Arrogant neighbours

[AlexD333]

Right.... Where to begin...

Since October last year me thinks my mrs neighbours have been renovating their house.. Sort of...

They got in some illegal Romanian builders in that slept in a van out the back for 3 months through winter on the side of the road...

They seemed to get no hassle of the police or anyone else for that matter, loads of dodgy work went on and then all of a sudden they were gone...

The first thing they wanted to do was out up a new fence, okay fair enough won't say no to a new fence... Why we didn't do something sooner I will never know but they put up a breeze block wall 6"7 in height... Leaving a horrid side for us and their side all rendered and decorated... Also as they have a tree in the way at the end they decided to just build around onto my mrs land...

This last section of wall has no foundation and has already split away from the wall, I can literally shake it back and forth... The rest of it is pretty ugly...


When we finally went and spoke to them about the state of this wall we got a sob story about cowboy builders that robbed them and all their money... Oh dear... We felt genuinely sorry for em... They also assured the wall would get sorted on our side as it's an eye sore...

Next more builders are in... Heavy drilling, hammering until sometimes 10:30 in the evening every night... Including Saturdays and Sundays...

Regular bonfires are going with house hold wood and such on the fire which a few of us have complained about..

Now these second builders have cleared off...?!? We did not know why originally..

Turns out he refused to pay them, and the first bunch after loads of work!!

One night I've gone off to the gun club, by the time I get back the gas board is here due to dangerous levels in he living room, his meter is chirping of the scale... Nothing to do with us... He knocks on their door to inspect the gas ect... And is told to furb off... To which he says he will call the police... Door is slammed in his face.

Later the police arrive and gain entry to the home... We can hear the meter going berserk next door, they have loads of old copper gas pipes under the floor that they have cemented over... the whole downstairs is a shell.. Seriously... A shell.. I'm not exaggerating

The smell from their front door was so overwhelming but yet they are just strolling about in it...

I've just been over to knock as the fumes of the fire are coming right into my mrs room... It's 26 degrees in here

At first I thought they were just hard done by... Now I know they are just scammers and pee takers... Breeze block wall, late noise, obnoxious fires... Constant shouting and religious babble....

What's a guy supposed to do...

Pictures are a comin'

[AlexD333]

For those of you in the building trade you'll like this one...

This is the quality wall they built around the tree on my mrs land...



Why is it cracking you ask?


Plant cemented into the wall


Nice legal foundation there... Oh wait...




I should not this is just the end section of the wall, the rest does actually have foundation...

Oh yeah.. You can see the last section of wall here... Along with a fire...

And the quality conservatory...


You can imagine how smokey it gets..

[jims-terrano]

That is really not nice, is your house rented or do you own it. If it's rented it might be a hell of a lot easier for you to move and have done with it. If you own your house you've probably got a hell of a legal fight on your hands. Big problem is that often most things like that are covered by civil law rather than criminal law so police wont be interested and chances are neither will the council.

I would suggest buying a couple of carbon monoxide detectors one for downstairs and one for upstairs.

Best of luck.

[rustic]

To pick up on a safety issue, walls less than that have been known to topple and kill children.
Get your views in writing into the council ASAP, if there is danger, they MUST and WILL act.

If they fail to act, and something happens, then if they knew about it and did nothing then they would be criminally negligent.

That wall is dangerous.

[AlexD333]

Cheers for the comments all, my mrs owns the house, the garden was green before the dog pee killed it all

The gas board came and shut it off, and because they were so rude the had man out a special disc inside to stop them turning it on??? They will be able to turn it on but if they don't rectify it it will be shut off from the road and £1000 fine to re activate it.

Problem is nobody working in that house is registered... It's all cheapo work... And crap cheapo work at that...

I like rustics view.. Lady council visit was January, the floor had been down since, apparently it must be inspected before it goes down...?

We called the council and they inspected Friday, we have not called of the report yet but suspect they will have wriggled out of any trouble as usual

Th con cig inspector was not even interested in the wall, and said to my mrs that "the wall is in the back of the garden and distant enough to not be a danger...." Even though there is a bench there

He did says it's an eye sore, ink he must be careful what he says...

No word of a lie I can literally pull it straight down... It rocks back and forth badly!!!

[johnb5177]

Originally Posted by rustic

To pick up on a safety issue, walls less than that have been known to topple and kill children.
Get your views in writing into the council ASAP, if there is danger, they MUST and WILL act.

If they fail to act, and something happens, then if they knew about it and did nothing then they would be criminally negligent.

That wall is dangerous.

Very definitely agree with Rustic on this.

Alex, get loads of pics, a timeline of the whole farce, and go to planning office and building inspector. I daresay they have broken or badly bent a few regulations, and the buttressed for the wall look as if they are your side of the boundary as well, so there is a boundary dispute there......

[jims-terrano]

Boundary disputes are civil law which is costly, time consuming and no guarantees and the costs are all yours.

As said keep diaries and most importantly dont go breaking any laws because it'll be you that suffers not them. Pushing wall over could be criminal damage which then becomes criminal law.

Look at some of the answers on here and think carefully about your next moves.

[Sweety]

Bloody hell i'd have lost it with them, might pay you to have a word with your local planning office about it all but Rick or someone else will know far more than me. Your Mrs garden looks nice by the way
EDIT Rick has replied whilst I was typing

[kitchenman]

a friend of mine had a fence problem, next door put one up 8 ft high, Council said they would talk to him, came back to say he built the fence that high to stop my friend spying on him so they would be taking no action.
Council did not talk to my friend a 50+ year old 5 stone female
Bloke next door, 6ft 18 stone thug with a criminal record and a drink problem
No contest
Criminal justice system nailed him for benefit fraud, someone reported him to DWP
Problem now gone away so has he, new owners cut the fence down to a legal 6 foot

[solarman216]

Think I would be going out there one windy night and push it over, ooer the wind was to blame and it would high light the shoddy construction, cos if you could push it over it really is unsafe, Rick

[Lazy-Ferret]

Originally Posted by solarman216

Think I would be going out there one windy night and push it over, ooer the wind was to blame and it would high light the shoddy construction, cos if you could push it over it really is unsafe, Rick

+1 just make sure you push it into their garden, and they do not have any camera's

[firebobby]

First off, you should get in touch with the building inspector and raise your concerns about the state of the build.
Did the gas board cut off the supply.
That wall is dangerous for anyone in your garden, it appears to be falling over..into your garden.
The back garden looks like a shanty town.

[solarman216]

Pay a visit to your Town Hall, block wall is not a fence and will almost certainly require planning permission, and defo if over 6 ft as will any other building work they have undertaken, there are variations with different councils thou, as they are only issued with "guidelines", so different authorities interpret them in their own way, Rick

[macabethiel]

Originally Posted by solarman216

Pay a visit to your Town Hall, block wall is not a fence and will almost certainly require planning permission, and defo if over 6 ft as will any other building work they have undertaken, there are variations with different councils thou, as they are only issued with "guidelines", so different authorities interpret them in their own way, Rick

I believe that the height for a rear boundary is now 2 Metres, no planning required that includes wooden fences, brick walls and breeze blocks or concrete. Front walls have different rules for open plan areas but local Councils rarely take up cases due to legal costs.

[briggie]

shall I pop down and tell them some jokes ? , they might move then