“Thought She Owned The Street”: 47 Times Neighbors Took Pettiness Too Far
“Good fences make good neighbors” is one of those lines that gets thrown around, but sometimes one has to deal with folks next door so entitled that it becomes pretty clear why anyone would want a fence (and perhaps a guard dog) in the first place.
Someone asked “What’s the most petty thing a neighbor has done to you?” and netizens described some of the worst neighbors they’ve ever dealt with. So get comfortable as you scroll through, upvote the truly pettiest and be sure to share your own thoughts and experiences in the comments section down below.
#1
Two years ago my husband and I had just bought our first house. I was so excited to finally have flower beds so I bought 5 purple tiger rose bushes and went out everyday to tend to them.
Our next door neighbor came over one day while I was watering my roses and decided to be a creeper. Asked if he could give me his number, started asking probing questions about my schedule like how long I was home alone, and kept hitting on me. I turned off the water and went inside, locked the door and called my husband because now there’s a strange man walking through my yard that knows I’m home alone and won’t accept my boundaries.
My husband came home and met the neighbor’s wife in the driveway to explain what happened and how the guy was out of line.
Didn’t see the guy again, but within days my roses started to shrivel up and die. I tried everything but I’m pretty sure he sprayed them with plant k****r.
Karma’s a b***h though because he got fired for sexually harassing a customer shortly after and his wife booted him out of the house.
Silaquix,Raymond Petrik/unsplashReport
Final score:
60
Mike F 4 months ago
Hahaha, hahaha!
16
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#2
Oooh this is my time to shine…
Had a neighbour who was old and had bipolar episodes.
My neighbour changed the locks on our communal door which only allowed access to our flat and her flat, yet refused to inform us that she changed the locks.
She then refused to answer the phone to us or let us in then called the police on my partner when he broke in for breaking and entering.
Also tried to get us to pay for the new keys…
Same neighbour called the police on me when I was in the bath. I don’t know what she said to the police but answering the door to armed police whilst in a towel was not fun. Her reasoning for calling the police is that she thought I was being attacked and wouldn’t answer the door when she knocked. I didn’t hear her knock and I was in the bath the whole time so unsure what exactly she heard.
Same neighbour also called the fire brigade to our property twice claiming we had purposely started a fire in our flat, both times my partner and I were at work and had to come home to check that there was in fact no fire.
We couldn’t get WiFi installed in our flat (top floor) but our neighbour (bottom floor could) could so we shared our the WiFi bill 50/50. Neighbour would turn the WiFi off if we pissed her off, if she went away for a few days, if she wanted to spite us. She would change the password and then demand more money from us to change it back. When she moved out we cleared out her flat and found letters from the internet company. She literally took our money but never paid the actual bill. I don’t know why they let her have internet for so long but alas.
Same neighbour filled up our own outside bin then called the council to complain we were overflowing our bin. The council believed her and provided an enforcement notice for causing waste in a communal area.
Also not petty but proves how much of a d**k she was: my partner asked our landlord for a private postbox as our post and takeaways kept getting stolen (from the building with only two flats in). Landlord said no because only us and the neighbour live here. Neighbour denied ever stealing our post and takeaways. Said neighbour was then arrested a week later for selling fraudulent tarot readings online but when the police arrested her they also found my partners bank card which we assumed just never got delivered and many other items that were addressed to us. Police did not prosecute because apparently could not prove that she actually stole them even though they were in her flat.
F**k you Jane.
satanchaps,Ceco Petrov/unsplashReport
Final score:
55
Mike F 4 months ago
Jane is a bit©h.
23
#3
We were sort of that neighbor a few years ago. We were in the process of building our new house and had everything staked out before any of the groundwork started. I guess our neighbor thought we were too close to their property and had some city official come out to measure and in the process delayed our contractor.
Turns out we were 1 foot further away from their property than necessary and so, without even bothering to ask, our annoyed contractor picked up all the stakes and moved them 1 foot closer to the neighbor.
RxHumdinger,Valerie V/unsplashReport
Final score:
51
Lost Panda 4 months ago
I would have used the gained foot to add a large privacy fence
22
#4
It in was 2001, the neighbor wanted me to join an HOA. I had no interest. She contrived all these rules and insisted the neighborhood follow them. She would call the police, city inspectors, and everybody on anyone who didn’t follow her rules. She finally got me a warning from the city on my house needing paint. In her vision she wanted earth tones and encouraged me to change the color of my house from a light powder blue, to a tan. I painted the house PURPLE. I sold it as a purple house.
DukeBeekeepersKid,Molly the Cat/unsplashReport
Final score:
49
Nuku Nyara 4 months ago
I love this for you. Purple houses rock!
20
#5
A dorm neighbor was a huge d**k and didn’t care for anyone in the suite. So he did something like tip over his sub woofer, turn the music up and left for the weekend. The entire crew could feel it from our beds. I guess he didn’t know that RA’s have keys to the rooms. Maybe he also didn’t know that you could get ejected from dorms.
F**k you Bosco. You t**d.
GirlsPMYourSpreadAss,Andrej Lišakov/unsplashReport
Final score:
46
Mike F 4 months ago
Yeah, Bosco you’re a 💩.
16
#6
This happened years ago at my old apartment complex. My downstairs neighbor had a grill that they set up directly underneath our window and when they grilled the smoke would get into our house when the window was open. It was terrible. So I politely asked if they could move their grilled further away. They moved it but setup a fan to blow the smoke at my windows direction. That really got me steaming but the breaking point was when they were having a party I went to close my window the wife started shouting “that’s right b***h close your window!”.
Okay you started it.
I noticed their car had a paper license plate for several months that looked like it was printed out of computer paper and could tell it was faked so I reported it. I expected them to get a ticket for not having registration and that would’ve been fine. Guess what? An officer comes by and finds that it’s a stolen vehicle. One patrol car turns to three cars and they arrest the husband and cps takes their kids because they found d***s in the house. All because of a grill.
Final score:
45
Steve 4 months ago
I would have yelled down to her, “That’s right, b!tch, say goodbye to your husband and kids.”
15
#7
Had a weird neighbor. Friendly at first but slowly got colder and colder. They had the same landlord as us.
We were going to have a neighbors back yard party with us, the neighbors on both sides and the neighbors across the alley. Only the weird neighbor declined. Everyone was bringin something, beer from across the alley, sides from most of the others. We were hosting so it was our job to grill some brats and host in the back yard. Had the charcoal grill fired up and put some store bought wood chips on at the end to give the sausages a smokey flavor. I’m stepping out of the kitchen with a big tray of raw meat when a firefighter pokes his head over the back gate.
Firefighter: “Hi, we’ve had a smoke complaint that you are burning trash or yard waste?”
Me: “God I hope not, I’m not that bad of a cook.”
Firefighter: “May I come in and look at your fire?”
Me: “Uh, ok, let me put down this tray.”
I let the guy in, he looks at our charcoal grill.
Firefighter: “Did you put anything other than charcoal and lighter fluid in this?”
Me: “Yeah, some of these wood chips from the grocery store.”
Firefighter: “I hate to say this, but the city has an ordinance against any organic matter other than charcoal in grills.”
Everyone: “What.”
Firefighter: “Yeah, it’s a dumb law and almost never comes up unless you are really burning yard waste or if you have a neighbor who has it in for you. I won’t give you a citation, but I do have to stand here and watch to make sure the fire is completely extinguished before I go.”
Me: “So I can’t grill these dogs?”
Firefighter: “I’m afraid not.”
I proceed to take the tray of raw meat into the house, pop them in the oven to broil and come out to hose down my grill until the whole thing is cold and wet. The firefighter left with an apology and thanked me for not getting mad at him for the bad news. Only one person within six houses wasn’t there and I don’t think any of my guests called the FD on our own party.
Eveningangel,Vincent Keiman/unsplashReport
Final score:
43
Mike F 4 months ago
What a jerk.
14
#8
I had a neighbor who literally thought she owned the actual street and had some big beef with my landlord (she’d sued him several times for things that never made any sense). My landlord installed cameras because she took him to court so often and he needed proof that she was making stuff up.
She would mark down the time that I or any friends of mine arrived at or left my house and would sit in her driveway watching us.
Once, my landlord was going out of town and told me I was welcome to use his grill and have friends over (he lived next door to me). I did so, inviting maybe 5 friends, max, and we had a nice, mellow cook out. No loud music, no drunken debauchery or anything like that. True to form, the nosy neighbor called my landlord and told him that she was calling her lawyer and threatening legal action over our small party. Thankfully my landlord had footage of our gathering and deemed it all totally fine and completely within the bounds of what he’d invited me to do.
She sucked. F**k you, Sandra.
Violinist-Rich,Getty Images/unsplashReport
Final score:
40
Multa Nocte 4 months ago
Yeah, fuck you Sandra as well! Fuck all of you! (shakes fist angrily)
15
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#9
Stole the windshield wipers off of my car. I caught him on a security camera stealing them one night.
Next day I went over to his house and told that some low life stole my d**n wipers. The look he gave me was priceless, don’t think he liked me calling him a low life.
After I told him I had him on video he goes fine take them back and that was the last time I spoke to him.
snoozer854,Mark Boss/unsplashReport
Final score:
39
Mike F 4 months ago
I hope the OP put some Vaseline on the idiot’s windshield when he was done.
13
#10
Lived in a condo with concrete walls and high ceilings that had small gaps in top that allowed sound to pass through.
Cue new neighbor moving in, they have really nice furniture and seem okay.
Group of “friends” stay over and party pretty late during the weekend. No big deal, we like to party too.
Next week another group of “friends” stay over. No issue. She complains that our dogs bark too much. Understandable, as our rescue barks whenever someone is near our front door. I get dog collars to help ease the situation.
Then another group of “friends” stay over and decide to sing at all hours of the night and make noise during the weekday.
This happens 3-5x more times.
I sign up for AirBnB for an upcoming trip. Decided to look at who is hosting an AirBnB in our complex.
Surprise, surprise. Neighbor’s so-called “friends” are actually guests.
I threaten to report her if she didn’t get her guests in check after they took our parking space (people will want to shoot you for their spot).
She bitched me out, so I sent her AirBnB posting to the HOA. No more “friends” and she moved out and sold the condo within a month.
achilleshightops,Oberon Copeland @veryinformed.com/unsplashReport
Final score:
38
Nils Skirnir 4 months ago
Airbnb is a blight upon the earth. And plain evil
32
#11
I live in a townhouse that has an adjacent townhouse on either side. The neighbours on one side are absolutely fantastic.
About two years ago, there were renters on the other side, where the adult male living there was some sort of tradesman who regularly left for work at 4.40am. Whenever he left he would slam his front (metal) gate closed, which would regularly wake me and my 4 year old daughter. (The gate is only about 10 metres from our bedroom windows.)
I wrote a very polite note, explaining that it was a problem and asking them if they could please close their gate quietly. To his credit his started leaving via the other exit.
About a month later, it was becoming clear that my front lawn was increasingly covered in dog p*o, so I set up a webcam to see where it was coming from. Very quickly it became clear that these neighbours were regularly opening their gate, letting the dog out to do its business, and then return home, with no attempt to clear it up.
I approached him one early evening as the dog returned home from its defecation excursion, and (again very politely) asked him and his wife to stop letting the dog leave its business on my front lawn. They denied it, despite the fact that I had just caught the dog in the act, and told them that I had video evidence of what their dog was doing.
That absolute arsehole decided that every morning he left for work thereafter he would literally slam his front gate using all his strength. Some people are human garbage. Thankfully they moved out only a couple of months later.
EvilBosch,Marcel Eberle/unsplashReport
Final score:
32
tori Ohno 4 months ago
I would have scooped it up with a shovel and yeeted it at his front door.
15
#12
Growing up, we had a neighbor with an immaculate lawn and home. He kept it that way by flicking his cigarette butts over the fence and into our yard. To him, we were just white trash.
One day, my mom picked up ALL the butts from our yard and flung them back into his yard. Problem solved. He never did it again.
ShelteringInStPaul,Pawel Czerwinski/unsplashReport
Final score:
32
arthbach 4 months ago
I did this with dog dirt one time. A storm had blown down the fence between our gardens. It was their fence, and they were incredibly slow about getting it replaced. I realised their dog was being let out to ‘do his business’, he’d run through their long grass, and onto our short grass, leaving a ‘present’ behind. I started launching their dog’s present back into their garden. At one point, my husband noticed the neighbour had been watching me do this. The neighbour never said a word, but the following day work started on the fence and my garden was free of dog defecations.
15
#13
Not me, but what the woman who did live in our house did to her neighbors.
We moved into a house up a long shared driveway. Our neighbors are an elderly couple and she has dementia. Sometimes she doesn’t know where she is or what she is doing.
The new neighbor came over one sunday night to ask if he could put his wheely bin in the end of the drive so the rubbish truck could back up the drive to empty it as it would save him trying to move it to the road. I said that was no issue .
Turns out the old resident had her lawyers send the elderly couple a cease and desist letter over putting the rubbish bin in the driveway the first week after she moved in. No knock on the door and ask to stop or talking to them. Straight to get the lawyer involved.
We also found out she got upset about the neighbor with dementia wandering onto her driveway. Remembering she had dementia and didn’t know what she was doing. So she put a chain across the driveway to stop her wandering into her property.
The chain was fitted and hung at about 8 inches off the ground and the first time the elderly lady wandered over she tripped on it and fell face first onto the drive, knocking several teeth out and breaking her hip. She spent some time in hospital and before she even got out of hospital,the elderly neighbor had a knock on the door from the police with a trespass notice…………
All the neighbors were ecstatic when she left and we moved in. I met the woman once and she seemed Ok. But what sort of piece of s**t acts like that towards neighbors?
Amockeryofthecistern,Curated Lifestyle/unsplashReport
Final score:
31
Nuku Nyara 4 months ago
Poor lady with dementia and her husband taking care of her. No one deserves that kind of treatment from a nasty neighbor 😢
22
#14
Bought and moved into a condo and the previous owners apparently did not like cleaning. My third floor deck was green and growing things so went to my downstairs neighbors to let them know I wanted to power wash (note: nothing in condo bylaws prohibits this). First neighbor says of course, do whatever I need. But neighbor below me pitches a royal fit: how dare I inconvenience her? She’d have to move her furniture inside! Decks get dirty, that’s just how it goes. So I talk to the office (as does she) and she whines enough to get them to say no power washing but I can use a garden hose and scrub brush and (important later) soap. Well what would’ve been a 15 min power wash becomes an all day cleaning extravaganza of green soapy grossness going down to her deck. But is the neighbor satisfied? Oh no. She did not realize SOAP would be part of the deal. She is not pleased and come Monday morning is complaining to the office again. Thankfully they told her to shove it.
Runner up prize goes to the unknown neighbor who ran to the office as I was moving in to tell on me for having a doormat, which is, as I later learned, prohibited.
gingersnap9210,Vitaly Gariev/unsplashReport
Final score:
30
arthbach 4 months ago
A doormat is prohibited? What’s the logic behind that?
20
#15
Our neighbors CONSTANTLY complained for like 2 years about a tree in the back yard that looked like it was going to fall. They threatened to sue us if it did. Thing is, the tree was clearly on their property. Like by 5 feet.
Then one day during a strong storm, a huge, seemingly strong & healthy tree, smack dab in the middle of their front yard blows over onto their house. We went over the next day and helped them cut it up & remove it. They could barely make eye contact with us & never said thank you. They did shut up about the other tree though, that’s still standing to this day.
