‘Neighbour won’t let me get fence in my own garden, he dislikes how they look’

A woman has reached her wits’ end after her “entitled” neighbour made it his mission to stop her from installing a fence between their gardens. She explained how she has an “old but active” dog and has been struggling to keep her confined to her garden without a fence – and decided to go out and buy one to put an end to her problem.

However, as soon as her neighbour heard about her new fence, he marched over and claimed she doesn’t have the right to install it because he likes how his garden looks without one. Taking to Reddit, she said: “About a year ago my family moved states for work. We got a nice house in a good neighbourhood and most of our neighbours are kind and sweet.

“However, the neighbour right next to us has been nothing but a problem since we got here. He is a retired doctor and because of that, he thinks that everyone else should cater to his every word. The first problem we noticed with him was with my little dog.

“She’s old and wouldn’t hurt a fly but she does get excited when meeting new people and loves to be outside. So we were planning on putting up a fence so she could play outside when we have to go to work. Ever since we’ve run that by him though, he’s been giving us ‘alternatives’ to putting up a fence all because he doesn‘t want a fence to ruin the look of his backyard.”

He suggested an “invisible fence” – but she outright refused because she doesn’t want to use a shock collar, or similar, on her precious pet. “He told us to buy her a cage to put her in, we again told him no because the size that he was wanting would have barely given her enough room to do anything,” she added.

Knowing she was adamant on installing a fence, her neighbour planted flowers directly on the property line, meaning they’d have to set it back further into their garden when putting it up. But this isn’t the only problem she has had with her nuisance neighbour, as he is also trying to pressure her in to chopping down a tree on her property because he doesn’t like the “mess” it makes.

She said: “He has also been trying to get us to cut down a perfectly healthy tree in our backyard because he doesn’t like the leaves that blow in his yard from time to time. He has come knocking on our front door a few times to remind us to cut down the tree. We are struggling financially right now so we couldn’t cut it down even if we wanted to. However, my family likes the tree so we don’t think we would cut it down anyway.”

Commenting on her post, one user said: “Ignore him, when you build fence, give them the option to move their flowers. He has no power, stop letting him act like he does. Sorry Mr. Entitled we like our tree and won’t be cutting it down.” Another user added: “Get a survey done and build the fence to code. Don’t give them a reason to take it back down.”

A third user said: “Put up a privacy fence ASAP! If the fence invades their flower bed, so be it. The privacy fencing will allow your family just that… more privacy from him! As far as the rest of his ‘suggestions’ go… always be polite, tell him, ‘Thank you for your suggestion and goodbye’. Remember, it’s your property, your dog, your tree and your choice as to what you do or don’t do.”

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