House next door being bought for social housing

Sammy5

Greetings all! I really need some help and advice please, as things are not going well

Last year I bought a house - it's a little balsa wood/matchstick type thing with bricks around the outside to make it look like a real house. But it is charming and fun in it's own little way and has real character. The area seems really nice and quiet, I should be happy about it. But... (there was always going to be a but!)...

My next door neighbours have been driving me insane. They keep running up and down the stairs, having huge arguments involving screaming, shouting, crying and from the sounds of it, hitting. Then there's the slamming of doors and these random loud thuds which I can't even explain. This is not always during the day, sometimes at night or early in the morning. As a result, I've been staying at friends and relatives houses fairly regularly and trying to avoid the place. I tried staying there last Friday and they kept me up till 6am with all the noise going on in there. I had to cancel all my plans for the following day due to lack of sleep.

In the end I decided to investigate. So I found out from a really nice guy who shares a wall with them that it's being rented by a company who house youths from troubled backgrounds. Last week the house went up for sale and I thought maybe, just maybe, my luck had turned. But I couldn't be that lucky, because the people buying it are that same company who are currently renting it I've only owned the house for a month and I've still not stayed there three nights in a row, neither am I ever likely to at this rate. Given that they're already causing problems for neighbours on both sides (and apparently this has been going on for a while with other youths), is there anything I can do to prevent this company from buying? It seems stupid to me that they're buying a house with thin(ish) walls in a quiet area for this sort of purpose anyway, but I suppose they don't really care. I'm on a fixed 2 year mortgage and I'm scared that I'm going to be put through this for another two years, or perhaps worse than this, and that I might have trouble selling the place due to the company owning the house and using it for this purpose.

To be honest, I feel a little cheated, as I've worked my socks off all my life and feel as though I'm being unfairly punished by something outside of my control. I've only ever been settled properly in one of the houses I've owned, the rest of the time I've had nothing but problems (my first property was a joke, we couldn't even live there at weekends because the drunken kids outside would kick the car in etc.).

Please please please if anyone has any ideas then I'd love to hear them. I'm just feeling completely devastated by it all. I thought I'd found somewhere nice to relax and enjoy my life, but maybe that's just too much to ask for?

Thanks,
Sam

stator

Have you written a letter of complaint? They might not want to buy a property with neighbour disputes.

Sammy5

Sorry, I think maybe I wasn't very clear in my original post. The company who are currently renting it out (and housing people there) is the company who are buying it. So while I guessed there would be no way of preventing someone buying a house generally, I thought that as there had been problems previously with this company then perhaps that might give us some options in stopping them (although I'm clutching at straws, I know). I wrote an e-mail to the company itself and I know the other neighbour has written several e-mails and called them.

I was planning to call the citizens advice bureau tomorrow as well, but I have a feeling this is going to be another sorry chapter in my life and probably two more years down the drain.

trevormax

I'm not an expert on it but some new legislation recently introduced might be of assistance but it depends on a lot of things including the willingness of your police force or local authority to use this new legislation.

The Anti-social behaviour, crime and Policing Act 2014 has a section regarding Closure Orders. They can issue a closure notice although this does not prohibit a person who lives at the address or the owner of the address. A closure Order prohibits everyone (including residents and owners) for a period of up to 3 months from entering the property.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2014/12/part/4/chapter/3/crossheading/closure-orders/enacted

Basically, the police or local council have the power to close a place down if it is causing significant anti-social behaviour. Anti-social behaviour can be anything which causes or is likely to cause harassment, alarm or distress. I would say that your neighbours constantly having a blazing row, shouting, screaming, swearing, hitting things, hitting the wall and who knows what else could cause you alarm and distress.

Like I said, I am not an expert in this new legislation so I could be completely wrong.

My suggestion is to complain to the council ASB team, complaint to the police and complain to the landlord. Check if your council has a landlord liaison section which deals with private landlords and complain to them. Complain to your local councillor, complain to your MP, get other neighbours involved.

Sammy5

Thanks, that's really useful actually. I guess ultimately I'll have two options... either go down this route and complain, get the police and council involved and do my best to fight it. Or I just accept it for two years. The only advantage to the latter is that I wouldn't need to declare it when I sold the property, which is a worry to me anyway, given that it could seriously hinder the sale if anyone knew the situation next door.

fishpond

Buy it, then let it out, or, as suggested go down the http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/...orders/enacted route.
Either way, I wish you the best of luck.

System

Good luck with closure. You are going to need a solid string of reported problems plus a failure of any other methods of dealing with the problem by authorities before they would even consider a closure notice. This is used as an absolute last resort.

bnegative

have you tried approaching the youths and discussing your problems rather than thinking of going straight to the landlords.

You say you would like to prevent the association from buying the property but where do you suppose they move too?

Maybe they should restrict these associations to only buying propertys on council estates or easier still and just leave these troubled youths to fend for themselves on the streets.

Sarcasm aside

Invite some round for a tea and biscuit and mention how much noise you can actually hear, you may find these troubled youths are actually decent human beings but not aware how thin the walls are.

Davesnave

bnegative wrote: »

Maybe they should restrict these associations to only buying propertys on council estates or easier still and just leave these troubled youths to fend for themselves on the streets.
.

That's entirely your suggestion, not the OP's.

My daughter works in this field. The young people she works with are, by definition, both troubled and vulnerable, so while they may have many positive qualities, they often keep anti-social hours and are not always amenable to reason.

Over time things can, and do, improve. The youngsters move on to a place of their own, but that means there are always new ones arriving who have behavioural problems.

It's therefore not desirable to house troubled youngsters in ordinary houses, bang semi-detached to ordinary families. That's not the situation where my DD works.

It's not good to isolate said youngsters either, which is why the unit closest to me is within our village. It's also detached, with a large garden.

The image the youngsters have gained in our small village is entirely positive and they're often involved in local activities, but I'm sure that wouldn't be the case if they lived in a close- packed residential street. After all, I sometimes hear them myself and I'm 1 km away!

Tea & biscuit by all means, at the right time.

bnegative

Davesnave wrote: »

That's entirely your suggestion, not the OP's.

It was also a sarcastic comment

But you decided to leave that part out of your quote.



I genuinly sympathize with the OP, I have had noisy neighbours.

We tried the sensible approach and recieved empty promises. We moved after a year as life is too short.

The OP appears to be skipping the first basic step and jumping straight to the extreme.

There is every chance these people next door will sympathize once they are actually aware of the issues.

susan42

I have just sold a house and there was a part on the form that I had to sign saying "what are the neighbours" like. Surely you will have some form of recompense
Might be worth taking it up with solicitors

I'm not an expert and views are entirely my own. So if I'm talking a load of twaddle , my apologies