Bad neighbour me or them?

MorningStar

I have some neighbours who are renting across the road. Never spoke to them as they never acknowledge me in the causal nod way that get things started. After a few fail attempts at being nice in this way I just stopped bothering.
As time has gone on they have shown some anti-social behaviour (as far as I am concerned). For example:
1) Sitting out the front window smoking a fag and drinking beer waiting for friends. ThEn shouting out at here friends
2) They and friends drive up and beep their horns rather than get out of the car and ring the door bell. Early in the mornings not that much at night but pretty often.
3) Being possessive about the space out side their house as they don't have a drive. They park their car there but there are a lot of cars on the road and not everyone has a driveway or more cars than will fit. They have asked people to move in unfriendly manners. Called around the houses ask who owns the car (so I guess I did speak to them once). They in revenge to one person parked infront of their driveway and refused to move the car when the person wanted to go to work. They were verbally abusive
4) Slaming their door. It is really loud I can hear it in the back of the house.

For what every reason they now seem to have 3 vehicales. The two "new" ones are missing tax,insurance and NCT!
Now here's wha I was going to do
1) Contact their landlord and mention siad bad behaviour and ask that he talk to them. As a landlord I know I would prefer to keep the residents happy
2) Call the cops about the cars

I know they are kind sh*tty things to do but I reckon it will get the best results.
I woud ordinarily talk to the people directly but I don't think they will be reasonable given their behavious thus far.

Am I just being petty?

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

just a tad...

dudara

The first approach would be to talk to them yourself.

Are the cars on the road? I think you said that they were as they have no driveway. In that case, head over there one night, remove the number plates, and then call the council, saying that there are two cars with no plates blocking your street.

Note: This is a tactic to be employed only when the noraml diplomatic channels fail

SoupyNorman

well reporting the cars will probably only make matters worse as they will know that they got a tip off espically if the cops show up on your road jut to check their cars!

an anonymous call to their landlord would prob be the no.1 move at the present time, the only hope is the landlord actually cares enough to do something about it.

MorningStar

bravestarr082 wrote:

well reporting the cars will probably only make matters worse as they will know that they got a tip off espically if the cops show up on your road jut to check their cars!

an anonymous call to their landlord would prob be the no.1 move at the present time, the only hope is the landlord actually cares enough to do something about it.

They won't know who tips off the cops and the landlord may not accept anonymous calls and tell them who complained. That was they way I was looking at it.

Raiser

I can see it now:

- Landlord will see it as another nuisance - same as if it was another blocked drain.

- Will have a "quiet word" with these cretins - referencing your complaint - Will say things like "take it handy with da ole door lads" then driving off, satisfied that all is well....

- Then the aforementioned cretins will poison your cat, verbally abuse you and your flatmates/partner/family and eventually break your nose.

Pray they move on - inbred folk are often transient.

P.S. They might be waiting for a chance to jump you anyway, seeing as your always peering at their cars and eavesdropping on their door-closing hobby.

MorningStar

Raiser wrote:

I can see it now:

- Landlord will see it as another nuisance - same as if it was another blocked drain.

- Will have a "quiet word" with these cretins - referencing your complaint - Will say things like "take it handy with da ole door lads" then driving off, satisfied that all is well....

Maybe I should let you know I am a landlord too!

We are not all lazy and inconsiderate but I do agree it is a concern

The tenants could be considered like you said.
Thank god they don't get up early or they would have spotted me looking at there car and van.

OLDYELLAR

Go to them yourself before going to the landlord , I remember when our old neighbours complained to our landlord , if they had just came in and said turn down the music , it would a been fine but because they went behind our backs ,we were like dogs.
Tip off the guards about the cars anyway.

MorningStar

OLDYELLAR wrote:

Go to them yourself before going to the landlord , I remember when our old neighbours complained to our landlord , if they had just came in and said turn down the music , it would a been fine but because they went behind our backs ,we were like dogs.
Tip off the guards about the cars anyway.

They have already been verbally abusive and threatening when spoken to that's why I haven't . I don't want to be on there radar unless there is no choice.

I know what you are saying but they have already shown themselves to be unreasonable.

I really have a thing about the fact they are driving around uninsured too.

Neuro

MorningStar wrote:

Am I just being petty?

Yes, very.

It would seem to me that you only discovered that they were 'anti-social' after they didn't reciprocate your attempts to get to know them.

As for calling the police regarding their cars, that's simply childish...

OLDYELLAR

MorningStar wrote:

They have already been verbally abusive and threatening when spoken to that's why I haven't . I don't want to be on there radar unless there is no choice.

I know what you are saying but they have already shown themselves to be unreasonable.

I really have a thing about the fact they are driving around uninsured too.

tip off the guards about that anyway , I hate people who dont tax or insure there vehicles , please call the guards about that!

MorningStar

Neuro wrote:

Yes, very.

It would seem to me that you only discovered that they were 'anti-social' after they didn't reciprocate your attempts to get to know them.

As for calling the police regarding their cars, that's simply childish...

First off that is huge assumption, I mentioned that because I was try to explain that from the start they have been a bit rude and not easy to talk to. I gave examples of their particular behaviour that I thought was anti social if you think they weren't explain why.

I really don't think much of anybody who drives without insurance regardless of if I know them or not. I probably won't ring the cops but if the other fails I will for sure. If they injure somebody while driving uninsured I won't exactly feel great though

Slunk

Do they park in front of your driveway making it difficult for you or is it just other people, if so I wouldnt get involved, they seem like a dodgy crowd.Two new cars without tax & ins. Always people coming and beeping horns drinking beer in the garden etc. No point in making things worse for yourself when theres no need to. Id just leave them be.

Sparky

Talking about bad neighbours, we had a few black people move in two doors down, so they were quiet for a while, no bother with that untill nissan sunnys would appear and be left abandoned taking up car spaces 4 to be exact, so some residents told the guards about it and the guards said they were watching the matter.
So then one day (this is no joke) 2 guarda riot vans pulled up and about 10 guards were running around like ants, firstly they started moving the cars with the pick up van they have and then they waited for the owner to come out about the cars, so he did so and was arrested, so alot of residents were supprised what was happening and were looking at all this, when we all discovered that these men were running a brothel, (which explains why half dressed black women were coming and going out of there every so often)
So cars were removed and the landlord THEN decided to evict the fellas for what they had done, even though the landlord knew 3 weeks previously.
So the story is some landlords wont do sh1t, but the ones who do are IMO the ones that lived there previously and knows the neighbours personally.

digitally-yours

do whatever you want to doo but stay at the backhand
dont show ur self at the front otherwise it will be personal

Saturnine

Whatever about them being bad neighbours its equal a **** to you if their cars/VW Transporters are not taxed/insured.

jongore

Neuro wrote:

Yes, very.

It would seem to me that you only discovered that they were 'anti-social' after they didn't reciprocate your attempts to get to know them.

As for calling the police regarding their cars, that's simply childish...

No that's simply being a good citizen, every a-hole without tax and insurance should be reported to the cops ASAP.

As for the bad neighbours, talk to a few other people and see if they've had problems, if they have send a letter signed by everyone to the landlord.

AdMMM

Its because of ****ers like them not insuring their cars that insurance is 6% higher than it needs to be.

Definetely report them to the Guards about the cars. As for sorting out the anti-social behaviour, a call to the landlord will do the trick because think of it this way, if you go straight to the landlord anonymously, it will probably be sorted out. If you go talk to the tenants personally, then they will know that you have something against them and if they dont comply with your requests then if you went to the landlord they would know it was you!

Saturnine

Yes and only for those on unemployment assistance you would not have to pay taxes either.

Son_of_Belial

They sound like total knackers! Yeah, call the guards about the cars, what if one of them bumped into your car? There'd be no come-back.

Sleepy

If you can't afford to tax and insure a car, you can't afford a car. That simple. Report them and do everyone a favour.

RainyDay

MorningStar wrote:

1) Contact their landlord and mention siad bad behaviour and ask that he talk to them. As a landlord I know I would prefer to keep the residents happy

What impact do you reckon a 'talking to' from their landlord will have?

Duckjob

First of all, give them every chance to be reasonable. Make a list of your beefs with them, pay them a visit and have a calm conversation with them. You'd be surprised how reasonable people can be. Approach is everything.

If this fails, (and it may well), you could try doing what we did to cure a noise problem with neighbours. - Make it the landlords problem. For example, you're kept up all night with loud music. So ring the landlord there and then to tell him you are being disturbed by excessive noise from his property. The later the better. Tell him you expect him to take responsibility for whats going on on his property, and he as long as you continue to have a problem you will be ringing him to let him know. Ring every 15 mins if necessary. We did this with neighbours, and after that night, there wasn't a peep out of them until they left 6 months later.

axtradub12

If all else fails. Drop a note in their letterbox saying, make friends here. Join Boards.ie

fred funk }{

How do you know they have no tax and insurance?
The few new cars i have bought over the years had no discs in the window for a while even though it was insured and taxed.
It only takes a phone call to transfer insurance from an old car to a new one.

There's two sides to every story. The sound like a bunch of young people enjoying the freedom of living away from their parents, At the same time they should respect the neighbours and not be loud at night.

Like someone else said go over to them with the proper attitude and pretend to be nice and ask them nicely to calm things down a bit because if you go over ranting and raging it will make things worse.

You asked were you being petty? Yes i say.

murphaph

I'm not a landlord but I will be soon. I don't get the whole 'make it the landlord's problem'. The landlord is providing accomodation to the market. If these people can't take responsibility for their own actions and it's disturbing folk then they should call the council and/or gardai. If the council or gardai choose to contact the landlord then so be it but the landlord can't really do much else-he can't just evict someone if their neighbour has issues with them.

MorningStar

fred funk }{ wrote:

How do you know they have no tax and insurance?
The few new cars i have bought over the years had no discs in the window for a while even though it was insured and taxed.
It only takes a phone call to transfer insurance from an old car to a new one.

There's two sides to every story. The sound like a bunch of young people enjoying the freedom of living away from their parents, At the same time they should respect the neighbours and not be loud at night.

Like someone else said go over to them with the proper attitude and pretend to be nice and ask them nicely to calm things down a bit because if you go over ranting and raging it will make things worse.

You asked were you being petty? Yes i say.

They are in their 30's so they are no younger than me. Their behaviour is intrusive. I have lived in good and bad areas in my life and their behaviour is normal in areas people would call bad. The area is mostly retired people so their behaviour is particularly noticable. They could be actingworst but it's context that makes things anti-social

The cars have no discs at all!They are old cars so they should at least have NCT and tax. Is a month long enough to get the insurance disc?

They have already been verbally abusive and threatening to people. If they don't listen to me they will know it is me complaining. I don't think they will be reasonable as they have shown themseleves not to be. Others have tried to be reasonable with them and it didn't work. The parking issue has been mentioned to them a few times as was the door.

I don't mind people saying I am petty but say how you see their behaviour is reasonable. If they were younger I could see it differently but they are not.

delly

I wouldn't consider any of the actions in the first post unreasonable. But no matter what you do, don't approach them directly as you'll be the target when fit hits the shan.

I have a family renting beside me at the mo. Nice and respectable, nice cars, good jobs and 3 young children. Problem is though that daddy's babysitting service is to let the kids play in the bushs and trees of the park, while tearing them to shreds at the same time. Also letting them to run back and forth accross the main road. One of the other neighbours 3 foot wall which slopes up to about 7 foot is another play thing for the boys of the family. The younger 4 year old got stuck up there one time, and a local who was passing by had to lift him down. In this day and age i can't understand why somebody would let there kids play unsupervised.

/end of rant

I guess what i'm saying is that even 'repectable' looking renters can cause problems.

MorningStar

murphaph wrote:

I'm not a landlord but I will be soon. I don't get the whole 'make it the landlord's problem'. The landlord is providing accomodation to the market. If these people can't take responsibility for their own actions and it's disturbing folk then they should call the council and/or gardai. If the council or gardai choose to contact the landlord then so be it but the landlord can't really do much else-he can't just evict someone if their neighbour has issues with them.

Well as a landlord I can tell you that attitude will not do you any favours. If you don't back the neighbours they won't look out for your interests. Anti-social people are not generally people who will look after other peoples' property. If the tenants started ripping the house apart would you not want the neighbours to let you know? Neighbours could make every single one of your tenants move out if they tooka dislike to you behaviour. I know an accountant who disliked the landlord of the building beside his office, he kept getting the cops to raid it for drugs with every new tenant.
It is in your own interest to keep the neighbours on side let alone the morals of it.
A landlord can evict a tenant for their behaviour but generally tenants do listen to the landlords about complaints. I have had to do the same myself and people I know who have been unreasonable are very reasonable to their landlord.

Duckjob

Indeed, another example of 'greedy new Ireland'. People want to reap the financial benefits of being land owners, but don't want to take on the social responsibility that comes with it. It's YOUR property :eek:

AdMMM

Duckjob wrote:

Indeed, another example of 'greedy new Ireland'. People want to reap the financial benefits of being land owners, but don't want to take on the social responsibility that comes with it. It's YOUR property :eek:

Well said!

samo

Duckjob wrote:

If this fails, (and it may well), you could try doing what we did to cure a noise problem with neighbours. - Make it the landlords problem. For example, you're kept up all night with loud music. So ring the landlord there and then to tell him you are being disturbed by excessive noise from his property. The later the better. Tell him you expect him to take responsibility for whats going on on his property, and he as long as you continue to have a problem you will be ringing him to let him know. Ring every 15 mins if necessary. We did this with neighbours, and after that night, there wasn't a peep out of them until they left 6 months later.

Very good advice, had a similar situation a few months ago with rented house next door, literally harassed the landlord about it and then in the last conversation mentioned that I would be discussing the situation with the local Sinn Fein councillor.....situation was soon resolved

knm

Yes, do report them.
My neighbours are Polish and very nice. However they have no Tax, insurance or nct on their car. I had this dilema, but then they got rid of their car - dilema solved. This is totally wrong. When in Rome - do as the Romans do. They have lots of friends that call every weekend in cars that are not taxed or insured.

Yea, it seems horrible (reporting people to the authorities) but if we all want to be Europeans, we al have to live by the same rules.
And you have to do whatever it takes to make your life happy.

MorningStar

Duckjob wrote:

Indeed, another example of 'greedy new Ireland'. People want to reap the financial benefits of being land owners, but don't want to take on the social responsibility that comes with it. It's YOUR property :eek:

I actually don't think it's greed as such just niave. There are a lot of people out there who think a landlord has it easy and don't realise the work and risks. There are a lot of new landlords now who don't no what they are doing.
Don't worry I reckon the tax man will have a field day in a few years as it's not hard to figure out why somebody has two houses. Many of the newer lanlords think it easy to avoid tax on rental income. I think we might have a similar situation to the bogus non-resident accounts in 20 years for some landlords

MorningStar

Well I met the landlord today. It turns out it is my Godmother and I just bumped into her lol

She was really upset about it as she warned them it was quite area beforehand. I asked her just to mention it and if there is still problems I'd let her know.

The car issue was kind of sorted out because they got rid of the cars but replaced them with better one. It turns out one of them is a mechanic. Unfortunately he started doing nixers in front of his house.

Anyway I think I am sorted and nothing heavy was done.

MorningStar

Well worse has happened they had an incident on Sunday morning. One of them apparently slept in their car. They suddenly woke up and drove off at speed down the road straight into 4 parked cars. Not sure if they were insured or not and I never rang the cops about it.
I spoke to a neighbour and she spoke very baddly of the landlord. I didn't mention my connection but they suggested they were some kind of slum loard. They now have two cars outside that don't have proper tax,insurance etc.. As the cops were there on sunday I would have thought they would have checked . Not sure if I should ring them or not.

ibanez

You must have a lot of spare time.

MorningStar

ibanez wrote:

You must have a lot of spare time.

Yeah I waited by my window untill they caused a 5 car crash.

They are intruding on me that's how I notice and I bumped into the landlord when they were collecting the rent. The only reason I found out who the landlord was because I knew them.

Hobbes

You are required by law to have a Tax disc clearly visible and up to date if you drive the car. There is a grace period afaik (1 month) from when your tax expires that you would have to show you are getting a new tax disc.

If they are driving those cars then report them. The cars will be taken off them. If they aren't driving them and they are left for a long period of time phone the council and explain there are cars on your road that look like they have been abandoned.

Rubens

Are these neighbours Lithuanian by any chance?

Had a bunch of those next-door who behaved in EXACTLY the same manner....

Duckjob

Rubens wrote:

Are these neighbours Lithuanian by any chance?

Had a bunch of those next-door who behaved in EXACTLY the same manner....

Ah yeah, those nasty Lituanians. Comming over here takin our jobs and our wimmin :rolleyes:

mjquinno

But if they are mechanic's dont they have special insurance and different tax obligations when driving a car, Im not an expert or anything mind....

Hobbes wrote:

You are required by law to have a Tax disc clearly visible and up to date if you drive the car. There is a grace period afaik (1 month) from when your tax expires that you would have to show you are getting a new tax disc.

If they are driving those cars then report them. The cars will be taken off them. If they aren't driving them and they are left for a long period of time phone the council and explain there are cars on your road that look like they have been abandoned.

MorningStar

mjquinno wrote:

But if they are mechanic's dont they have special insurance and different tax obligations when driving a car, Im not an expert or anything mind....

Maybe but his girlfriend doesn't get it and that's who crashed the car and drove it a lot.
They are pure bred Dubliners who just behave very baddly. There is certainly a social difference but it isn't from being from different countries.

Hobbes

mjquinno wrote:

But if they are mechanic's dont they have special insurance and different tax obligations when driving a car, Im not an expert or anything mind....

No they don't.

http://www.oasis.gov.ie/transport/motoring/motor_tax_rates.html?PHPSESSID=7bb2bf1712cb9bd35330af7d38580832

Lists it all there.

hshortt

I read the entire thread and agree with some comments and disagree with others. I totally emphatise with the OP, it's a difficult situation to be in but one which you can influence to some degree.

As for calling the gardai regarding the no tax/insurance thing. I would have no hesitation in this, I always think to myself, "what if they hit my son, or my wife in that car". This makes it easier for me to make the call. If they are the type of people who would risk driving a car without insurance then no amount of talking reasonably to them will fix it. Make the call, but be aware that if you call the local station (and you should) they'll want your phone number at the very least.

As for the Anti-social stuff, we all have different level of tolerance for this type of behaviour. If it bothers you then address it through one of your two options. Tell them directly, (won't help, they are not reasonable people!) or tell the landlord, this is made more difficult /easier for you because of the relationship. If it was me, it would be easier to tell a relation of mine to sort it out than to tell a stranger.

Good luck, would hate if it were me.
Howard

magpie

Make a list of your beefs with them, pay them a visit and have a calm conversation with them. You'd be surprised how reasonable people can be. Approach is everything.

You'd also be amazed how unreasonable people can be. A mate of mine with young kids repeatedly asked his neighbours to turn the music down as it was waking them up. They responded by saying "we have to listen to your babies crying, so you have to listen to our music". They honestly couldn't see the difference. In the words of Janes Addiction "Some people deserve to die, that's just unconscious knowledge"

If this fails, (and it may well), you could try doing what we did to cure a noise problem with neighbours. - Make it the landlords problem. For example, you're kept up all night with loud music. So ring the landlord there and then to tell him you are being disturbed by excessive noise from his property. The later the better. Tell him you expect him to take responsibility for whats going on on his property, and he as long as you continue to have a problem you will be ringing him to let him know. Ring every 15 mins if necessary. We did this with neighbours, and after that night, there wasn't a peep out of them until they left 6 months later.

Fine and dandy, if the people are renting. If you're unfortunate enough to live next door to Council Tenants the only thing you can do is complain to the EPA which can take 5/6 years to process (based on a recent case), while they live their 'Beverley Hillbillies' lifestyle at the State's (i.e. your) expense.

The only way to be safe is to get enough cash together to buy a big, detached house away from all the scum.

jaggeh

our old neighbour complained about us the weekend we moved in, she lived in the apartment below us and complained about 'moving furniture' we got a warning about it from our landlord.

the problem is nearly our whole apartment is tiled, no carpets except in 2 bedrooms, so even the slightest tap would make a noise.

The one time she came to us and told us exactly where the noise was coming from we were able to solve it straight away.

However in your situation i wouldnt approach them because anything negative they get from guards/council/landlord after that they will attribute to a complain from you.

report them for the cars, and contact the guards about the antisocial behaviour, if they are drunk and causing a nuisance im sure they can be hauled away for that too :P

DoctorEdgeWild

Bad Neighbour? Them.

Report the cars without any hesitation. You should see the sorta grief uninsured fooks get over on the motors board. If you want, post their address on there and they will have a boardsie mob at their door by tonight.

A phonecall to the landlord should do the job, if it persists, persist with the phonecalls, maybe if your neighbours feel the same, then get them to ring in as well.

Seriously please report the cars and good luck.

MorningStar

DoctorEdgeWild wrote:

Bad Neighbour? Them.
.

Well obviously now after smashing 4 neighbours cars my concerns about them have been proved right. Originally I thought I was over reacting as they hadn't done anything as major.

I am going to contact the cops tomorrow morning before they get up if they have the cars there again. They are doing something strange with cars changing them about and increaseing the number.

DoctorEdgeWild

Cool - best of luck with it and keep those of us with boring neighbours informed