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Entitled Family Builds Massive House, Are Now Upset About “Accidentally” Peeping On Neighbors
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Entitled Family Builds Massive House, Are Now Upset About “Accidentally” Peeping On Neighbors

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People often don’t get along. That’s just a fact. There are wonder-people with 7 thousand friends on Facebook and perhaps even many big groups of friends in the real world, but most keep to themselves and only have a couple of close friends.

So it’s no surprise that so many conflicts occur when someone new moves into a neighborhood. It doesn’t help when the new neighbors start off on a hostile footing with everyone, instead of being polite and friendly. So it happened in today’s story, when new neighbors built a huge home next to a couple’s cottage.

More info: Reddit

Sometimes new neighbors really can’t read the room and think that they’re the cool and important people on the block

Image credits: Maria Orlova (not the actual photo)

A woman took it to the Mildly Infuriating community to share how her new neighbors’ house has affected her life, even without their pestering

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Image credits: remesabo

Image credits: Pixel Addict (not the actual photo)

The neighbors, built a huge, 3+ story house right next to the poster’s seaside cottage, which meant that they could see what was on her property from multiple angles

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Image credits: remesabo

Image credits: Max Rahubovskiy (not the actual photo)

What’s worst is their roof deck, from which they have a bird’s eye view of the poster’s outdoor shower, even when she’s using it

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Image credits: remesabo

Not only that, but the neighbors have the gall to complain about them being able to see the poster, even though they’re the ones who built the all-seeing monster

As it is with most stories, everything isn’t as simple as it may seem on first blush. We’ll get into those details later, but keep in mind that these new annoying neighbors and their even more annoying house are just a symptom of a wider issue.

But let’s start at this “symptom” – the original poster’s (OP) problem. New neighbors move in, demolish the preexisting cottage, and in less than a month, start building a new home.

They quickly erected a new house instead of what I can only imagine was a picturesque cottage – a 3+ story, gray goliath. 12 feet from the nearest wall of OP’s cottage. That’s about 3.5 meters, for those of you not in the States.

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Now, I don’t know about you, but I feel uncomfortable around some people that are 4 meters away from me, so having a whole house so close to my own would definitely make me sweat. Besides the obvious annoyance of your neighbors having a pretty much direct view into your house, having a building so close feels like wearing a turtleneck one size too small.

It’s okay at the start and you think that you’ll just get used to it, but after a little while, you want to tear at your collar and burn the thing in your fireplace. Unfortunately, you can’t really do that in OP’s case. I’m not well versed in U.S. law, but I feel like taking a sledgehammer and committing arson are more than a little frowned upon in the courts.

I bet that the poster feels similar, especially as she mentions the house stripping them of any sea breeze passing through the home. That’s probably the second worst part – imagine not being able to air your house or feel a nice breeze during clement weather, especially if you live by the seaside. It’s almost stripping someone of their primal human right.

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Image credits: Taryn Elliott (not the actual photo)

So it goes that you get these new hoity-toity neighbors complaining about how OP has been living for over 10 years now, enjoying her privacy with her husband, letting a nice breeze into the home, and, of course, showering outside.

Now let’s talk about why this is actually happening. Some commenters balked about a building of this size being built so close to another, especially close to the ocean.

The poster is from Long Beach Island, New Jersey, and according to her testimony, this started happening when the new mayor was elected, unopposed. He quickly made some changes to the zoning laws, allowing such gargantuan and ugly buildings to be built in OP’s neighborhood.

The new mayor, coincidentally, has the biggest real estate business in the town. Another stunning coincidence is that the mayor’s son is the premier builder in that very same town.

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Sometimes things just seem to click, right?

If you’re stuck in a similar predicament and, just like OP, there is no one to complain to (the one time a HOA can help you), the best thing you can do is increase privacy in your own house. House Digest suggests two main methods – increasing privacy in the home and your property.

For your home, you can do things like blinds, curtains, or window film, like the poster has already done. For your property, you can build fences, grow hedges or strategically place flowers and trees.

Unfortunately for OP, with a house like that, little will help. Perhaps a tree could block their annoying roof deck about… 5 years down the line.

Her story collected over 30k upvotes in the Mildly Infuriating community, but it’s a worthwhile competitor for r/extremelyinfuriating, if you ask me. Among the 2.2k comments, people suggested how the couple could improve their privacy or shower extremely provocatively, only to further annoy the neighbor.

Share your own thoughts of annoying neighbors building their houses too close to others in the comments!

The poster replied to many comments, where people shared ways to deal with the neighbors, both funny and useful

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Larsas Jaseliūnas

Larsas Jaseliūnas

Author, BoredPanda staff

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I started as a writer, but time came when I wanted more, so I learned how to do the visuals for my articles too, with the help of my wonderful colleagues. When I had the chance to become an editor, I jumped at the opportunity, because I know that it will be the best way for me to learn more and help out my wonderful colleagues in return.

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Larsas Jaseliūnas

Larsas Jaseliūnas

Author, BoredPanda staff

I started as a writer, but time came when I wanted more, so I learned how to do the visuals for my articles too, with the help of my wonderful colleagues. When I had the chance to become an editor, I jumped at the opportunity, because I know that it will be the best way for me to learn more and help out my wonderful colleagues in return.

Saulė Tolstych

Saulė Tolstych

Author, Community member

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Saulė is a photo editor at Bored Panda with bachelor's degree in Multimedia and Computer Design. The thing that relaxes her the best is going into YouTube rabbit hole. In her free time she loves painting, embroidering and taking walks in nature.

Read less »

Saulė Tolstych

Saulė Tolstych

Author, Community member

Saulė is a photo editor at Bored Panda with bachelor's degree in Multimedia and Computer Design. The thing that relaxes her the best is going into YouTube rabbit hole. In her free time she loves painting, embroidering and taking walks in nature.

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Captain McSmoot
Community Member
1 year ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I second the shower sex. In fact, this should be y'all's exclusive spot for sexual activity. For an extra fun time, install handles and footholds. You might as well have as much fun doing it as possible.

Cyber Returns
Community Member
1 year ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I would look into whether they have the necessary permits. Something tells me they don't

Mad McQueen
Community Member
1 year ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I like the comment of subtlety telling the husband to stop staring and giggle to get the wife mental that he's actually doing it to get off. I'd also maybe put some clear acrylic wavey roof panels on the top w a small air hole. They can see shapes not you personally but them seeing into your bedroom is even worse. Invest in some of the rubber horse heads and back light yourselfs so you give a silhouette pony show to them. Also add a small bass speaker to the bottom of the window so it vibrates an thumps towards their house. Subtly destroy them. And check in the permits too. They surely can't build to encroach your property 12'?!? I'm in the NE too and see this all the time. I'm in a coastline town too.

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Captain McSmoot
Community Member
1 year ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I second the shower sex. In fact, this should be y'all's exclusive spot for sexual activity. For an extra fun time, install handles and footholds. You might as well have as much fun doing it as possible.

Cyber Returns
Community Member
1 year ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I would look into whether they have the necessary permits. Something tells me they don't

Mad McQueen
Community Member
1 year ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I like the comment of subtlety telling the husband to stop staring and giggle to get the wife mental that he's actually doing it to get off. I'd also maybe put some clear acrylic wavey roof panels on the top w a small air hole. They can see shapes not you personally but them seeing into your bedroom is even worse. Invest in some of the rubber horse heads and back light yourselfs so you give a silhouette pony show to them. Also add a small bass speaker to the bottom of the window so it vibrates an thumps towards their house. Subtly destroy them. And check in the permits too. They surely can't build to encroach your property 12'?!? I'm in the NE too and see this all the time. I'm in a coastline town too.

Load More Comments
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