile of junk collecting around the pool and the pool itself should be cleaned up. They neatly stacked the junk and managed to get the pool 1/4 of the way across the back yard. I guess that is a start. The rest of their yard is nice enough, they mow their poor lawn 2x's a week. You would think they would clean up the junk corner. We had some strong winds this winter and some of thier junk pile blew out into the driveway and road. I guess that is one way to clean up -.-
They also have these poor chickens in a pen that is so small they might have 1-2 square feet of poop covered ground each. (this is after they lost chickens the year before and decided they should expand the size of the pen.) That is just sad to see. I think they thought the small pen was ok because they sell them for chickens. What they did not understand is the part about moving it around the yard or only keeping 1-2 standard or 3-4 bantams in it, not 5 large hens!

Trash: I have a couple of neighbors that put their trash cans out a couple of days before pickup. Due to the usual direction of wind, it ends up in my yard.

Lack of respect for neighbors and their property: I don't mind the occasional ball or toy landing in the yard or the dog that got away. What I do mind are the kids who think my yard is just something between them and their friends. There's also the lady who allows her dogs to run all over everyones yards and do their business. Those dogs have attacked me and my dog on more than one occasion yet she just laughs and says "Oh they won't hurt anyone." Explain that to my much smaller dog as she's licking her wounds.

Barking dogs: I own a dog that I never let bark incessantly as my neighbors do. I've started yelling at their dogs myself. Don't care if they don't like it, someone has to do something.

Outdoor lighting: Enough lights it could be used as a landing strip for aircraft. And worse yet, they are positioned so several shine directly into my bedroom window. I can't leave my window open at night because of all these bright lights.

Living in San Antonio we experience drought on a regular basis so we replaced a dead front and side lawn with rock, flowers, trees, etc. Our neighbors on both sides seem to believe that thier grass clipping, hedge trimmings, etc. disappear magically when blown over on our rocks. No so! The yard trash builds up and makes our yard look unkept. One neighbor mows late at night which is OK but I never get to talk to them about the grass clippings blown on our property (they mow without a grass catcher) and the neighbor on the other side has a yard man who doesn't speak English so trying to get him to understand he's making a mess on our rock by blowing the leaves and debris our way is useless. I guess there is more important things to worry about but my husband and I are in our 60's and can't get around very well any more and the whole idea for the rocked front yard was to eliminate maintanance but it is only worse. Besides that anyone walking by seems to think rocks means it's a trash can and dog potty and throw everything you can imagine. Yes, everything, the kids use our property as a playground, hitting the house, garage door with the football & skateboards. Help!

Our neighbors at the last home where we lived (in PA) would not cut back their ornamental grasses - these were very large/tall grasses that tended to blow all over the place in windy weather. Most of the dead grass ended up in OUR yard and in the drains on our street. We'd spend early spring days raking up HIS ornamental grass and having to get rid of it. One time we got an apology (Oh, I'm sorry for the mess), but he never DID anything to help ... like cut back his grasses or offer to help rake it up out of OUR yard. What a putz. This was just one example of bad behavior from these neighbors. The list is long, but you only asked about landscaping issues!!! HA

They do NOTHING!

The dandelions were almost knee-high, until I hacked off the tops before the flowers could turn into seeds. They won't even notice I was in their yard! They moved in more than three years ago and haven't pulled out the dead shrubs at the mailbox. Haven't trimmed the hedge. I could probably do all that and they wouldn't notice! Why buy a house if you aren't going to take care of it?

Motion sensitive security lights. my neighbors turn on every time the wind blows a leaf or some snow across the yard. The lights are so bright ( and so misdirected) that i can read in my bedroom at night without turning on the light on my night stand. I have spoken to her numberous times but she never corrects the problem. All I get are excuses about "that's the way they work" and "that's how the man that put them up set them up".

My neighbors planted bamboo all along our share fence. It is now coming up all over OUR backyard. If we pull it up, more than one shoot comes up in it's place. The also planted wisteria vines along the cast iron fence we paid for. The had lumber delivered 5 years ago so they could build a deck. It is still on the side of their house by ours. We are now getting roaches and black widow spiders that love that damp environment. The also have a broken paddle boat leaning against our fence and it has a huge well in it that fills up with water and is never emptied. The mosquitos are horrible unless I go over there once a month and drop a mosquito tab in it. They recently saw me in there yard doing that and their adult son came over and yelled at my husband to keep me in my own yard. Unbelievable. We are fed up.

They park their vehicles in the front yard, up to the living room windows, turning the entire tiny front yard into dirt. They could easily park on the street. We live in a nice, well groomed middle class neighborhood. There are no other homes in such a sloppy mess. Also, on the side yard next to the street is graffitti on their tree which their son spray-painted a figure. It's been that way for months. I'm considering going in the middle of the night with shades of gray paint and getting rid of it!!! Our neighborhood has an association to which we pay into. I've called them and they said they can't do anything about it! Well, guess who is not paying association dues this year, LOL.

Our neighbors to the south have let their English laurel, an invasive species, grow 3 stories high. Our south-facing roof is growing moss!

Alexandria, Va:my nieghbors have duck tape holding thier shutters together and the house has had no outdoor mainence in yeras. The trim is rotten and bushes have grown so large getting a car in the garage would be impossible. However, they have two new cars sitting in the street! They have the adacity to question why the nieghbors down the street did not sell for 850K....DUH!

My neighbor likes to put geese decoys in his front yard, and hang owls from his front porch. We've seen geese land in his lawn before! Not sure why he does that. Understand this is a NICE neighborhood we live in...

We've got the neighbor from Hell, he's a retired old fart with nothing to do but annoy everyone in the neighborhood. He starts at around 6 am most days, no later than 7. he's out there with his leaf blower blowing off the sidewalks and driveway. then in the spring and summer months he mows for what seems like hours, we have equal size yards and I can mow and bag mine and be done drinking Iceed tea and he is still out there going at it. I've had back surgery so I go slow, but he is rediculass. I have watched him go over the same spots several times. I think he just likes to annoy the neighbors on the otherside (they have had a fued going for a long time) they take turns calling the cops on each other. everyone in the neighborhood has to suffer because of this crap.

All the light pollution. The whole house lights up like a space ship after dark. Shines in our living room and bedrooms, even with the blinds closed. Miss the days when the stars and moon lit the night instead of landscape lighting.

I have beautiful, non-invasive Hawaiian Gold bamboo in my back yard, and my neighbor hates when it gets too tall because he's concerned it will hurt the power lines in some way. When I am not home, he comes over and cuts my bamboo at a very unnatural height (approx 6' tall) and leaves the trimmings all over my yard. I have never given him permission to do this, and even after I put a pad lock on my fence, he is able to trim it using a ladder and reaching over my security fence. If I can catch him, I'll report him, but until then, I guess I have to deal with it.

My neighbor is constantly getting notices from the city to keep his property clean and cut, but he doesn't. His house and property on the block is the only one that is not kep clear of debris. It annoys me and his next door neighbors that there is a lack of enforcement when dealing with those types of situations.

People who choose to spend all their leisure time or lots of extra cash on something as trivial as their lawn... and then complain when their neighbors don't choose to follow them in this wasteful excercise.

I clean up after my dog (don't want to spread disease)

I mow my lawn once a week (fire hazard kept down)

I make sure the lawn and "weeds" don't enroach on the sidewalk by edgeing occaisionally and pulling the ones trying to grow in the cracks.

THAT's IT!

I don't use round up, or other chemicals on my lawn.

I don't spend my hard earned money on a "lawn service"

I don't spend my leisure time pulling weeds all day.

My lawn is full of dandelions, and various other "weeds". one persons weed is another's pretty flower.

Our neighbors put Astroturf on their concrete driveway. Weird. And it stinks when it gets wet.

They were elderly, and when the wife died, the husband was taken in by family and the house was abandoned. We have fought rats and the risk of arson ever since (five or six years). Only by pestering the city repeatedly were we able to get the grass/weeds over there cut a couple of times a year.

The ultimate resolution: After being abandoned for so long with no property taxes paid, ownership transferred to the county. I petitioned the county Land Bank to take ownership of the property and demolish the house, which was beyond rehabbing by this time. They agreed, and they're mowing the yard on a regular basis while arrangements are made for demolition.

Once demolition is complete, they will be selling us the lot for $100, which will double our lot size. Yay!

We've lived in our home for 15 yrs. The first incident happened the first evening we moved in. The crazy lady next door decided she didn't like the shrubs that were between our lots so she cut the last 5 down to knee high length (down from 7 feet). She blows as much debris as she can over into our yard and in front of our driveway. She has poured swimming pool chemicals on my hydrangeas killing them. She drove her car into our privacy fence breaking the same 2 posts 3-4 times each. We replaced the same 4 sprinklers 13 times in one summer. She would drive off her driveway and gun it winding up 8 feet over onto our property, crushing our sprinklers. We've even been outside when she's done it and she would drive off. When confronted, she would say "oh, some worker must've done it." Finally, she started calling the police on us claiming various things that we were doing to her and her property. The sheriff's office told us she called 23 times in a 6 month period and that unfortunately, it wasn't against the law to be mentally unstable. They suggested we erect security cameras just to protect ourselves from her claims that we were "trimming her shrubs", "cutting her flowers", "screaming at her", etc. When she tried to lie about throwing her dog's poop onto our property, the deputy told her we had her on video and this angered her more. She then started driving to the front of our property throwing Round-Up on our lawn. We now have cameras all around the perimeter of our property. She will purposely drop her dogs' leashes so they run up to our house which she believes is her right to come up to our house as well as around our vehicles. The police say they cannot arrest her for tresspassing unless they catch her on the property, that the video evidence is not enough. She cusses us, flips us off, etc. The police have been sympathetic with us and tell us not to let her "run us off our own property" and that to keep in mind that she won't live forever---she is 65 yrs old with nothing better to do. I ignore her as much as possible and if she is home and outside (90% of the time), I stay indoors. Thank goodness I'm 20 yrs younger than her, but boy, I learned very quickly that you can't reason with someone who is mentally ill. By the way, the sad part about it is, she works at a nursing home 3 days a week. Now that's scary!

Kills everything. RoundUp, bug zappers, insecticide. Pollutes nearly daily with some kind of mower, blower etc. And they live in a completely rural setting.

I'm surrounded!!! My back yard is large enough that I have two back neighbors. One has lived there for as long as we have (almost 30 years). Sadly, he has a drinking problem & definitely needs anger management! For most of these years he screams & yells at the top of his lungs at whoever may be living with him at the time. This yelling goes on for hours...day or night...well into the hours of 2-3a.m.. He also plays his music so loud that it literally vibrates our house (same time frame). His loud music playing is being done most of the time to P off his neighbor (he told us this)...which is our other back yard neighbor. I'm assuming they (in retaliation) have weekly karaoke nights (using microphones) loud singing until 1-2am. They call the police on one another but it still continues. My previous neighbor to the left of us had an animal phobia so built a brick wall surrounding her house. She wanted to build it all the way into our back yard but we said no to that . When we were away she had it built in the front portion of the yard. She had a phobia of wild animals (possums & raccoons) getting into her yard so she would place dozens of gallon jugs of water on top of the walls thinking this would keep them out. I would chuckle when I saw a possum sitting in the middle of the jugs of water. It was such an eyesore! They had to more due to foreclosure & new owners have moved in & so far, keeping my fingers crossed, they have been nice neighbors so far.

Now...the neighbor to the right of us is driving me crazy! They know that our bedroom backs up to their side yard & the husband will go out there at all sorts of odd hours sweeping, shoveling, talking loud to his dog & all sorts of activies. Meanwhile, he turns on the "flood light" which lights up our entire bedroom. I hung darker curtains hoping to not see the light but it still comes through. It looks like I'm going to have to get black curtains. Until recently his daughter was living with them...she would scream & talk so loud that I had to close my windows to try & filter out some of the noise. The father was just as bad with talking so loud as if it was normal waking hours. I really enjoy having the windows open to get the fresh air & many nights I have to close them to filter out the noise. I work 6 days a week & have to be at work @ 7:00am & I'm constantly losing sleep because of them. All this is an apparent lack of consideration for their neighbors but what he does that toast my cookies the most is mowing, wacking and edging his front lawn at least 2 times a week and then blowing it all onto my side of the sidwalk. Then adding insult to injury he hoses it all down onto my side. It drives my crazy!!! I don't understand how he can think this is okay to do. I know he's capable of sweeping, especially with all the shoveling & sweeping he does on the side yard. I took a picture recently & showed it to my co-workers & they were blown away by the amount of dirt & depris that he blew & washed onto my side. I've wanted to sweep it back onto his side but would I be any better of a person to do so? No...so what do I do? I recently injured my shoulder (rotor cuff) so I'm not able to sweep & my husband is in his mid 60's & shouldn't have to sweep up our neighbor's mess. So frustrated!!!

I have a neighbor(s) that have beautiful lawns but make a habit to walk their dogs down to mine and my neighbor's yards so they will pee or poop there instead of on their own yard. Yes, they do try to clean it up, but this really makes me mad (at the owner, not the dog). I have even been sprinkling a natural deterrent on our grass, but doesn't seem to be working.

the neighbor that meets up to our back property put up a chain link fence to sepperate the two about 10 years ago. since then, it has rusted and she has allowed vines and weeds to take over. this past spring i sprayed weed killer on the fence in attempt to help with the eye sore. a couple months later, on her yearly walk off of the property, she noticed and flipped. seperating our properties is about 75 yards of dense woods. we cant even see one another's houses. since then, she has been dumping food scraps, broked glass, landscaping timbers, dead plants and cat litter.... yes cat litter!!! she literally walks 125yds up hill to dump her trash.

My retired, elderly neighbor is constantly at my door or trying to catch me on my way out to complain. I work from home and this makes things so much more difficult, to have to be rude to a little old woman. The week I moved in, she complained the trees in my front yard needed to be trimmed. Then it was the grass, then it was the others trees, after living in my oregon home for a year and a half, i thought I'd won the battle by completly redoing the frontyard. Now she is on my case about the back yard! And she had the gall to show up at my door with a bill for seven hundred dollars, saying that was my half due at the end of the month for a new fence between our properties. I politely let her in my house and showed her how many inside projects I'd been up too and that I had no money this year for more projects. I'm worried she will sue me, so I asked her for more time before putting up a fence or to see if she would consider using other materials or let me look for a different quote. she says I can pay her back over time but she's doing the fence the way SHE wants it. What can I do?! Somebody please help! I feel bullied.

Wow...I never knew there were so many annoying neighbors and habits! Our young neighbors moved in a couple of years ago--and recently cut down all the trees on one side of their swimming pool--the ones that provided a screen between our two properties and lent shade to my yard! One tree was especially beautiful--a tall evergreen that must have been 50 years old. And they did this while we were out of town. Most people didn't even know there was a house next to us--but now......it's a brutal afternoon sun that beats down on our house. It was especially hot this past month with temperatures over 100 degrees! We now have to get window shades for that side of the house and this fall, plant plenty of trees for privacy. This is also in a older neighborhood known for its stately trees. What were they thinking?

Our neighbor planted trees so close to our fence that they are destroying the fence. He also put a drainage system so that when it rains, all the water runs into our yard. He tries to hide the drainage pipes but we know they are there. He built a crappy shed and put it right against the fence. The city told him he couldn't do it but he told them he was going to do it anyway, which he did so we view a decaying shed whenever we are in the yard. He also built his house on a higher elevation so when in rains, all his water is in our yard.

We have an above the ground pool and his trees have gotten so big that we are getting biting ants in our pool from these trees.

He mows his lawn and doesn't rake the clippings which blows into our yard.

Nice guy but went "nuts" planting trees!! I don't think he planned on them trees getting big.

My neighbor chose not to be our friend anymore after they acrued everything they wanted from us for ten years and used us for free board.
and accuring horse show saddle at 1500 dollars and bridle at 300 dollars and free board for 2 horses at 400 dollars for 10 years and they pulled us into their I am broke and have no money after buying land from us. So we gave them a 2900 dollar run in for the cows they kept on our property and did not pay board for them either. They were given a 850 dollar shed to store tack. They were suppose to work off 400 dollar board and did not. After they got what they wanted ( which is a lot more etc.) they quit talking to us and refused to return our farm implaments . I had to get a lawyer to have them returned. It was like when we had no more money they wanted nothing to do with us. Now they are harrassing us by using our pasture fence as part of they pen for there cow. They have put up posted signs and privot drive signs and a no tresspassing sign on the easement and a put a camera on a telephone pole pointed towards out property. They could put that down the easement watching for trafic with out watching our property. What is the law about using our property line fence for making a pen for his animals and can this be harrassment.

Blowing stuff. Blowing stuff ruins the enjoyment of naps, breakfasts, the rare chance to read on the patio, and intensifies suffering from migraines and illnesses of all kinds. Blowing stuff disturbs people for great distances.

Far too many of our neighbors blow stuff. Seems to be a hobby with husbands to wander along blasting surfaces with a massive hose. Stench, dust and the infernal droning racket drifts through our windows, sometimes for hours.Tranquil summer mornings, holidays, dinner time - doesn't matter. Any time is a good time to create stench and clouds of top soil, fertilizer and dried rodent feces.

I've walked over and asked every one of my neighbors, or their landscapers, to PLEASE, STOP BLOWING NOW. It might make them mad at first, but I believe they have become more conscious of the intrusion they cause, and there is less blowing in our neighborhood because of it.

On

The house I live in the second floor apartment in was sold. My new landlords planted tomatoes in the front yard, in between hedges. After awhile, they ripped out the hedges, leaving just the tomatoes in the front yard. It also takes them forever to weed or clean up trash that blows into the yard.

My neighbor attached a long tube to her sump pump which dumped all of her water in our backyard. After my husband asked her to move it THREE times, she and her boyfriend started a big argument with him. I heard the comotion inside of my house and went outside to see what was going on. Her boyfriend, who just moved in, tried to tell us where the property line was. Not sure where he got that information from :)

She ended up having the tube buried underground and the water draining to her driveway. However, I was done with them. We had a survey done and a fence put up within a month.

To everyone that complains about their neighbors leaves blowing onto their property (which they then in turn have to clean-up with no assistance), I have to say "BE HAPPY THAT THERE ARE TREES THAT HAVE LEAVES TO FALL"!! As we all learned in school (at least I did), plants are essential to our existance and survival due to the oxygen/carbon dioxide exchanges. Unfortunately, wind falls under the category and is an "act of God". The neighbor's don't control which direction the wind comes from and ultimately all the loose items (chairs, leaves, trampolines) that it sends on their merry little way. We don't mow up our leaves until they have all fallen from our trees. We are on the east side of our subdivision so not only get our neighbor's leaves but just the wind tunnel effect brings even more. Not one time have I or my husband EVER complained about having to "clean-up" our neighbor's leaves. Not to mention the fact that in the fall their are SO many leaves falling, good luck figuring out whose leaves belong to whom. If it is that big of a concern, put up a small picket fence around your yard, a snow-drift fence, or better yet, move into a vinyl village with small trees that will die in a couple of years anyway. Visit the Arbor Day website to get an understanding of the importance of our ecological system in relation to trees (and their leaves)!

Source: http://www.arborday.org/trees/index-b...

Touching about Arbor Day and all, and yes...one thing if leaves are a commonly shared nuisance ("A" blows around with "B" and "C" ad infinitum), where everybody's in the same boat with "commingled" leaves AND routinely deals with them it's petty to argue.

We live on a big corner lot in a foresty part of a Pacific NW urban town; across from us lives a guy with his own huge trees. Most people in the area, aware of their surroundings, about once per week during Fall get up a good accumulation regardless of how it got there, and watch it build the next layer until all leaves are gone.

But the guy across? EVERY year? He never touches them, lets the wind blow them into our yard completely, and if it's rained, he'll actually bring out a blower and blow every stinking leaf to our curb and over! Neighbors say since he has a minor non-faculty State University job he's a "feather in the area home values cap"(?), and say my wife and I are the bad guys for daring to criticize him...he has a family of five including two teenagers to boot, all able-bodied, but how can THEY be expected to get anything done?

With grinders and vaccums and mowers, to get his zillions-per-day little pink leaves up alone can take up to two hours! When I grumbled again this year, on "strength" of his position he went to the local USPS station and had them halt our mail...on USPS agent statement he'd called our home an abandoned mail-drop due to so many pink leaves piled up in our drive, lawn, and walkway! Pointing out such plants with such leaves don't exist on our property but do on his, and USPS seeing that, they backed off.

The jerk doesn't make enough to be worth suing, and we've been fortunate enough to be able to move. But this extreme case shows that some folks will even include leaves for the practice of bullying, expressing envy, or whatever else is twisting their noggin, transcending the value of the thing employed.

For the sake of plain old gossip, it's kinda fun to hear what annoying things that neighbors do. And I could certainly make my own list of grievances. However, as a previous answerer said, he didn't think Angie's List was the place for people to report 'neighbor rage'. (OK. That's an indirect quote.) Someone then responded that as a newby it was helpful to know how to avoid annoying neighbors. Both points are well taken. BUT (y'all knew that that there's always a 'but') I'm more interested in how to resolve these issues in a what I hope would be a considerate, as well as effective, manner. If there is such a site on Angie's List, please let me know where to find it.

Great food for thought, Confused. Given the flurry of activity on this topic, I'll certainly pass this on to our editorial staff. Tips on polite and effective conflict resolution with annoying neighbors might make a good story, or series of stories.

my neighbor put my newpaper in my mailbox (along with all the mud stuck on the wrapper) she told me there was a bond in the neighborhood and it had to be picked up or in the box by 9...she's early 70's and a yard nazi
she obsesses over her yard. its PERFECT and she only likes WHITE flowers so when i planted yellow mums on my property she rips the petals up and sprinkles them on the mud. she tells me i don't water enough and likes to get stuff for free. she stole the property marker after i paid to have a survey done, she dumps leaves over the fence, and she is constantly Watching us. that is the creepiest. she used to come over all the time and complain. once she said she when in the newly added kitchen of our home while we were gone! Now she calls the neighborhood security patrol EVERY time i come in my yard..i told them that was stalking so they quit and another neighbor started circling my cove. she calls the city every chance she gets but its always useless. she wants for me to so badly do something illegal so she can "get" me
my tires have been slit, she's put splintered wood with nails in the cove
and she acts so nice you would never believe she does this she is a Con artist. she has also stolen the balloons off my mailbox twice

I was just out in the backyard today. And noticed one of the neighbor's daughters at the corner of our yard. She had two pails or something, she dumped something out of them either in the field behind the houses or right by the fence. Thing is they have their own yard she could of just went back and dumped it behind their house. They also have the whole yard of the house that was next door to them that burned down. But yet they have to dump stuff behind our yard. If they've done it once they've probably been doing it all the time, just first time I've seen them.

Great question, no wonder there are so many replies.

My neighbor likes to throw bread and other food scraps into the yard. It's no so much to feed animals as it is to help nurish the yard. But the problem is that it does attract animals and his yard still looks very bad.

"Proper composting is a cost effective way to help maintain the yard. But be mindful of where you compost pile is located and how it may affect your neighbor."

That being said, it does it up being more of an eye sore than anything.

Other than that, simply not watering the lawn during summer and letting it die and not killing the weeds drives me crazy. It's no wonder the moles and grubs like my yard. It's nice and soft and full of nutriants.

Source: 

They have big tv in the garage , they watch the sports, they have lots of people over,all the time. The guy that lives there can be helpful at times but he is like to know about everything' and every body and what they are doing.be a good person, but don,t be so up in someone else life.

A neighbor one side , does nothing but mow his lawn when its needed, doesnt water or fertlize, and his lawn looks good! we fuss over ours and its just okay! whats up with that?

I had it good for years, and should of counted my blessings. Now, I have a very loud person in the house behind me. He can't seem to talk unless its at shouting volume, and to make it worse, that house has a covered patio that amplifies everything. The previous owner was as quiet as I could of hoped for, seems so long ago. The first thing this new person did was cut the only tree on that property down. Not one tree now. Now two years later, they have it in for my tree, that grows near the fence and had chopped it back as if a laser beam up from the top of the fence had shaved any twig off that was growing over. This happens when I am not around or at some early hour, not one word to me about it being a problem. I don't understand how someone can be so underhanded about something as good as a tree. This neighborhood has always been lacking in trees, its so hot in the summer, I just don't understand why someone would think they were bad things.
I know its in their rights to do this, but they do it in such a bad way, chopping indiscrimanently not at a branching point. I need to pay someone now to try and trim it right, and get it away from the fence.
Next door on one side decided about 5 years ago to just let everything die in the yard, and only cleans up all the dead leaves and trash every year or so. Can't understand why they will let it all fall apart, and yet just got a 3rd! satellite dish, this one has 3 receivers on it too! Priorities.
Now on the other side, is the guy that washes his truck 3 times a week and has a mow and blow come in once a week. I can always look forward to a lot of dirt and dead leaves to suddenly appear all over my sidewalk and under my hedges. Such good workers...I hate leaf blowers. They love to use them and the hedge trimmer. Every single plant has been carved into a little round ball. Awful!

I can totally relate as I have had the exact same problem with neighbor. I actually caught him in the act 6:00am one morning blowing his leaves onto my side of the frontyard. I ran out and shouted at him, hoping to draw attention to what he was doing..(witnesses help!) The unruly neighbor then carried & dropped an armload of leaves near my front porch. This guy is 6' 7" tall and he verbally threatened me. I told him I was calling the police and I did. The officer had been out before on related issues but when they don't get there in time to actually see for themselves, it's a gray area for the police. The officer called his bluff and played out the consequences of the outcome. The neighbor agreed to remove his leaves. I had just raked my yard about 3 days before, having only a few fallen leaves and the officer noticed he didn't have a single leaf in his yard and he had done the same with the elderly neighbor on the opposite side. The best advice the officers gave me was "Fences Make Good Neighbors." I have put up a fence since and it also serves 3 purposes: !. Eliminating their trash from constantly blowing in my yard. 2. Driving his vehicle/trailer on my property. 3. His kids from playing ball in my front yard. (yes, on the lawn) and of course, the leaf thing never happened again. You can also install hidden bullet cams to catch neighbor in-the-act for police. In the last 3 years, I have mowed and mulched leaves and he took notice and did the same thing. He was angry about the fence and pulled up stakes, rebar, etc, to mark the post & outline. Finally used spray paint - he wouldn't be pulling that up anytime soon. Hope this info helps.
Sheila

I have a neighbor who seems to either be mowing their lawn, using (loud) weed wackers, getting their carpets cleaned, etc etc. All noisy activites at least 4 or 5 days a week. They use to start at 7am or 8am but they now start closer to 10am. I am a college student and I do a lot of homework at home. It is so distracting....I love it when they just leave the house for the whole day or when they go on vacation. Pretty much every time I talk to them I tell them to go on vacation just so I can get a little peace and quiet to write yet another essay. I've started to do more and more homework at both of my jobs. Customers and the music that always is playing is more quiet than their noise. I have such a headache right now from trying to write an essay (it's only three pages long, I usually write at least five pages) while they are having something yet cleaned inside their house. Although what else they could be having done is beyond me. They have a young child who I babysit as often as possible. Their kid goes to bed at about 8pm every night and they never get home before midnight. I get four hours every time I babysit for them to do homework at their house that they pay be to do and then when I go home after that, they are usually just in bed and I get all night to play catch up on homework.

The use of yard machines on Sunday and on Saturday afternoon is a downer for professionals who have one day of peace and quiet before the work week begins again. We understand that everyone has a hectic schedule. We do our mowing, blowing, and whacking at times that are not Sunday or Saturday afternoon. We wish all our neighbors did the same so that Sunday lunch on the terrace or Saturday afternoon on the deck were not ruined by loud noise beyond our property line.

My neighbors have beautiful lawns. One is obsessive about loud lawn equipment. usually just before or right at dawn the blower, mower, etc will start. including weekends.

I think there should be a ban on loud lawn equipment before 8am!

I love my neighbor except when he decides to do his own landscaping after my professional landscapers leave.
it takes him hours to cut his grass (and its only a 2 x 4 area because most of his backyard is concrete from his patio).
the worst part he has electric blowers and edgers that just "wiiiiiiiiiine.
it is just the most annoying noise in the world. He continues to blow everything under my fences, just to avoid picking it up and bagging it like the rest of us do.

I have a neighbor who is very lazy and hates to mow his yard and kill off his daneloins that are always coming into my yard. I have asked him why he only mowes 3 times a year and his reply is that he doesn't like to mow. I solved my issue at least with the danelions. When he leaves for work, I hook up the hose and spray his yard with Scotts Weed & feed! We have a chain link fence so it's easy to do what I want. Yes I buy it and I use it on his yard, and only the liquid because he can't see it. This has now solved my issue with the danelions! He hasn't said anything about not having any more weeds. I know this is a little extreme but hey it works. I have done this for the past 2 years.

We have had more issues with the yards of abandoned houses than those of actual neighbors. The house next door to us was abandoned for several years, and the grass was never cut by the city unless we all complained loudly enough.

The good thing is that they house eventually was torn down and I was able to buy the very nice lot to combine with mine for a mere $100. I've now put up a privacy fence and it's awesome!

Just a note to the person whose post is right above mine: There are health issues in my family that would be very negatively impacted by someone spraying chemicals on my grass. Shame on you for what you're doing to your neighbor's yard.

Wow, Guest 987etc. You have some nerve! Does your neighbor with the life-threatening dandelions have any pets or children? Did you know that Weed & Feed products contain carcinogens like dioxin, 2,4-D (close cousin of Agent Orange) and endocrine disruptors? The disease rates (childhood soft tissue cancers, lymphoma, breast and prostate cancers, Parkinson's Disease) among people with chemically treated lawns is much higher than among those who don't treat their lawns. Their pets develop cancers, too. Don't think Round-up (aka glyphosate) is any safer; a growing body of studies links it strongly with cancers, birth defects, infertility, etc.

If you wonder why such toxic products are on sale in any hardware store--look at cigarettes. Meanwhile, as long as Monsanto et al are so well represented in the FDA and Ag Dept., and pay so much for congressional campaigns, the info remains in the shadows.

Oh, all parts of dandelions are edible and really good for the kidneys and liver; the plants also promote soil health.

When our neighbor moved in he killed all of the grass up to our driveway and resodded everything except the last 18 inches which is actually our yard. Never said a word to us, never asked if we would like to pay for our 18 inches, just killed it and moved on. He waters his lovely grass, every night, apparently doesn't care about water restricitions and when he sprays weed killer he gets its yellow mist all over my white car. We have tried to talk to him but he refuses to answer the door or walks away.

I have lived in my home for almost 10 years. The living areas are on the south side of the house. The neighbor to the south of us moved in maybe 2 years ago or almost 2 years ago. For the first 10 months I really didn't even pay them too much attention besides the initial hello introduction when they first moved in of course. It was originally the guy and his fiance, which they have since gotten married. Now they have the brother living with them too. About 6 months ago my bf and I were invited over to a party at their house. My bf and the guys sort of hit it off, me and the wife for some reason didnt get a chance to chat very much. Over the course of 3 months they came over and helped my daughter with her project, the wife encouraged her to pick the viola as her instrument for school (which she did), they also came over to hang out in our front and back yards and we in turn have been to a handful of their parties. They are the same age as me. In December I had to kick my bf out for good which really the neighbors knew was going to happen since October and kept on asking me when I was going to. I went to their new years eve party and I thought it went great. But all of suddent they are giving me AND my daughter the cold shoulder. My daughter is especially effected by this as we dont have any family near us and being around them was something she looked forward to. It baffles me and urks me that these neighbors can be so hot and cold for really no apparent reason.

Using bright blue tarps for anything outdoors - just looks terrible. Same for boats and trailers and so forth parked permanently in front yards on on the street. And, year round Christmas lights left up - even if not lit.

Your yard need not be perfect, but things like above really make a neighborhood look bad.

After reading all these posts for the last 30 minutes, I am amazed at people. So petty. I do not like my neighbor burning because the ash gets all over my screened in porch but he is such a good neighbor, I have not the heart to tell him not to burn. I am just so grateful to have friendly but private neighbors in our quiet, simple and non-ostentatious neighborhood. Live and let live I say. We have large trees and lots of shade. It gets hot here in NC so that really helps. Yes, I have an enormous amount of leaves that fall from October until at least January or February and pollen in March and April. All my neighbors that are across the street and next to me are wonderful people. I am really grateful so what little might annoy me I overlook and hope they do the same. Lived here for 12 years and no arguments. Very grateful.

Hack up and top their trees. Over pruning, bad bad pruining of beautiful trees. Once it's done, the tree is as good as ruined. It will never be the same. It makes me think of someone needing surgery and instead of seeking out a trained surgeon so they will properly heal, they try to do it themselves. That 's how it seems with those trees. The results are about the same. It is not that hard to learn about proper pruning .

We live in a rather rural country setting. My neighbor's next door to me have about a 5 acre lot, ours is about 2 acres. Even though they have a large parcel of land for some reason they chose to put their burn pile right next to our property line. Their house is located a ways up the drive from that location. However, my house is located approximately 200 yards or so away from the very spot that they do their 'burning' every year! There's just no excuse for it. I hate to say anything to them because the wife and I are pretty good friends and I really don't want to spoil that. Still, you'd think with all the property they have to burn on they could have chosen a different spot than the one they did to burn their brush, etc. This has been going on for over 10 years now. Maybe they just don't realize the discomfort it can cause depending on which way the breeze is blowing on any particular day. But you'd think they'd have a little more consideration than they do. I realize a simply remark to the wife might be just the thing to change the problem. On the other hand, we moved into this house after having severe problems with some horrible neighbors at the last home we moved from (which we also owned, and the neighbors were just renters). I had horrible problems with them. I'd like to preserve the friendship we have with our current neighbors, so we just bite the bullet every spring during burn season, and hope the wind blows in the opposite direction! It's terribly annoying though. The smell, the ash, all of it! Do people just not THINK??

We have a neighbor who does not believe in drapes or any kind of privacy, this ongoing issue is forcing us to spend a lot of money of privacy landscaping etc. Now as an added bonus they put up a fence that is very unattractive andthey build it on their property about 2 to 3 feet in meaning that we cannot put any scrubbery along the fence unless its that distance away from their fence. We have pointed that out and were told....dont worry about it, if we ever sell the house we let the new owners deal with that problem. Now we have a walkway between our homes but they do not want to use their property as the grass is nice so they use our site to do all their washing of windows, cleaning things or whatever. Yesterday my hubby saw a large pool of water that the neighbor was using to clean some garden equipment...he finally spoke up and said...dude your flooding our basement. We have hired a landscaping company to put in an interlocking patio and walkway along with trees high enough to make our area private, neighbor does not like it so spoke to the landscaping company to advise that he would have no choice then to damage all this work as he has to pull his lawnmower etc past the newly beautiful and pricey landscaping, he cannot use his site of the property as it would damage his grass. Anyway, hope you get the jest of what we are dealing with and really do not know how to prevent this person (a police offer no less) to stop damaging our property. Any idea welcome!!!

Love my neighborhood. All good people, quite similar circumstances, ages, etc. There is always one though... Doesn't have to be the same one. But the profile is the same. Retired, obsessive, spends lots of time landscaping. Last decade was a different person, then she moved and eventually passed away. This decade is another. Similar situation. She is the self appointed yard police. Would come over with complaints about how tall my grass is, how I much I should trim my hedge, even how to do it. All the other times I would politely say 'you are welcome to do it'! This last time, coming up to me while I was trimming the hedge to tell me how to do it, I just turned around, handed her the trimmer, pulled my gloves off and smiling, thanked her for her thoughfulness in correcting my hedge, while walking away.

That was four years ago. The entire street heard about it too - they all had a laugh! Hasn't happened since. Needless to say, I never see her in the impromtu neighbors get togethers.

My neighbor seems to think that their big blue trash receptacle is a lawn ornament! There it is...right out front...24/7/365.

Source: Me!

Top their trees!! monkey see monkey do seems to be the code in our neighborhood. Once beautiful trees are systematically ruined and eventually killed in some cases bringing the beauty of the nieghborhood down considerably

Entitlement issues... my neighbor(s) husband/wife just do whatever they want to my yard while I am at work. I planted decorative grasses, some wildflowers in spots, clover/groundcover in designated areas and some very expensive 'no mow' grass(you mow it once a year in late sept/oct when it goes to seed) and some mulch for the path through. She mowed my yard while I was working and cut everything down to the ground, and now I have very uneven ground gouged holes by her gas mower. I talked with her about it and she said those were weeds and I needed some help! She dug up a tree stump I used as a planter base because it was in her way & unnecessary, although it was on my property, and they seeded my ground with some generic grade grass(which is miserable looking and weedy). I had the city mark the underground lines and my sprinkler heads marked so I could have a small deck outside my kitchen and the husband asked what the marks were for & what was my intention. I told him...BIG MISTAKE. I work holidays, long hours and when I came home one Memorial day evening there was this large planter box full of rocks erected over my marks and over the property line. It just never stops... I had to get a surveyor(a second one) to mark the property lines again, additional expense, still don't have my deck & have contacted the city who cannot advise, of course, except to say 'good fences make good neighbors' and that I can fence the prop line-my fence is inside the prop line. Oh did I mention the real estate agent and the real estate attorney consulted in addtion to the deck builder, landscaper and other people I had to engage to have it moved. Also, we are in a water restricted area and they continue to mow their lawn very short every couple of days and wonder why it is so dry?? I could continue as there are many more incidents but this is long already.

I don't know what I ever did to these people but I wish they would move, they are miserable to deal with.

My neighbor allows his dog to roam the neighborhood. As dogs do, he has his favorite (and pretty consistent) places to poop. Unfortunately, one of them is on my driveway.

Living in a city with tight water regulation, which is necessary, still it's not necessary to just let a lawn turn into a dead brown mess and leave it that way.

If you deep water once every 15 days, that is all a lawn needs. There is no need for daily automatic watering.

Many people on our block don't bother to learn anything about gardening, leaving all the responsibility to gardeners. When they don't have a gardener, they do nothing at all. In this part of the country, no one does their own yard work. It's considered weird to do so. Well, we do our yard work, and gardeners themselves have actually complimented it.

The deliberate ignorance of people regarding their property is infuriating.

My neighbors are nice to speak with but they have no respcet for other peoples property. They park there car in front of my house and leave it there for a weeks. The car is generally parked partially on my lawn which makes it difficult to mow. Recently, they decided to spray paint a bunch of old bed frames on my lawn. They were about 6 feet in on my property line, not sure why they had to use mine when they have a .5 acre lot with amble free space to spray paint. Then they left the bed frames in my lawn all day to dry.

Not sure where to start. How about stole my sons cat and dumped him far from home. Luckly someone saw her do it and rescued and returned to animal shelter.. Then denied (of course) stealing and dumping the cat but took a stuffed cat and hung it in her window for us to see. It hung while we were doing yard work. If that wasn't enough sprayed our lawn with weed killer 3 separate times! Then acused my son of ruining their lawn. Stole a pair of my sons shoes and told everyone that she had to go out and buy him a pair because we were to poor to. This was announced at the homeowners association. The list goes on and on. Very scary person

It's not so much about their landscaping, although they don't follow the law, which says you must keep 100' of defensable space cleared around your house and they rarely do that which is a HUGE fire danger to all of us that live near this neighbor.

But WORSE THAN THAT, they let their big dogs outside everyday and leave for work and their dogs bark and bark and bark sometimes - it make me absolutely CRAZY!! And because of budget cuts in the local government here, Animal Control will NOT respond to any calls, you now have to write a complaint to them, and they "investigate" your complaint - as if that does me any good that day or every other day with the CONSTANT BARKING of these dogs!!! I HATE IT!! They should be fined at the very least, for disturbing the peace!

Source: My self!

my neighbor has junk all over his year. His back yard is what we look at out our windows and from our back yard and deck. In addition to looking bad I believe the buckets, etc. out there are mosquito breeders.

My neighbor installed a giant trampoline within a couple inches of our property line. Our houses all surround a small lake, and he apparently didn't want to block his own view--so he installed the trampoline as far as he could away from his house. Consequently it blocks our view instead of his!

urinates in his yard

Maybe I am not sensitive enough, maybe just lucky but generally my neighbors do not drive me crazy. It does seem that many people are just looking for a reason to go off but that is a miserable choice.

Usually no adults home and kids running amuck, smoking weed and out all hours making noise. Cops have been out many times and I have called them on occasion also. Wish they would move. Any suggestions, I know they are bringing down my property value and my peace of mind.

@the member who wrote that she found this string offensive and asked that it be taken down: I see your point that it has the potential to launch a stream of hate talk, but what if it is used in an earnest way? I cannot speak for the original poster's intentions, but I have been looking for a good anonymous forum to ask for neighborly advice about dealing with neighbors because I am a first-time homeowner. my husband and I bought a fixer-upper on a city corner--a decision that has yeilded an intense all-absorbing venture of time, focus and money for over two years now. we are still going. I do nothing else. that's okay. I just mean to say that I am invested.

our property neighbors a large victorian on either side. one had been built out long ago and split into somewhere between eight and six condos--only one is owner occupied. while the building is not in great repair, this is completely acceptable in our city, which is a college town and requires many units for rent. besides, our house (still a single family) was in deplorable condition when we bought it. we never would have been able to afford a large home in this area otherwise.

the neighbor on our other side was also kept as a single family. on it's original lot. more or less, one of the biggest mansions with the most beautifully-kept grounds you can imagine. there was a football field of gorgeous garden between this lady's home and ours, letting in tons of light, privacy and quiet. it was ideal. and then, she passed away. she had no heirs. her property was estate liquidated to fund whatever cause she had left the rest of her great wealth to and a developer purchased the home and lot. he built the entire lot out into three single family sized condos, pulled down the gorgeous trees and grounds and added an enormous parking garage blocking all of the light and view we had for our bedroom and kitchen. he made these three homes into a gated community with a giant iron automated fence like you might see outside, for example, the home of a crime boss. in the third world.

he re-graded the whole property to drain into our (nonconforming, so their parking garage pretty much lines up with our foundation) lot. we had some words during this time, as he specifically promised me when he began that I would still have good light enough to grow trees when he was done... that did not happen. so, as a "gift" (his words) because all I can see after our big kitchen and master rennovation is the backside of a new construction parking lot, he planted 5 or 6 arborvitea next to the garage --right in front of the door to our house. so--there will be "green" per his promise. it is just not viewable to us other than as a fast growing wall that will block out the rest of the morning sun, just in case we wanted to leave the house to dodge the big shadow enveloping our home every morning.

in August the trees began growing cones. cones don't grow on arborvitae, but these trees were covered with them. Guess what? not cones. Bag worm. what some people I have showed refer to as "the single worst infestation they have ever seen...including photographs in books". I guess they were brought up from the south, or someplace where they are a bigger problem. but I have never seen them in this state, let alone the city. it turns out, the only way to kill them is hardcore toxic spray. regularly. outside my door. I reported the issue to his voice mail and email just in case he wasn't aware. have heard nothing.

now. what. do. I. do? by the way, the pride and joy of my very small yard is a corner of mature conifer. plus I am having more plantings installed this month as we start to tackle the exterior renovation. my request is sincere. I'm so mad that I'm almost afraid to approach the giant electronic gate of the "closed community" next door. the arborvitae are in the corner of the yard furthest away from where they would ever venture. my guess is that they won't care and that I will make a poor impression and burst into tears.

Fabulous swaths of velvety green lawn -- Middle class America's way of imitating the British aristocracy -- "I own all this land and I don't have to grow food on it"

Several decades ago when my sons were very little, we had a neighbor who kept his hunting dogs in an elevated cage out back. Whenever I got the boys down for a nap and got ready to enjoy a little peace, the dogs would start barking and wake up the babies. They never barked when the owner was at home, so he did not believe this was really a problem. My husband brought a high frequency noise generator home from his lab, and set it up in our garage, adjacent to the critter cage. It was plugged into a circuit controlled by a light switch in our kitchen. We would wait until his downstairs lights went off, bedroom light turned on, then off. We'd give him time to get to sleep, then flick the switch on. The dogs would bark up a storm, he'd storm out in his jammies and yell at them. Switch off. Wait until we thought he'd gotten back to sleep, then switch on, dogs barking again. This went on every night for about two weeks, then the dogs went bye-bye and did not return. Problem solved. LOL.

Source: Dixie, the SOB (Salty Old Broad)

Fabulous swaths of velvety green lawn -- Middle class America's way of imitating the British aristocracy -- "I own all this land and I don't have to grow food on it" --If you don't need the food yourself, grow some and donate it to a Food Bank or Soup Kitchen. There are a lot of hungry people around.

My best neighbor story -

Several decades ago when my sons were very little, we had a neighbor who kept his hunting dogs in an elevated cage out back. Whenever I got the boys down for a nap and got ready to enjoy a little peace, the dogs would start barking and wake up the babies. They never barked when the owner was at home, so he did not believe this was really a problem. My husband brought a high frequency noise generator home from his lab, and set it up in our garage, adjacent to the critter cage. It was plugged into a circuit controlled by a light switch in our kitchen. We would wait until his downstairs lights went off, bedroom light turned on, then off. We'd give him time to get to sleep, then flick the switch on. The dogs would bark up a storm, he'd storm out in his jammies and yell at them. Switch off. Wait until we thought he'd gotten back to sleep, then switch on, dogs barking again. This went on every night for about two weeks, then the dogs went bye-bye and did not return. Sleeping boys, happy mother. Problem solved. LOL.

Dixie, the SOB (Salty Old Broad)

My next door neighbor has a some sort of mental problem. Everyday in the summer she digs in her yard. She uses a line trimmer and has cut her grass down to the dirt. This causes dirt and grass to end up in my swimming pool. She has no plans to reseed the yard even though it's mid October. She thinks, from a conversation I had with her that she'll get better grass to grow next year. Really!!! I wonder if she plans on doing this to all the neighbors yards because she's just going to have the typical lawn we all have here. Dandelions, Creeping Charlie, Clover etc.

Recent refugee move-ins in our neighborhood are hacking up the beautiful trees in their yards with machetes. Sometimes it's just removing lower branches (although pine trees have been denuded up as much as 12 feet or more), but other times all branches are hacked off, leaving a 10-15-foot stub. Why can't they at least use hand saws? I feel so bad for the trees, and our neighborhood is starting to look like a disaster area. Why can't people who move into another culture look around and see the culture of the neighborhood? I asked one of them why, and they said that it's so they can get more sun to the ground so they can "farm" -- I understand this in the back yards, but why in the front? None of them are planting anything there! : (

Source: Plant Lover

Just found out that my neighbors have clandestine labs in their garages, this explains everything...need to move!

Source: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Our mailbox is across the street and on the same post as the neighbor across the street and the neighbors next to us. The neighbors next to us refuse to shovel the snow. We are supposed to share this duty, but they never did care for other's rights. I found out they had a key to my house the first winter we lived here when I caught him opening my door when he thought we were both at work. They love getting their mail in their van so they can park it in front of the mailboxes and go through our mail.

They refuse to shovel, preferring to drive over the snow and creating an icy mound that is too slippery to walk on. Does anyone have any idea what I can do? I would think they should have a legal obligation to help keep the area clear.

Allow their children to tromp all over our property no matter how many times we have requested them to stay on their side.

Said children always leave garbage on our lawn. I found quite a pile in the woods from them as well. Trash always blown against the chain link fence. Their trees they planted came through our fence and is lifting the chain link ruining it.

They don't keep their dogs hitched. I even offered to pay for a run for the dogs but they refused. So now I get to clean crap up off my yard and deal with them eating my garbage ect. One even came in and ate all my hens!

They enjoy cook outs which means they hang on the fence, sit with their chairs facing our yard and watch us and make a ton of racket. The parents sit in the cars in the morning to get the kids to school and rather than everyone walk out together they sit out there and honk HONK HOOOOOOOOOOONK until the kids come out. Our bedroom window is right next to their driveway.

This discussion is terrible; I can't believe there are more than 100 responses. It sounds like you all enjoy complaining about your neighbors.

Shame on you.

The owner of the house next door for some reason wants to do anything to piss me off. They rent the house out to a family that doesn't even pick up a newspaper that comes out once a week. Next to my driveway they have a sewer line that backs up from time to time and a clean out is righ between my drive and their house. The wife won't fix the line and left the clean out open more than once to keep the toilets etc from backing up in the house. I tried to get her to let me put a stepping stone over the opening so I wouldn't trip when comeig in and out when my car was in the drive. She was violateing a code by not covering the cleanout and created a healtsh code violation by leaving the plug on the cleanout open, I didn't file a complaint, being a good neighbor, and now I'm sorry I didn't because the last time I put a stone over her cleanout she got made and two weeks later had her husband put up a wood fence right on the property line. Now I can't park in the driveway because it's too hard to get in and out the car. I've been here since before she was born, her grandparents own the house and left it to her, and now I can't use the driveway. I'm at a loss as to why she dislikes me so much. This was the ultimate but there have been many things she's done to cause problems. I'm no longer the good neighbor as far as she goes.

We have a neighbor who loves the yard ornaments. He has 5-6 large statues of Venus pouring water from a bucket. There are at least 15 of the mirrored garden balls. He also has several concrete benches scattered randomly around the yard. It literally looks like a landscaping supply warehouse! Luckily, they keep the grass, bushes, ornamental plants and trees all trimmed and neat. They just love the yard art. It is sure a head-turner.

carolathome

For those who don't think this is an appropriate venue for these issues, chill out! It is obviously popular considering all the responses on here.

As for the issues being posted: they say good fences make good neighbors. If you don't like seeing the junk next door - put up a six foot wood fence. If you don't like his weeds encroaching on your yard, invest in Weed-B-Gone and drench it along the property line. If his trees' leaves fall in your yard, after you rake them all up, shove them into his yard for disposal. If you don't like the windchimes, for heaven's sake, go knock on their door and politely inform them that they are keeping you awake. Most people who have windchimes think they are enjoyable background noise, and would probably be horrified to know that they are annoying someone else.

I have young neighbors who are clueless to landscaping. They had never trimmed their bushes. The bushes are now growing into a plant that has vine that is growing up their front step. They have small bushes on each side of the walkway that blocks the front walkway. They planted all of these trees up against their fence not giving any space to grow. After 3 years of this, I complained. They trimmed 90% of it and leave it on the front lawn. It's been weeks since it's been there.

I have two neighbors that have trees in their backyard. I asked them to cut the branches they told me its my problem. So I am going to find out how to kill the trees. I couldn't use my backyard because of the berries and pieces of woods.

Its what they don't do. Like mow or pick up their dead trees or fix their falling down fence. I have contacted Code Enforcement for 8 years now....they keep reassuring me they will go in and fix it...nada.

My dopey neighbor and I have driveways right next to one another, he has just one old car, he used to have two. I call it an old car-no in fact it is a rusted unmoving thing with FOUR very flat tires and some oh so artistic cracks in the windshields. He stores rakes and other things in the remaining car. He has so much tarp and bedding-like things in it I am sure mice love it as a nice winter home. We have had a mouse in the house one time and Mom did not calm down for three months. Thank goodness for our cats!

Also we can't pull our car all the way in, so renting the end of our driveway is not going to happen.

The other "storage car" was removed by some charity or other when they re-did the garage- now they have a nice new gargage with a sound roof - instead of tarps. These tarps are now covering the pile of junk he moved OUT of the garage but can't give away yet.

Slowly the birds are ripping up the edges of the tarps for blue nest making material.

If he ever gets rid of the junk in the yard and the second storage car I will send his wife a bottle of champagne!

My next-door neighbor loves, loves, LOVES to burn any variety of wood in his fireplace. The wood ranges from the cheapest pine from shipping pallets to the nicest oak and maple. Ordinarily this wouldn't be something to complain about, but the air currents over his house to mine practically guarantees that the smoke from his chimney gets sucked down onto my house as long as his fireplace burns. I learned that my house is NOT AIRTIGHT. His smoke gets into my house and can aggravate my sinuses, allegies and asthmatic condition on weekdays and weekends.

I have a neighbor that waters three days a week whether it rains or not..we have offered to help her reset the timer but she says no worries I can afford it.....the good thing about this is we don't have to water the southside of our property we turn off two zones. One year, the system was on for two weeks or more..we were out of town for two weeks..we came back to a soggy spongy front yard.....luckily nothing drowned.....the temps were in the 100's...so that helped. We have had water restricitons for 6 years..and believe me we have the highest rates in Colorado.....

my neighbor occassionally doesn't pick up after their dogs poop and i have children. very irresponsible. i love animals but if u want to be a pig do it inside ur home not in front of my sidewalk or in my driveway easement.

I read a lot of these stories and looked at myself as a neighbor..and how can I improve. I think instead of pointing fingers at others , first look at ourselves. I think we are good neighbors, but there is always something we can work on to improve relations with our neighbors. Just sayin, be kind to others, sometimes your neighbors might need a helping hand.

Yowza! I read all the horror stories. It was like reading a B movie from Stephen King. I t amazes me what a person is capable of doing to another human being. I guess tha's why we are fortunate enough to have prisons, Some of these people need to get a life, take their meds or be sent to the loony bin. Yall shouldnt have to endure such idiocy. I am blessed. I finally live in a neighborhood where the children are polite, dog owners are respectful, and my neighbors are quiet and kind. But, trust me......I had to move to accomplish this. Life is too short to be miserable. DO SOMETHING! Anything. If the police won't help you then take it upon yourself to face this head on. Just try to stay inside the law and don't put yourself in harms way. Some of these people sound like they could get physically violent if the wind blows the wrong way. Someone who presents you with unwanted pacakages should have them returned. I wouldn't hesitate for a minute dumping someone's poop on their front steps. And these "blower" pigs? Blow it back. It's there's not yours. Good luck yall. If you decide not to move then you are gonna need it.

We have some neighbrs who have too much "statuary" in their front yard AND never pick up the free weekly newspaper--there are 3 in their yard right now!

Then, there is the one that took down and bunch of trees and promised to replant smaller ones 2 years ago, and has not done it.

The HOA landscpaing company owner that blocks access to my drive!

Leaf blower!!! it always seems just when I geta chance to relax and enjoy my yard he starts that dag thing up and usually for three hours. I really want to buy him a rake and leave on doorstep. would he get the hint?

We have an association as many homeowners do now, they are not too strict, but they do have bylaws and rules. I can't stand neighbors who do painting or landscaping upgrades without checking the bylaws and rules. For instance: Most all front yards are desert landscaped, meaning gravel, desert scrub and acacia trees. Our community requires a tan color for the gravel and this neighbor just laid about 3 cubic yards of red rock gravel. It stands out like a sore thumb - it's so ugly I do not understand what they were thinking.

My biggest pet peeve are neighbors three doors down who have no respect for others concerning noise - this neighbor has a Harley Davidson with open pipes. He does not just idle out at 7 am or when he comes home, he motors up through third gear rattling the windows. He also has a son that rides a mini dirt bike a breakneck speeds up and down out street, all hours of the day. It also has open pipes. I understand kids and their need to have fun - I used to be one; me and my friends had and old mini-bike, with the lawnmower engine and centrifugal clutch. But we always found a vacant lot or field somewhere to ride.

I think the worst is the neighbor caddy-corner from us who has about 4 cars in their front lawn, which isn't the nicest thing to look at on the planet. There are plusses and minuses to not living in a neighborhood with a housing association...and this is one of the minuses:(

Well, years ago, I trimmed all the limbs on my Holly tree from the ground up about 6'. I think it is cute, looks like a gum drop on a stick, and is healthy. Some neighbors might not like it, I have no clue, don't care. My 2 dogs get out a few times a year, not too many, and one of them likes to bug the neighbor dog and has stolen his treats. I have bought new treats and thrown over to him. Gosh, can be embarrassing, but we try! It is never the same spot they escape from. The breed digs and tracks so they can be a pain. I know we aren't perfect, but it is hard when the guy next door, who is so involved in his church, looks down his nose at you because you are toting in beer, stops inviting your children to his children's birthdays, and refuses to stand up for what he wants, but yells at us and the HOA when things don't go the way he wants. We got mail from their church inviting us to attend. We go to our own fabulous church, but we went anyway, twice, and I think they thought we were converted because they were friendly again for awhile. Then we sent them an invite from our church, not sure if they ever visited, didn't talk again for awhile after that. We recently moved and just found out the new owners are 2 men. I hope they have fabulous pool parties, Karma is awesome!

I have neighbors right across the street who let their kids scream for hours on end, stand around their driveway with their next door neighbor and drink beer, smoke, play loud music for hours. They let their kids go into the lot next to us and party and leave mounds of trash(it is private property, too) We have very short summers here, and treasure nice days. It's amazing to me that people just don't care how their actions affect others.

Then all winter both of them smoke us out with their wood stoves. They stink up half the neighborhood and know that there are children here with asthma(including their own), but they simply do not care. There's no getting away from them. We may end up taking a loss on our house and move.

Personally I don't care what people's yards look like as long as they aren't affecting us. We do have another neighbor whose yard looks like a dump, but other than eyesore, it doesn't bother us.

When my neighbor's kids hang off my trees or play in my yard, it totally annoys me! I want to say something, but I don't want to be a bad neighbor. I want to say something to the mostly absent parents without making enemies!

I made the mistake of purchasing a home that was attached. I should have saved up more money to purchase a detached but where I was living previously I wanted to move out right away. Well my first home has been a nightmare thus far. I think I live in the worst house on the block because I live next to the worst neighbors on the block. They blast their music with a high level of bass and I've complained several times and asked nicely if they could turn down their bass in their music. The houses on my block were built in the 1920 and of course did not take into account for the high tech music sysems of today. The wife said exactly, "You don't have the right to tell my husband to turn down the music." Ever since them, I don't have anything to do with them and I just report to 311 everytime they blast their music.

Their bass literally causes my home to vibrate. The pictures on my wall, furniture and everything else vibrates causing an annoying humm in my house. There were times I had to remove the pictures from the wall to stop them from banging up against the wall. I have been awoken plenty of times from an afternoon nap because if their music. I have put cotton balls in my ears when they began to hurt due to the bass shaking my home. I've also had headaches behind their music. I didn't want to move because my home is close to my job and very convenient to navigate without a car. I don't know how long I can live like this. My only consolation is that while I was looking for another home to move into their home came up for sale. My prayers have been answered!!!!! I want these inconsiderate people gone YESTERDAY!!!! I've contacted my agent who sold me this place and explained to her why I had to get out of here. I'm still looking to move because even when they sell, who knows what types of neighbors will move in next. They could be even worse and I'm too fed up now to wait around to find out! I never knew that my first home could be an absolute nightmare.

WOW! AFter reading these posts I'm gald we live where we do! We live on 4.75 wooded acres. ALL the homes around us are on a minimum of 2 wooded acres and none are fenced, so we each have plenty of privacy and get to enjoy the varied wildlife that come through, deer, turkey, foxes etc. The 8 or so homes on our street are all well maintained as are the lawns (our is approz .75 acres in front). Because we are all surrounded by woods and have extremly large front yard no one rakes leaves. All the leaves basically end up providing nutrients to the earthworms and the land itself as they break down over the winter. Everyone mows weekely during grass season and take pride in the appearance of their yard.

I was going to respond but after reading all these post, heck, my neighbors ain't all that bad. PTL!

As I said to one neighbor this past autumn - so many in our area use a landscaper, can someone please tell me: When did it become acceptable to "CLEAN" your property by simply "BLOWING" your sh*t onto MY property???

I just cannot believe the audacity of people today.

What? Because your landscaper does it, you are relieved of responsibility?

HELLO!! Moron! I can't afford a landscaper - I do it myself. And I don't need to clean my lawn AGAIN afer your landscaper has blown your leaves onto my lawn. Since when is this acceptable??

Welcome to the 21st century! The era of unbelievable selfishness.

These are great! Thanks so much for sharing!

Megan H.

Angie's List

Member Care Department

Source: 

I have neighbors from hell on the east side of me.

The next door neighbor for 5 years has blown his grass/weeds on your property.

When we had the area hydoseeded, I came out the next morning and the entire 6 foot area we seeded along the property line was covered in his clippings.

I have spoken to him at least 5 times very nicely about blowing his clippings and finally gave up and just wait till he is done cutting and then going out and blowing the stuff back onto his property which he had issues. Go figure. Never once have I stepped onto his property to get the stuff off my lawn.

Finally after putting up with it, he has for the past season not blown it on our property.

His house is an eye sore. Has needed a new roof for the past 7 years but just doesn't do anything. Gutters are hanging off the house, overgrown shrubs and vines.

The next 2 neighbors past him think that the world revolves aroung them.

We live on a gravel private road and for the past 6 years have taken it upon myself to fix the potholes. The neighbors to the west of us are very nice and either helped me pay for the materials I bought or thanked me for what I have done. In contrast the neighbors to the east of me have taken credit for my work when speaking to others.

We have tried to let the past problems go but the east neighbors just seem to love to be nasty

I answered this question once already, but alas, yet another situation has arisen. Why is it the most basic things that seem so impossible for some people? Yesterday was trash day, and I look out the window and out of thin air, 3 trash cans appear in front of my house. My cans are where I usually put them, at the end of my driveway. For some unknown reason, the people on the far side of my house wheeled their cans all the way up the street and leave them to be emptied in front of my property. I can't figure out why. And of course, its the next day and they are all still out there. My best guess is that there wasn't any curb space in front of their dump.

They have 3 cars and an old van parked along the entire frontage of their house, (usually its one car and the old van0 with nothing in the driveway, that is wide enough for 3 cars.

I have no idea why they did this, other than to try and annoy me. The people that lived there moved out months ago, and as far as I can tell, left their daughter there with I guess is her boyfriend. They do nothing to keep the house up, it is a mess, of course. I have a hedge that is 6 feet tall to block the view over there, and luckily, its on the far side of my garage, so I can't see it from most of my windows.

I never see them, don't really know them, and have to say, don't want to know them. I don't want to be a whiner, but they drag down the whole neighborhood, most of which take good care of their homes.

Source: 

My neighbor is a property line creeper. He keeps coming further and further into our yard with his mower, fertilizing, and even flowers!! I pointed out to him there is a mark on the curb indicating the property line, but he says he doesn't think they surveyed right. Uh, yeah they did, you are just wrong. He too blows his leaves and ornamental grass cuttings into my yard. He is so smart he stores his dried sticks and clippings in a tub directly under his dryer ventilation outlet. He burns his leaves in a fire pit where the flames reach ten feet high and twice have singed his yard. The pit is on his patio 5 feet from his back door. His wife is the neighbor gossip so you have to pick your battles carefully as it will become an entire neighborhood issue if she gets fired up and feels she needs to discuss the issue with everyone. They landscaped but did not (forgot?) bury their drainage tube so they literally have 18 feet of a black drainage tube running across their backyard which they have to move every time they mow. Yet, they believe they are the best neighbors and that their yard is perfect. No flowers, just bushes and trees and grass. They have even felt obligated to readjust my sprinkler heads to water portions of their yard, and when I asked them not to do it anymore they simply replied they did not think I would mind and its easier for them since they have no sprinkler system. (Yes, really!). I could go on, but I think you get the point. They are annoying (to many) and yet what can you do.

I live in a subdivision with an HOA. There are many who comply with the regs. But I have two neighbors who have so many vehicles they park in garage, driveway and the street. So as you are trying to make a left turn into said neighborhood there is no room for two vehicles going in opposite directions, you have to find a place to pull over or you have to back up. Very annoying!

One of those neighbors has a pushcart with Mexican hot dogs, other mexican stuff on the cart and she blows this incredibly annoying horn when she gets to my house. I do not live in a barrio and am sick of these mexicans turning AMERICAN neighborhoods into Mexico ghettos

During elections, our neighbor puts up two sets of political signs. One for his steps, and one at the border of his yard and ours so it looks like we support his candidate.

The worst is, when we moved in we noticed our back fence was two feet into our property. I suspect while the house was under contract, he saw a prime opportunity to move the fence and help himself to our yard space.

Another annoyance is each summer, he insists that we "take turns" mowing our common front lawn. At first we thought it would be neighborly to go along with it. Naturally, he didn't mow for weeks and weeks, so we ended up mowing his lawn 3 or 4 times for every time he got around to mowing.

Allow their dogs to run into our front yard (on their 30 ft leash) to do their business. A good pet owner walks the pet in their own yard to do its business and then takes it on a walk (picking up after if needed). Also, curbing your dog means; not 30 feet into our front yard but in the grass between the curb and the sidewalk!

my neighbor copies evry thing that i do. I have to work secretly during HER working hours or she will make it her business to come over and ask what i am working on and how much I paid. I swear she is so doggone annoying. look online, watch diy channel get some ideas instead of wating to see what i am going to do and then copying !!!

My neighbor keeps two trash cans in their backyard for yard waste. Both blow over and spray their contents each time there is the least Wind. This has been going on for over a year and each time they blow over they roll down the hill hitting our fence and knocking against it. They leave them sitting there for days, pick up the cans but leave the debris to blow away. Seriously, how bright do you have to be to figure their placement of these cans is problematic. Just had storms and stuff is all over both cans up against the fence. One is a Rubbermaid the other is the rolling commercial variety. I'm just amazed they have not figured out a better place for their cans as it obviously inconveniences them to pick them up each time they blow over. Oh, and he is friends with the hoa president so nothing will get done if I go to the hoa.

I've read these entries with interest. Sad that so many people have such rotten neighbors.

And I learned something: I was about to buy wind chimes - which I love - and had no idea that it was annoying to so many people. Oh, well.

Re the issue of weeds etc. I agree with those who commented on the harmful nature of the poisons we put unto the lawns and into the aquafir. The sooner we get over this fetish for "lawns" of a single type of plant, the better. Unfortunately, in the interest of being a "good neighbour", I spend good money on a lawn service that swears they don't use products that are harmful to the environment (do I believe that?) but I wish I had a better alternative. If someone can come up with something, I'd be happy to hear about it.

I am turning my ¾ acre yard into a food forest. The neighbors probably think I am crazy, but in 10 years we will see who has the most food production and wildlife value. Even though my neighbor gets his riding lawn mower out for every leaf he spots in his yard I love dead leaves, because that equals future top soil. Since we moved in less than a year ago the amount of worms have dramatically increased under these decomposing leaves, and already I am seeing a difference. Since most of our yard is shaded by mature pecan and oak trees we do not have much grass. That is fine with me because I don't care for grass anymore. Grass doesn't attract wildlife, and it doesn't feed us unless you are talking about grain grasses. In addition to the swales I have dug for water catchment I have planted 12 chestnut trees, 2 peach trees, and started a garden that isn't traditional. The garden is mixed, and vegetables are planted in a companion type way to benefit each other. This includes climbing beans with corn and watermelon and cantaloupe to cover the ground. The shrubs I will be planting in the yard will be at least 75% fruit producing such as Hawthorn, Blueberry, Blackberry, etc. In addition I will be planting many more fruit producing trees and more hazel for nut and firewood production. America needs to wake up. We are depending on farmers unorthodox soil depleting methods to sustain us, but this will not last. They will run out of top soil and the inputs come from petroleum. We must turn our yards into food forest once again providing for ourselves. Our ancestors did it and so should we. It is time for those of us who love permaculture to live by example and show our neighbors what a difference it can make. God created life to function in a certain way and man in his ignorance came up with his own methods. Follow the Lord and his plan and he will sustain us.

Nice people, but they planted invasive bamboo and ivy on the property borders.

I am annoyed by neighbors that let their yards grow full of weeds. Several adults usually live in the houses but apparently none of them are capable of pulling a weed. I am old and handicapped but still can spend 15 minutes in my yard pullling a weed or two. When they do mow the yard, they just mow over the weeds, which grow right back. We have a homeowners association, and they were very strict at first but now, "anything goes". The untended yards are lowering the property values here!

My neighbor takes their crappy car and parks it directly in front of my house. They don't put it in their driveway, they don't park it in front of their home, it's right in front of mine! All of things I do to keep my home looking nice are totally diminished by doing this!

Even blowing, cutting grass 3x weekly is absurd. Someone should let neighbor know about the new grass that grows but so high. Code Enforcement may need to get involved. Is bamboo considered "leaves" when they fall from high, wavy bamboo stalks from my neighbors yard over into my property? They have not been trimmed at anytime. I purchased my home Nov. 1995.

Source: Angie's List member's question.

We live on a cul de sac and street parking is very limited. We also share driveways, so that option is often not viable. Using the area in front of my home is the only option for both cars and trash cans on trash day. Not so bad most of the time, except when people park ith their wheels on my lawn (there's no curb) sometimes for days, and when the trash in their cans blows into my garden and I get to pick it up and throw it away again. And the folks who leave their trash cans out for days. Once one was out for a couple weeks and someone put it in the center of the cul de sac, whereupon someone else drug it into my garden! (Neither of these people were me) Sheesh, peeps, how much energy does it take to pull your trash can in when it's empty? Apparently the owner didn't realize it was their can in the street - for weeks? Where did they put their trash? I'm happy to pull it for you if you let me know you need help. Now we've put our house numbers on the cans so we know which one is ours. None of this is anywhere near as bad as some of what is in this forum, thankfully!! And it puts into perspective just how great my neighbors are - so I'll stop foaming at the mouth about these two very minor irritations! Thank you all for contributing your stories and giving me reasons to be greatful!

I have the neighbors from hell and thats no lie. We have a small farm as well as this new neighbor that moved in, I've had horses, goats and pigs. On my property as she has two horses. I know the laws and would spread the horse poop with a spreader as for her she started throwing it all over her fence in to a vacant wooded property. Once she was told to stop that she just started piling it up in front of her barn and back forcing water to flood out my property. Fact is she knows she's doing it and I asked her to stop! No medications because she went off on some rampage and started slobbering at the mouth as she was yelling. I would start cutting my yard over my hill and would run oer ar parts wire you name it, I don't have any other neighbors so I knew it was her trying to destroy my mower. I told her it better stop and she said it would happen if I hadn't thrown a branch in her yard. What! I have woods and she has woods so your trees don't have branches that come down. This is crazy and now when I cut my fron yard I'm now running over baseball size rocks from her driveway. I watched her boyfriend pull in and back up then spin wheels in his truck just to shoot rocks over my yard. Now is this crazy or what! I'm a former marine and she knows I will take only so much with her boyfriend taunting me to come ober there and looking for me to get in trouble. I'm way to smart to play there games and fall for some little kids games. I just said come on my property and I catch you then there will be a problem. They came over the night before and opened my gate so when I let my dogs out one of them witch is my hunting dog would run. Luckily my daughter saw him run past the front window so I caught him before he was run over. The gate was propped open with a huge rock by them. I've now put cameras around my entire property to nail them if they keep it up. Now this is the neighbors from hell!

Nice neighbors but when the landscapers for the house across the street come, they use the blower and cause a huge "dirt cloud" that comes fully across to me. It leave a layer of dust on my car, house, fence and driveway. I had my fence and house powerwashed so it looks nice and it makes me crazy. I spent the money to keep my place nice and they cover it in dirt. I don't want to be the complainer but I think I may have to say something ,nicely, to the company and hope it works ok. Otherwise I will have to mention it to my neighbor. Very inconsiderate.

They planted flowers (perennial) in my front yard flowerbed while I was away at work. The flowerbed was already landscaped & now every year their flowers come up & mine don't. I've tried to get them out but they come back every year. It's not even a flower I like. I wasn't consulted at all. When I got home from work it was just, "by the way, I planted a bunch of flowers in your yard, I hope you like them."

I have an elderly neighbor that owns a delapidated fence that separates our properties. We discussed it for hours!!! He can talk a dog off a meat wagon. Anyhow, HIS fence is falling into my yard. We offered to pay for half the fence and my husband and some friends would install it. Once he found out that HIS share of the cost for HIS fence would cost $500, we hadn't heard anything for a few years. We have the fence barracaded up on our side and we aren't too bothered by it. Now, after a few years, he is after us to pay for the WHOLE fence AND do all the work. It doesn't belong to us. It is on his property. I am all for helping out elderly people and if we had the money then, we would have probably paid for it in the first place. But now he is DEMANDING it and we are absolutey awestruck by his audacitity. He's been pretty nasty about it too. Probably in the long run, we will end up paying for it. But not until we have all of our other projects out of the way.

Nothing I've read here for me compares to the torture I endure with my neighbor's refusal to take down his wind chimes. I've politely asked. He told me I could stay in my house with the windows closed and that he's not violating anything. I was taught you want to live in peace with your neighbors. His refusal is selfish, mean, and ego-centric. I am so stressed out though have not actually called out the police. I'm afraid those chimes are not going to register enough decibles, though sooner or later I'll find out as I will call the police eventually. I've considered looking into a civil case against him in that my health, well being, is being negatively affected, frankly going out of my mind. Chimes are horrid forms of noise pollution which unfortunately when used by the wrong kind of person actually gives that person a legal way to torture you. And if you tick that person off they might even put out more.

My neighbors need to cut down and destroy popcorn trees!! These trees are not native to the U.S. and are so invasive, they are destroying native vegetation. I don't think people are aware of how problematic this can become if the trees aren't removed, especially when trees are small. Popcorn trees have gigantic root systems which travel very far. They can pose many problems for septic tanks and home foundations. I'm tired of pulling up little baby popcorn trees that sprout up all over my property. Help!

Source: Conservation

Ha! Wacko lady across the street who has an obsession with lights. She needs to light up her snake house I think to make the property look bigger. Our home across the way is twice the size. She also is awkward home. They go no where, it's extremely strange. Oh and get this, she claims that watering her plants is good cardio.. I'm sorry but lol! Push a lawn mower lady and lose some weight. It's also very messed up with a mentally challenged son living at home at age 25 and he does nothing but smoke cigarettes. The daughter un educated cranking out kids by different men at age 19. Does this really annoy us? Not really it's simply trashy and sad to see.

Source: Kimberly

WOW! The most recent post shows just how horrible neighbors can be--I'm referring to the poster who clearly has issues (not the least of which is speaking/writing english), if they are so closely watching their neighbors lives. That is just CREEPY!! Perhaps the reason the neighbor caring for a disabled son does not socialize more is because of horrid, judgemental neighbors like yourselves. Most of these posters assume and project the worst of and on their neighbors. You all should be ashamed of yourselves. If you do not have the backbone to politely discuss your issues/concerns with your neighbors, your post reflects most poorly on yourselves. I mean really..... the wind blowing THEIR trees' leaves on YOUR lawn??? (mechanical blowers aside--totally with you on that one). What is next?---"I know that awful neighbor is hogging all the rain!". Geez people---go live in a condo or surround yourselves with lots of property! Has it occured to you that your terrible attitudes are creating the problem?

Our neighbors literally use thier garage as a living area. They are alcoholics and very needy, thus trying to always run to the street when you walk by to flag you down to spend time in purgatory garage. We have stopped walking our dogs because thier dog runs out to interact and they beat it right in front of you. At least we dont have to have them staring at us continually, like thier closer neighbors. That would certainly make me move!

I have neighbors from HELL!!!!! I can't stand them and they can't stand us. I answered this question months ago on a different issue. I have been kicking myself for 4 yrs purchasing this attached house. When I first answered this question it was concerning the loud music with extremely loud bass vibrating my house.

My next pet peeve is is that we get grocery store circulars every Friday in our neighborhod in plastic bags. The person that comes through to deliver them tosses them on our steps. I don't use them and would pick up mine and throw them in the garbage. My neighbor doesn't do that. He uses the side of my steps to toss them there. I didn't notice it until one day the tree in front of their property dumped tons of brown stuff on my front yard and I went out there to sweep. When I looked in between the steps, I noticed three weeks of circulars back there. It took me about 10 minutes or more to dig them out because we had rains and then much su, therefore when the plastic dried, it was stuck to the ground. These people have cameras all around their property and saw me trying to dig their garbage from between the steps. I just threw them in the trash and didn't say anything. So, what do you think happened next week? Yup, you guessed it, they threw their circular back in between the steps again. It just shows how dispicable, insensitive and downright dirty these people are. What? They are too good to pick up their garbage just because they have the nicest house on the block? Well, forget being Mr. Nice Guy. My son dug out the circular and threw it right abck on their property. I guess they realized we weren't taking their crap any longer and didn't want to fight with us, so they picked up their circular and did the right thing.

They blast thier music in the backyard and all throughout the house. I can't wait until they are GONE!

They secretly put up their house for sale and now it's in contract. I noticed it when I was looking to move. I couldn't see myself staying next to these people another year. THANK GOD!!!! Now I'm counting down the days when they are finally GONE!!!! Hopefully the next people will not be as bad as they are.

My neighbor rented the house on 5 acres next to us. He turned it into a junk yard, literally. He delivered furniture for a local furniture company. When he delivered new refrigerators, washers, sofas, etc to customers, he would take the old furniture and dump it on the 5 acres he was renting, which bordered our 3 acres. He was a huge burley man who looked like a mountain hermit, and all the township officals were afraid of him. There were plenty of complaints about him, but everyone was afraid to do anything other than send him letters. The man who owned the land died, and we bought the land. My husband was a number one salesman, and he always got along well with everyone. He was always friendly with the mountain. When it came time for the mountain man to move, surprisingly enough, he moved. I think if he hadn't respected my husband so much he would have just become a squatter on our property. Of course he left all the garbage for us to clean up. It was a real job, but it is a beautiful piece of land with a fantastic view. We built a lovely home on the former junk yard. The neighbors were extatic!!!!

This is my lawn

There are these irritating neighbors of mine staying next door. They all stay in joint family and all oll of them are annoying . We stay in row houses and having this amazing lawn garden in the front and we are even fond of it. But these neighbors hate my lawn. They party every next day throw all stuff at my lawn. There are these 5 kids in the house which i havent seen in the entire north shore and all are free runners. They come and spoil my lawn garden. We have been so frustrated doing and gardening the lawn garden that i had to hire a professional here for the taking care of my lawn garden. Thankfully they don't charge much.

My neighbor planted plastic flowers through out the front lawn.

I live in the city and we have dumpsters. 1 for household waste, 1 for yard waste, and 1 for recycling. unfortuneately the neighbors across the alley from me don't understand the concept of dumpster usage. one of them puts household in the recycling and yard waste or just walks over to the fence in the alley and drops the trash over the fence into the alley, and two other neighbors walk down to the dumpster and just drop the bags on the ground next to it. of course their yards are above the alley and mine is alley level so after the "critters" tear open all the bags looking for food, the wind blows it all into my yard. I am constantly picking up used paper plates, chip bags, napkins, you name it, it's in my yard. The worst part is I am the one who is physically handicapped and I have to clean up all of their trash. They also don't keep their weeds or "wild" trees cut down. I have to access the alley just to get in and out of my house because I can't do steps and I have a ramp to the alley, Sometimes I have to fight the overgrowth of weeds just to back my van out. Last weekk when one of them decided to finally cut down some weeds and small trees, she just dragged them across the alley and dumped them behind my next door neighbor's garage. she could have put them in the yard waste dumpster because they were small enough pieces but she was too lazy.

We have a neighbor's backyard that runs perpendicular to ours. They have part of their yard fenced in, the rest extends behind ours to a stormwater managment area. They decided it was a good idea to store their trash cans behind our shed on a wooden pallet that they deposited there. We were never consulted about this. The problem was their cans had no lids (violation of county code), so all the critters from the stormwater managment "forest" came over every night and knocked over the cans and ripped up the bags. I was always left to clean it up, or the trash would smell and blow everywhere. So nasty. This went on for several months. Finally my husband went over to speak to them. Luckily the neighbor's son was visiting and was able to interpret our complaint for his ignorant father.

Now the cans are stored inside the fence. The pallet remains. Pick your battles, I guess.

This is not landscaping. Try living next to a family of three drummers who practice throughout the day in the garage which is not soundproof and the sound fills my entire house as they play as loud as they can. The parents are never home during the day. This sound permeates my entire house. I think I would take the mowing, sprinkling, whatever anyday to what I have now.

Our lovely young kids crotch rocket wheelie riding, car speeding neighborhood renters (everyone else on the block is a quiet family raising homeowner) thought it would be a hoot to move the toilets out to the front porch before moving out. They have been sitting there for three months while the home owner has been trying to repair whatever mess of damages they left inside.

Yes, just what our neighborhood always needed...toilet bowl garden trolls.

We have several neighbors that leave their dogs outside to bark off & on ALL day long. And, even into the evening hours up until bedtime. Their dogs. Part of their landscaping! Inconsiderate jerks.

I have no complaints with my neighbors. But I do want to comment on a lot of the complaints posted. First, for those complaining about the leaves from their neighbors trees which are falling by NATURE onto their property. Guess you are not using any of the shade from that tree are you? Guess that tree wasn't already there when you bought it? This is a ridiculous complaint, and at least one poster complained because of neighborhood trees being cut down because they lost that shade. I'm positive that they are gaining a lot more positives (lower utility rates due to shade on their house, etc) than it is costing them to mulch or rake those leaves. If you are so determined not to have trees around your yard, consider that when you purchase and don't just look at your yard, but at your neighbors, as nature will do as nature does. (And no, this does not mean those who purposely blow the leaves across boundaries.)

Second... I find it amazing that so many will post that windchimes are abhorrent, or that they bother dogs. My grandmother had 2 windchimes my entire life, and dogs and cats, and none were bothered by them. In fact, the dogs generally slept on the carport under the chimes. Animals are generally able to adjust to changes in the environment, and if your dog is barking at windchimes, it is probably because of the unknown aspect of it. A little education would help that. Now, some windchimes may cause problems for folks with hearing aids, I wouldn't know, as I don't wear them.... but as many of my family as has had windchimes, I've never heard of this issue. It may be that folks were just understanding and talked, and found that one set of windchimes might be harder to listen to than another (they have different octaves and such), and it is just a matter of finding one that doesn't affect the hearing aides. I also question how far away you are when you are hearing this.... Again, speaking from my experience, when the windchimes are in my families' front or back yards, they are not so loud as to be able to be heard so loudly as to be an earsore on the neighbor's properties. Generally, you can't hear them at all.

I can see where there are some who have honest gripes about neighbors, but for the most part, the responses here seem to be about nuisances that would be non-issues in a society where we realize that everyone has rights, and your rights don't supersede mine, and vice versa. We are too busy trying to enforce OUR rights, to realize that by doing that, you are encroaching on others. If we all started caring a bit more about each other and less about ourselves (not such a selfish society) things would be working a lot better.