[Nicky]

My girlfriend and I moved in together back in February this year, into a nice little 1-bed flat in a block of 9 in Surbiton. We thought this would be a lovely quiet friendly 'commuter-belt' sort of place and never really expected to get to know the neighbours or to get involved in block-of-flat politics.

Oh my God. How wrong were we! We are one of three flats on the ground floor, and the little old lady in number 1 is an absolute bloody nightmare. She's single, retired, and a 'director of the residents' association'. As she doesn't have a job (not even just helping out with the WI or at the Oxfam shop or anything old lady-ish like that), the residents' association is evidently her life. And as such she takes it upon herself to ensure its rules are rigorously enforced at all times.

After living here for a couple of weeks, I washed my car out in the street. The main entrance is round the back, but we have a patio door and a few feet of grass between our living room and a 2-foot high wall between us and the road (quiet with residents permit parking). I thought it'd be quite reasonable to fill up my bucket in the flat, go out the patio door, hop over the wall and wash the car in the street. No! She appears out of nowhere and asks "can you do me a little favour please and not jump over the wall". First complaint of many, although I wasn't to know at the time... She suggested next time I just take it round the back to the garage area (with the big 'no parking' sign - our flat doesn't have a garage although some others do), and as a bonus use the communal hosepipe. Fair enough then - but a bit ridiculous about jumping over the wall...

Next one, as we washed our clothes in preparation for going off on holiday back in April, we hung them out in the sun on our patio to dry quickly so we could get them packed. Up she pops again, telling us it's against the rules to hang washing out and could we take it in straight away please. Give me a break... who actually cares??

On another occasion, we planned to have a barbecue, just the two of us, on our patio. We thought we'd check with our landlord about smoke etc, and he said it should be fine and maybe just check with the neighbours in case it bothers anyone. So we popped a note through every door to that effect a few hours before, and had no comments - except of course from her, who pops up to say "thanks for the note, actually we're not allowed barbecues because of our public liability insurance, and nobody round here really has barbecues anyway". For Christ's sake...

On other occasions I've also been told off for walking across the communal grass outside - walking the length of it so as not to jump over the aforementioned wall, even though I park directly opposite our window, the entrance from the street is at her end of the grass - because I have to go past her window and it invades her privacy. Apparently because nobody walks past people's balconies on the upper floors she shouldn't have to put up with it down here, despite it being a communal lawn... Could I "keep it to a minimum please" she says.

By the same token, she's once intercepted our Tesco delivery man before he could even get out of his van to tell him not to walk across the grass and to please go round the back.

Now the garage area round the back has been freshly tarmacced in the last few weeks. Before this took place she made it abundantly clear to me that I wasn't allowed to do "car maintenance" round there - in her words this includes "oil changing, wheel changing, anything...". She subsequently reminded me before the tarmac was laid, when I was cleaning my car out there, that "once the tarmac has been laid you'll only be able to clean your car and not do any maintenance" because she doesn't want "anyone making a mess". Oil changing, hmm fair enough, but wheel changing....? Whatever...

But today takes the biscuit! I was out the back washing my car, when she comes out in a right flap, telling me "you're not allowed to wash your car round here any more!". I pointed out that she specifically said I would "only" be allowed to wash the car. But no - now that the tarmac is down she doesn't want any "mess".

I'm a very patient man (my girlfriend had already given up speaking to her a couple of months ago) but at this point I ended up just shouting at the old bat, pointed out that she said exactly the opposite a couple of weeks ago and that she should "make her mind up". She told me to finish what I was doing and then not do it again...

The big question is, when it rains, how are we ever going to protect the tarmac from all this "mess" falling from the sky?!

She may be a little old lady, but she absolutely does my head in!!

Sorry that was such a long one but as you can tell it's been simmering away for a while!

 

[Guest]

WOW, I have just read that and my blood is boiling. How have you not made a mess of the tarmac by digging it up and putting her under it?

Makes me appreciate the flats here, I don't actually know many of the people here but generally everyone gets on and has far better things to do than get shirty over sweet FA.

Not sure how your system works but can you not complain to the management company? We have two blocks of 6 flats and a few maisonettes in our setup and a couple of people act as company directors but there is a company that manages it all.

 

[ACAPULCO AL]

kill her

 

[craig matthew]

Yeh down the woods with her Dig dig chop chop job done

 

[classicgal93]

Are these 'rules' printed up somewhere? or does she make them up on the fly?

 

[symon]

Tell her to get stuffed. You pay the rent, and you are going to do what the hell you like.

Unless you have signed a written agreement not to do these things then she cannot do a lot.

The busy-body old bag just has nothing better to do.

 

[GJ]

Good grief..... She is obviously related to Herr Schickelgruber.

How did she become director of the residents association.... presumably
you have association meetings at which the Directors are elected.

Have you asked the other residents what they think of her

It sounds like you need to canvass the opinions of the other residents
and see if you can get her voted off. (I know 90% of the other residents
will be apathetic but she must have upset someone else). If not voted
off she obviously needs a co-director to hold her in check... do you fancy
the job?

I the end you may have to take over her role yourself... payback time.
I don't really see any other solution.

My mother lived in a block a bit like yours and yes there were problems
with communal areas and people breaking the rules... but a bit of common
sense from the residents association usually solved the problems.

 

[Guest]

Crikey.....she sounds like an utter nightmare!!!

MrsM and I rented a flat in a block when we first moved in together. There was a 'residents committe director' there. One evening our landlord called me saying that he had received a complaint about me using 'five' parking bays rather than the allocated '1'. One was my own car, one was MrsM's, the third was MrsM's after the first was written off, one was my friend's, and the fifth, well purely a figment of someone's imagination. The point is that we never used any other spaces apart from our allocated space, thus there was only ever one car at any one time in the carpark.
Our landlord later explained that the residents committe director was a bit of a busy body with nothing to do:lol:

 

[1of1]

Tell her to get a life!

 

[Stu GTV]

Sounds like a total nightmare......she will not change, just ignore her when she speaks to you, unless the rules are in your contract or displayed in the communal lobby she can't do anything except annoy you, bite your tongue and walk away when she starts a rant and that will annoy her more.........

Failing that.....dog poo through her letterbox.......

 

[Nicky]

All your comments totally echo our own thoughts and those of everyone I tell about this nightmare of an old bat! The problem is that as we're renting, we don't get any 'official' say with the residents' association and management company.

However, our letting agent and landlord are fully aware of how much of a nuisance she is and totally agree with us. With the latest car washing incident yesterday, our agent called up today and said he'd mentioned it to the landlord who is pretty annoyed that he's paid towards the tarmac but his tenants aren't able to use it - so will be having a word with her in the next week or so.

As for having the rules written down - some of them are covered in a two-page set of rules that come with the flat, the one about hanging washing out for example. But I've never seen written down anywhere anything about barbecues, car washing or maintenance, walking across the grass or jumping over the wall. She always has some excuse like they're 'in the deeds', which as tenants we haven't got copies of, or that 'the tarmac is jointly owned by the individual garage owners' so is covered under different rules. Or that 'we're not covered under our public liability insurance' for barbecues. How much of this is total BS I unfortunately can't easily find out, but she's now rapidly pushing me to the point where I want to find out as much as I can so I can tell her where to go.

 

[alfapud]

just shout at her. she keeps telling you off because she knows you will listen to her. she hasn't got any real power has she? just do what you like. the only thing she can do is complain to the landlord right? and if they get wind of it (i'm sure they're not going to ring you up for excessive grass walking) you can always just talk to them about it and see if she is right or not. :thumbs:

 

[Stu GTV]

Grass is there to be sat or walked on, golf courses and parks look Ok having people walk on them.......:thumbs:

 

[Guest]

Grass is there to be sat or walked on, golf courses and parks look Ok having people walk on them.......:thumbs:

Looking at it from another angle Stu, grass with head stones on it looks quite nice in a way......RIP annoying old woman:lol:

 

[divadiva]

Tell her to get a life!

+1

She sounds bored, bless her!

 

[Scudetto]

no matter how annoying she might be, she might be right with respect to what you can and can't do under the terms of your tenancy. It might be worth checking this first, so you know where you (and her!) stand legally.

I'd also suggest (don't laugh) inviting her over for a glass of wine one evening. You can use that time to befriend her; maybe she has had nightmare residents in the past, and has decided to rule with an iron fist because of it. Plus, if she sees you as 'good neighbours', she might be a bit more chilled when it comes to upholding the rules. So it might be worth hearing her side of things, too.

I've had a few problems here (barking dog, and my parking bay being taken - now resolved); in anticipation of this, I now charm the pants off new neighbours, so when/if there is a problem, it becomes more of an 'oh and by the way...' polite request from a friendly neighbour, rather than a 'them v us' war between parties who only speak when one is pi55ing off the other.

All i'm saying is...you trap and kill more flies with honey, than you do with vinegar

Whatever you do, i hope you get it resolved, as our homes should be peaceful places, where we feel at ease, especially when we're living private lives in public places.

Good luck! :thumbs:

 

[PaulR]

no matter how annoying she might be, she might be right with respect to what you can and can't do under the terms of your tenancy. It might be worth checking this first, so you know where you (and her!) stand legally.

I'd also suggest (don't laugh) inviting her over for a glass of wine one evening. You can use that time to befriend her; maybe she has had nightmare residents in the past, and has decided to rule with an iron fist because of it. Plus, if she sees you as 'good neighbours', she might be a bit more chilled when it comes to upholding the rules. So it might be worth hearing her side of things, too.

I've had a few problems here (barking dog, and my parking bay being taken - now resolved); in anticipation of this, I now charm the pants off new neighbours, so when/if there is a problem, it becomes more of an 'oh and by the way...' polite request from a friendly neighbour, rather than a 'them v us' war between parties who only speak when one is pi55ing off the other.

All i'm saying is...you trap and kill more flies with honey, than you do with vinegar

Whatever you do, i hope you get it resolved, as our homes should be peaceful places, where we feel at ease, especially when we're living private lives in public places.

Good luck! :thumbs:

Great advice.

The alternative is to smile sweetly at her but ignore anything she says.

I doubt that the residents association has any legal status but you could join it and "sway" opinions in your favour.

 

[GhostyDog]

Set her on fire, old ladies are generally quite dried up so she'll go with bang and the police will think it was spontaneous human combustion

 

[Nicky]

no matter how annoying she might be, she might be right with respect to what you can and can't do under the terms of your tenancy. It might be worth checking this first, so you know where you (and her!) stand legally.

I'd also suggest (don't laugh) inviting her over for a glass of wine one evening. You can use that time to befriend her; maybe she has had nightmare residents in the past, and has decided to rule with an iron fist because of it. Plus, if she sees you as 'good neighbours', she might be a bit more chilled when it comes to upholding the rules. So it might be worth hearing her side of things, too.

I've had a few problems here (barking dog, and my parking bay being taken - now resolved); in anticipation of this, I now charm the pants off new neighbours, so when/if there is a problem, it becomes more of an 'oh and by the way...' polite request from a friendly neighbour, rather than a 'them v us' war between parties who only speak when one is pi55ing off the other.

All i'm saying is...you trap and kill more flies with honey, than you do with vinegar

Whatever you do, i hope you get it resolved, as our homes should be peaceful places, where we feel at ease, especially when we're living private lives in public places.

Good luck! :thumbs:

Unfortunately the time for pleasantries has, as far as we're concerned, completely passed. As I say I'm far more patient than Mrs. Nicky, and if I were to invite her over I think we (the neighbour and I) would both be chucked out :lol:

I've always been very civil to the neighbour and have grimaced but politely taken on board her advice, sorry instructions, on most occasions. The fact is that she goes about it in such an unnecessary manner - most of the 'infractions' we've caused have, in reality, been of no problem to anybody, and a common sense approach would seem to be far more appropriate than her calling everyone up on every little thing.

It literally feels like living in a boarding school, and has got to the point where we're paranoid about going out to the bins or sitting on our patio because we know that sooner or later she'll pop up from somewhere and get herself involved. All we want is to just live here and get on with our lives, without constant interference from a busybody with nothing better to do - and she unfortunately adds an element of stress to the experience of living in our own home, entirely down to her own actions.

And on top of our moaning, everyone else we've spoken to about her at any length (4 of our neighbouring flats) feels exactly the same way we do. As tenants we can't do anything about it, but our managing agent today told me that our landlord is annoyed at her regarding the latest no car washing rule and will be speaking to her about it - he doesn't see why he should pay towards the tarmac if his tenants aren't allowed to use it.

 

[Sterzo]

smile sweetly at her but ignore anything she says.

+1