Selling after harassment from Neighbours

dingleberry123

Three and a half years ago me and my husband purchased a housing association shared ownership flat.
For most of the time we have lived here we have been harassed by a family that lives several doors down. They are an antisocial family that many people have reported for their behaviour, but for some reason they have convinced themselves that I am the only one who made complaints about them, probably because we were the only ones who spoke to them directly about the issues (kids vandalising cars and communal areas, general ASB behaviour). After that they deliberately started targeting us. The last incident happened three months ago in which the Mum was screaming from the car park that she was going to kill us, trying to smash our car up but was being restrained by her boyfriend. The police were involved and she was issued a conditional caution, she also has to write an apology letter. They say she is genuinely sorry but that is nonsense. We haven’t had any problems with her since. We also had problems with a house that is right next to our block of flats who moved in a couple of years ago. They became very good friends with the family that harassed us, and because the Mum has been hell bent on turning everyone against us (literally been going to all the neighbours spreading lies, telling people we have complained about them when we haven’t) this new family turned against us and ganged up with them. Both families got their children to intimidate me, I had to contact the police about the new family as their kids were following me and shouting things at me. That was several months ago, we’ve not had problems since. We asked to do mediation with them but they refused. Our HA have been very unhelpful. The main family have been in breach of their tenancy multiple times, yet they have not been evicted when they should have been. A few months ago we had a new neighbour move in upstairs, after three years of no noise problems this new neighbour makes an unbelievable amount of noise when she walks around. Sounds like an elephant. We wrote her a polite letter explaining the noise and telling her my husbands work schedule (goes to bed early and gets up very early) things are better but it’s still affecting us. We desperately want to sell but I’m realising that we have to declare all of this on the TA6 form, surely nobody will want to buy? Is there any hope? I can’t mentally bear being here anymore. It’s shared ownership so we can’t rent it out.

Davesnave

I think you could write that there were problems with two neighbours who targeted you specifically, now resolved after the intervention of the police.

Many people would infer from this that you were the source of the problem, or equally to blame, but this is unimportant in the situation you have to deal with.

As for the neighbour upstairs, that was happily resolved, wasn't it? Who else would know?

da_rule

Alternatively you could just decline to answer the question. You aren’t obliged to answer any of the questions, but if you do then the responses have to be true.

You may want to ask your solicitor which option is likely to be in your best interest, as either way may cause a buyer to walk away.

Bossypants

I agree with Dave. The only thing you can really do is frame it as a specific problem between you and them, the implication being that it will go away once you are no longer in the picture. It does also sound like that's mostly true? You say other residents have been bothered, but none targeted as you have been, so your specific issue will go away once you do.

Some people will still be put off by that alone, but at the right price, someone will take it off your hands. Be prepared to take a financial hit though - if it helps, you can think of it as the 'getting shot' tax.

AdrianC

It's HA shared ownership - so will the HA simply buy your share back?

dingleberry123

This is what we are wondering, we will ask the HA as a last resort. I don’t care if we don’t make any profit from when we purchased, I just want out.

zagubov

dingleberry123 wrote: »

Three and a half years ago me and my husband purchased a housing association shared ownership flat.

For most of the time we have lived here we have been harassed by a family that lives several doors down.

They are an antisocial family that many people have reported for their behaviour, but for some reason they have convinced themselves that I am the only one who made complaints about them, probably because we were the only ones who spoke to them directly about the issues (kids vandalising cars and communal areas, general ASB behaviour).

After that they deliberately started targeting us. The last incident happened three months ago in which the Mum was screaming from the car park that she was going to kill us, trying to smash our car up but was being restrained by her boyfriend. The police were involved and she was issued a conditional caution, she also has to write an apology letter. They say she is genuinely sorry but that is nonsense. We haven’t had any problems with her since.

We also had problems with a house that is right next to our block of flats who moved in a couple of years ago. They became very good friends with the family that harassed us, and because the Mum has been hell bent on turning everyone against us (literally been going to all the neighbours spreading lies, telling people we have complained about them when we haven’t) this new family turned against us and ganged up with them.

Both families got their children to intimidate me, I had to contact the police about the new family as their kids were following me and shouting things at me. That was several months ago, we’ve not had problems since. We asked to do mediation with them but they refused. Our HA have been very unhelpful. The main family have been in breach of their tenancy multiple times, yet they have not been evicted when they should have been.

A few months ago we had a new neighbour move in upstairs, after three years of no noise problems this new neighbour makes an unbelievable amount of noise when she walks around. Sounds like an elephant. We wrote her a polite letter explaining the noise and telling her my husbands work schedule (goes to bed early and gets up very early) things are better but it’s still affecting us.

We desperately want to sell but I’m realising that we have to declare all of this on the TA6 form, surely nobody will want to buy? Is there any hope? I can’t mentally bear being here anymore. It’s shared ownership so we can’t rent it out.

Just paragraphing it a bit more so more people will be likely to reply

markin

A rule of thumb is anything that was put in writing to a neighbour, or phone calls made to the council or the police, needs to be mentioned.


How many times did you call the police.