Neighbor is Not Happy With Me

[Wayne County Hose]

He told me that I was city folk that was trying to blend into the country life and that I had no idea what I was doing. This is from a guy that apparently despises livestock of any type and drives a BMW. I am not familiar with a hatred of livestock and love for BMW's being "country" attributes.

Eddie,

I have read many of your posts and truly respect and admire you. You would make a great neighbor. I don't think anyone (including me) is judging this neighbor by the car he drives, but by the words he has spoken. But let's look at this objectively. He speaks of "city folk" trying to blend into "country life" yet he is the one with the beemer. Maybe it's different out there, but here in the northeast, "country folk" just don't drive beemers. It doesn't mean anything mean or deragatory, it's just a fact. The only beemers around here are from "city folk." How many 4wd F-350's with a steel flat bed do you see in the city? Not many, unless it's a contractor. Around here, that's daily transportation.

We have the same problem around here, hence in my signature, "If they call it tourist season, how come we can't shoot them." People come up here from the city, move next to a dairy farm, then want it closed down because of the cow manure smell. Now mind you most of my dearest friends are from the city, but they are not like that. It's the bad ones that make a bad name for the good ones.

As far as being "arrogant and displeased" by his view being ruined, displeased I could see, but arrogant? I'm sure this neighbors house "ruined" someone elses "view" also. And, a "view" is not a right. If you have one, great. If someone buys a piece of property and puts up a house on it in your view, too bad. Deal with it.

 

[Podunkadunk]

I am building a new home in middle Tennessee and decided to go over an introduce myself to my new neighbors this past weekend. I did not get three words out of my mouth when my new neighbor proceeds to tell me how displeased he is with the siting and orientation of my new home. He is used to having an open field next to him and now there is a house there. He told me that the "country" thing to have done would have to included him in the decision making process on where to site my home. My options were very limited where I could locate my house because of the terrain and I was completely unaware that I should have asked my neighbor if it was o.k. to build a house in that location on my property. In the summer time, we cannot see each others houses because of the leaves on the trees. Now that it is winter, we can easily see each other. Keep in mind that these two houses are at least 750 feet apart. I admit that I am not a deeply rooted country man. I grew up in a very rural part of southern Maryland but have lived in Tampa, Florida for the past 15 years. Have I committed a country faux pas or is my neighbor just venting. I would really like to befriend the guy and his family but it is not looking good at this point. I have committed to planting 6 white pine trees to help further screen the houses which will help immensely in the winter.

In addition, I have three miniature donkeys that I will be keeping at the house. His reaction to that was just as negative. He told me that I was city folk that was trying to blend into the country life and that I had no idea what I was doing. This is from a guy that apparently despises livestock of any type and drives a BMW. I am not familiar with a hatred of livestock and love for BMW's being "country" attributes.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. The city part of me wants to tell the guy to go fly a kite and that I am going to do whatever I want to do regardless of what he thinks. But I am just not like that and would like to be a good neighbor and friend to this guy.

Thanks,
Mike

I hope I'm not the only one reading these post and hoping the comments are not mostly said in humor.

The neighbor with the BMW never did anything towards the original poster. He stayed on his land and did his own thing. There's no incication that he's tried to have the house stoped from being built, or that he's trying to stop him from having donkeys.

Eddie

Not true Eddie, the guy with the beemer was being negative and talking down to Mike (Haneyrm) regarding his house orientation, him not getting his advice on where to put his home and made it clear he didn't like the idea of him putting donkey's on the land. The guy is a jerk. Yes, Mike did go see him, on his land, but still...he could have been hospitable, which around here, is synonymous with "country".

Sure, nobody wants to lose their nice, open field view, but hey...he should have bought it or leased it.

Mike,
Drown the guy with kindness. Don't go out of your way to do it, but you'll draw more flies with honey than vinegar. It's a "hard row to hoe" so to speak, but you'll be the better man for it. Otherwise, if you guys have a "lifetime" of despise for each other, he may throw a handful of roofing nails on your driveway one day or something worse. Listen, I'm usually the first one to jump on the bandwagon AGAINST fumbling idiot neighbors, but you have to remember...he is your neighbor and you'll have to live with the consequences of your actions/words/looks for a long time to come. You WON'T be lucky enough for him to sell out...trust me. Besides, if you guys become friends, you'll have a good neighbor. Good neighbors are indispensable when it comes to helping out around a farm/homestead. You'll have someone to help put up fences, feed your animals when you are on vacation and keep an eye on your place. The benefits are endless, but on the other hand, if he's an enemy, you'll have to always keep an eye on him.

One final thought if all else fails:
Great fences make great neighbors!

Mike, enjoy your property.

Podunk

 

[dmccarty]

Seems like no matter where we live there are always problem neighbors...

My parents live in a gated golf community which I still find hard to believe that my dad would live in such a place. I guess they figured there would be less problems with the neighbors.

Nope. They have a neighbor that works a second shift and like to come home and talk on the pourch late at night which keeps my parents awake. Security won't do anything. Talking with the neighbor does not do anything.

Personally, I would be up at sunrise every morning running a chainsaw until the neighbor realized that two can play at this game and it would be mutually beneficial for us both to play nice and get some sleep... Since my parents are retired they can nap during the day....

I wont list the problems we have with one neighbor. Talking with them wont help.

We just smile and wave. The wife will wave back. The husband will turn his back on you. We just keep smiling and waving.

Its less stressful this way. Let 'em live in their own mess.

Later,
Dan

 

[MossRoad]

Also, I would not grovel, nor "act nice" trying to be a friend...(taking the high ground).

Taking the high ground is a military move... taking the high road is a moral move.

Try the high road, first.

 

[riptides]

.........
My other biggest problem is when people move in and start trying to change what happens around them. Example idiots moving next to an airport, shooting range, ORV area, farm, etc, and then whining/wanting restrictions because it's noisy, or smelly or something.

But change happens. Things don't stay the same forever, and many factors such as zoning and re-districting play a part in the change.

-Mike Z.

 

[tommu56]

Years ago we had a guy in our area that people were complaing about him wanting to expanig his buisness so the township woulden't give him the exemption to do it. He found that he was in an aggrecutral area and started a small pig operation (didnt need any permision) needless to say the guy got his exemption after the "stink" of the pig farm the few extra cars wernt an issue any more.

If you can start raising some pigs then he wont raise a "stink" about were your house is!!!
tom

 

[MarkV]

Around here the "country" saying is a good fence makes good neighbors. Although the pig farm is and interesting alternative if a fence does not work. No one can say that is not the "country" way of living.

You might want to consider some Leland Cypress as a tree barrier. They are fast growing, after the first year about 3 per year, nicely shaped and make a wonderful barrier.

MarkV

 

[stumpfield]

I hope I'm not the only one reading these post and hoping the comments are not mostly said in humor............

Eddie

Eddie's got a point here. I felt the same way. The neighbor has the right to his opinion and feelings regarding what's around him just has much as you have the right to build on your land. Remember, you come to him. He didn't knock on your door to tell you how much he dislike your home or try to stop you from building it... Country or not, it's just people. At least you got an honest neighbor. The best you can do is to minimize the impact by fencing and screen with trees. May be you can ask his opinion again to see what you will say....

I got the same problem many years ago but only it's in the city. Unfortunately, my city requires a public hearing when you apply for a building permit. One neighbor against it for the same reason. The only differience is he can play games and use delay tactics to slow down the permit process. After 2 years and spent tens of thousands on waste paper work, I gave up the fight and sold the land. Lesson learned.... Before I buy land to build and plan to live there, I always visit the neighbors 1st. Even that, there's no guarantee you will have good neighbors. That's one reason I chose to build in the middle of nowhere and and no neighbor within miles.

 

[the_sandman_454]

But change happens. Things don't stay the same forever, and many factors such as zoning and re-districting play a part in the change.

I agree some things are subject to change. Certain things, however, should not if they've been a certain way for a while. If you move next to an established race track, you should then not have the right to complain about it's operation, since you should have reasonably known it's there. Same with a shooting range, or other activities. It's up to the buyer to do his/her research and actually try to understand how things are in the area they're considering buying into.

I don't like when "cityfolk" try to move out into the country and then push for all the same laws and stupid restrictions they had in the city. Bottom line for me is "it's the country, get over it".

 

[AlanB]

I have a neighbor that refuses to speak to us. We bought the house he grew up in and there is some real bad blood between him and his mom for selling it.

It bothers me somewhat, but at the end of the day, I just go the other direction and have Wonderful neighbors, and that is where I focus my thoughts.

I wish it could have been better, and I am sure he and I would get along well, and I am probably the worse off not knowing him, but it is just beyond my control, so I wave, and leave it at that.

Maybe in some years it will change.

Before we bought, I did go to all the neighbors, because I would just rather avoid a fight if possible (we passed on several places where our landscaping business would cause hassles) I knew I was at the right place when I was speaking with my neighbor and I said that we would have tractors and equipment there, would that bother them.

His reply is that he sure hoped they were GREEN, them little blue ones may get run over (so far they are surviving)

Good luck, I would wave and smile and be sincere about it, but let him to himself. Hopefully it will get better over time.

 

[RedRocker]

Oh NO! I just figured out that I might be POW POW Mike.

 

[jinman]

Oh NO! I just figured out that I might be POW POW Mike.

If you bragged that the value of your gun collection was 10 times the value of your $1000 trailer house, I might consider that name for you. Otherwise, you can't hold a candle to Pow-Pow Larry.

BTW: I'm having a 40' container delivered tomorrow morning to build a temporary shelter. This next year I'm gonna get my old barn torn down before they start callin' me Crooked-Barn Jim. With any luck I'll get a shop built there before I retire.

 

[SLOBuds]

Well, there are a lot of approaches floated here. I always try to be at peace with my neighbors, but get what I want. The objective is to have him or her understand my perspective and even buy into the result I want to have.

Along the way I'll take compromises that are basically OK for me - nothing important though, from my perspective.

These conversations sometimes have rough edges but I always want the thing to end up on a positive note. There are some people on the other side of the table who will not be happy. Ever. I do continue to try to understand the person and try to help him make sense of where I'm coming from. But there are people, though, who just will not be happy.

And yes, I do think better results are achieved when you try to get in front of potential issues. So I try (and fail many times) to figure out who might be affected by my actions, and go out there to make sure they are squared away. Doesn't mean that I succeed. But getting in front of things in this way usually has a better result than not trying at all.

It's darn hard to do. Any many times I don't even see that someone is affected ... blows over my head.

When I was getting my MBA, I had a couple of 'capstone' classes - one of them organizational development. It covered (literally) hundreds of theories of motivation. One of the naive students asked the professor 'So, with all of these theories, which one is right?' Then the professor laughed and went ahead with an answer. He said the right answer was to live by the golden rule: treat others as you would like to be treated.

I said 'you mean, after all this work, THAT's the answer???' It would have made my semester a lot easier if he told us that earlier! But I remember that simple answer to this day. No MBA required!

 

[BigE_]

I have the good neighbor / bad neighbor scenario. I was warned about the bad neighbor even before I moved in, I didn't really think anyone could be *that* bad, so I made a go at friendship.

Day I moved in, the moving truck didn't have enough power to get up the driveway so we have to unload at the bottom and made 30 trips (1/4 mile each way) with the pickup to unload the truck. To top it off, the well decided to quit working (and our car got rear-ended, same day, but that's a different story).

The good neighbor hears about the well not working, happens to own the well shop in town, and comes over and fixes it for free with a welcome to the neighborhood.

The bad neighbor I meet late that night just as we are finishing up with the unloading of the big truck at the bottom of the driveway. He says hi, and then that he noticed the truck at the bottom. He said he would've gotten his big tractor out and pulled it up the hill for us, but he was busy and didn't have the time. (This from the guy who tried to run over his other neighbor with said tractor and ended up getting arrested for the trouble).

Things have progressed to a point where I just completely ignore him. I tried being neighborly, but that didn't work out.

My passive agressive act is to build firewood storage buildings along the fence line any place his house or driveway is visible from mine. And then I put big ugly green tarps on the back side.

The good neighbor, we chat over the fence, kids play with their kids, etc., so things are good. Four years out in the countryside now for me, and still loving it.

 

[ultrarunner]

I've got a friend named Ron. He acted as the General Contractor when he built his home.

Just about daily, someone from the area would come by with some complaint or negative comment. Too much grading, trees being removed, more traffic, view conflicts... the neighborhood was simply against any change and angry that the county gave Ron a building permit.

Each time someone new visited the site, he would go over to greet them, shake their hand and and ask them where they lived.

Before anyone had a chance to say much of anything, Ron pulled out a note pad and said, "Let me get your address and the names of everyone in your family so my wife can invite you to our open house." Most people were caught off-guard and did know what to make of Ron.

Last Christmas... Ron was told by the wife of one of Ron's the most outspoken opponents that she had never her seen her Husband so flustered. The Husband said this guy wants to be friends and I don't trust him... their kid now go tot the same class and the families get along fine.

 

[hazmat]

I...My passive agressive act is to build firewood storage buildings along the fence line any place his house or driveway is visible from mine. And then I put big ugly green tarps on the back side. ....

You should use Blue tarps to match your tractor.

So far I've been striking out on the direct neighbor front. We have met some nice folks in the "neighborhood" though.

To the West we have "crazy guy" who likes to yell at the world while out in the yard. To the East we have clueless Mrs. L who is letting her beautiful old barn rot in place & is letting the yard return to forest. A couple years ago I brush-hogged it for her (gratis), but she hasn't maintained it since. Now there are saplings obscuring my view of the old barn .

The latest whopper is that Mrs L has rented her apartment to a *** offender - her tenant was arrested a couple weeks ago for exposing himself to a couple middle school girls walking down the street (school is a block away). Mrs. L is in real estate - you'd think she'd do a background check on her tenants living in her house. The guy has done time for burglary. My wife is wanting to trade our labs in for a "more aggressive model" to protect our daughter .

 

[Haneyrm]

Wow! Thanks for all of the advice. I need you guys as neighbors (at least most of you). The high road is the only road I will ever take and is exactly my plan in this case. There is no reason why we cannot be good neighbors. If he does not want to be my friend, I'm fine with that. I have other friends. I will give it time, be polite and courteous, and see what comes of it. I am also fine with ignoring him all together for the rest of my life. This is his choice.

I did not give you the entire story. What makes this a little more difficult for me to swallow is that this house is a home we have built for my elderly parents to live out the rest of their lives in. The very last thing I need is for them to be hassled. I live further back on the property and my house is completely screened by trees and is at least 1/2 mile from this guys house. We built my parents house there because quite frankly, that is the only spot we could afford to build it. Keep in mind that this is two houses on almost 60 acres. It is not like a development or anything. My front field is a sloping 20 acre pasture and their house is at the top of the hill with a great view of the surrounding hillsides. We are very happy with the house and location and are looking forward to living so close to my parents once again.

Oh well, live and learn. Thanks again for the great advice and funny stories.

Mike

 

[sandman2234]

Right up my alley!
I live on 2.5 acres, with a 2.5 acre wooded lot next door to me. Nothing on it, but I talked to the owner of it, right after I moved in and told him if he ever decided to sell, let me know. He sold, never said a word. I contacted the new owner, told them the same thing. Then a couple years later, a very small 4sale sign pops up. I immediately called, asked how much, told them who I was, etc. They put the sign up, then sold another piece of land elsewhere and couldn't sell that one due to tax problems(capital gains?). They took the sign down within a week. I had my Mom call, just in case they had something against me, with an offer. They told her the same story, so she gave them her phone number and said call her when they were ready. I came out of the house one day and there is two guys with machette's in one hand and a beer in the other right next to my fenceline. I asked what they were doing, and they said they were trying to give the owner an estimate for clearing the property. The owner's name wasn't right(so I thought) so I called the number they had, and sure enough, the property had sold. They cleared it completely, left about half a dozen trees on the entire property, and those are 5" or less. Then they build a house in the lowest part of the property, exactly 15' from my fence, right across from my garage/shop and the eyesore that is my junkyard. They built a 5500 square foot house, and have almost $600,000.00 in it, so far, and they aren't done. Still have the pool, 2.5 acres of sod, and a fence to go that I know about. Since they built it so close to the property line, there isn't room to channel the water around the house, so that has become a problem. I started stockpiling dirt to be ready when they are done, to prevent his elevation changes from affecting me. The new owner is a little cocky, telling us he was going to "overbuild" the neighborhood.
I do tractor work for all the neighbors when they need it, no charge, but when he asked me about it, I told him I normally charge $60 an hour, but since he was a neighbor, $40 would do it. He had me bush hog the property so they could get to the back of it. They purchased it without ever walking more than 30 feet into it, and it is 630 deep. I wave, but the requests to borrow my truck and skilsaw didn't get noticed in time for him to use them.
By the way, he is a car salesman, and sells... yep, you guessed it, BMW's.
David from jax

 

[Podunkadunk]

Right up my alley!......
By the way, he is a car salesman, and sells... yep, you guessed it, BMW's.
David from jax

Bravo...I got a good laugh out of this story!

 

[RobJ]

Do the ah schucks routine bring him over a bottle and tell him for now on you'll check with him before you do anything. You are right you did nothing wrong BUT banging heads (especially while building) is something you don't have the time for. Being right doesn't mean a thing if he decides to call the powers to be (ie building dept, epa, health dept etc) every time he sees an opportunity. P.S. you might want to down size that house you're building and sell pronto. Isn't that why you moved out to the country? to get away from those xxxxx. -Ed

Yep just play it cool, you may have lost him as a friend but you like to keep others if possible. We had some folks build across the road from us at the same time (can't see their cabin). They stopped by one day and the first thing they said is they were going to build their "big" house right out in front of ours. I just said great man you can keep an eye on our place. Well they have since proven to be XXXX with everyone, once asked their other neighbor if they could put their fence on HIS side of the creek (the line goes down the middle of the creek). Of course he said no. I've gotten in with all the locals nicely. Borrow a tractor, hunt, fish on their place, ride atvs on there place. When the phone company came out to put in a phone they parked behind the house, they were greeted by my neighbor with a rifle sticking out the window. He suggested they park around the front and they moved their truck. On the other hand if my neighbors house was burning, we'd all help by grabbing a coathanger and some marshmellows!!