UK Landlord Forum / Life

Hi all,

My fifth tenant has now decided to leave after having been subject to 6 months of abuse and hell from the neighbor adjoining the maisonette. All 4 previous tenants have lasted 6 months and have all cited this neighbor from hell as the culprit for their misery and reason for leaving. This has put me at substantial financial loss not to mention the stress. This is my first property and subsequently my first time as a landlord.

I have exacerbated all my options. The troublesome neighbor likes to throw his weight around and seems to relish bullying my tenants he is also very devious, he has filed noise complaints with each one of my tenants with the council, complains to both letting agencies about the noise, my current tenant mentions that the last straw was when they abused and threw stones at his mum while she was visiting instigating my tenant to angrily shout at the neighbor who recorded the interaction on his phone. When my tenant called the police they did nothing as the neighbor had footage of my tenant shouting. Emails from my previous 4 tenants include incidents where the troublesome neighbor, grabbed Tenant A round the throat and threatened him in my property. He jumped over the garden fence and threatened Tenant B. Threats to steal, shoot, beat up Tenant C and Tenant D apparently used to come home from work and watch TV wearing headphones so as not to disturb him, the list is a lot longer than this.

Police have been called on 6 separate occasions by 2 different tenants (the other two were too scared to).

I have contacted the landlord of the property direct, and their letting agent who is not prepared to do anything about it giving the excuse that it is one tenants word against another. I am have now lost my fifth tenant, is this not evidence enough that the neighbor is the cause of the problem?

My letting agent has tried to influence the other letting agent but I feel both have dragged their feet hoping that the dust will settle. My letting agent now is refusing to re-let the property due to this neighbour.

I feel like I only have two options: Reluctantly sell the property or try and re-let the property by switching my current agent to the same letting agent who oversees the troublesome neighbour - this eliminates the denial that there is a problem and who causes it by meaning one letting agent gets to hear all the problems at both properties without any middlemen diluting the seriousness of the allegations.

What other options to I have? Please help.

I have had a similar problem recently although it would seem my neighbour has mental health issues.
You could go to the Council's Environmental Dept and complain however they need evidence and if you tenant has moved out, you can't exactly ask a new tenant to collect evidence on the nuisance neighbour!! (my dilemma)

I would go with the agent who lets next door.  If they say there is no problem - good, they can take on your house and deal with any issues, that's what they get paid to do after all.  They won't help you at the moment because you are not their client.  If you can't beat them - join them!!