Myself and my husband have lived in our privately rented accommodation…

Question

Myself and my husband have lived in our privately rented accommodation for 6
years in March 2011. This is a semi detached property in the countryside on its
own. The property is owned by a Country Estate and although the property is
actually owned by the Lady there was an arrangement when we arrived until about
a year and half ago that the incapacitated daughter was allowed to collect and
keep the rent for our properties, however the Lady then took this arrangement
away from her daughter. (The management of these two properties has always been
dealt with through an estate agent). Our property is 3 bedroomed and next doors
is a 4 bedroomed property. Recently I have found out that although our's is an
AST next doors is a Secured Tenancy arranged by the daughter who was "friends"
with the woman next door, although I am led to believe that she has, and by her
own admission when we moved in, that she has not signed any sort of Tenancy
agreement. When she moved in the house needed work done on the inside (as did
ours), but the landlords did do what was needed for these to be lived in,
however it suited her lifestyle of occasional work and cheap rent to only let
the absolute minimum be done to the property. Over the six years we have vastly
improved the property because we are decent hardworking people, however, this
has not been the case with next doors as all the time she does not do anything
with the house and it is not improved her arguement is that they cannot then put
up the rent. They are paying £100 less than ourselves for a bigger property. The
landlords did recently try to increase our rent and we refused to subsidise next
door until we had confirmation that next doors rent would be increased to at
least the same, which they could not do because of the state of the property. As
it seems she is allowed also to rent out rooms. When we moved in she lived their
with her ex-boyfriend who was a complete alcoholic and her present boyfriend who
has been banned from the local pub and so has a big drink problem at home and
who is also verbally and now, within the last month, physically agressive (he
attacked both myself and my husband within our car smashing the windscreen on
the 21st December 2010, knowing that I had had a heart attack in Nov 2010 and
stood there screaming "I hope you have another f**k**g heart attack). The woman
next door is also a drinker. Over the years we have endured nightly pub "spill
outs" from the pub to her house and contended with late night/early morning
comings and goings, drunken sleepovers and none of it quiet. We have had to
vacate adjoining rooms to their rooms, their windows being smashed due to lost
keys, being sick out of the windows, their dogs being allowed to wonder
unattended on public highways uncontrolled when we tried to take our dogs out of
the gate. The boyfriend then very early on started to stand outside the property
and let their dogs try to attack our dogs through our gate, he was actively and
pre-meditatingly starting the dog fight. Eventually the boyfriend managed to get
rid of the ex-boyfriend (the boyfriend is well known to the police, he has a
police record... I know of drink driving, sending threatening emails and the
incident in attacking us, which is being dealt with by the Crown Prosecution the
first Court Hearing of which he has pleaded not guilty to criminal damage.
Another is to be held in March when we will have to attend, which is obviously
what he wanted of course. When the ex-boyfriend left he really turned his
attention to us and has made our life a misery here, however, about 2 years ago
we had a meeting at the Agents office with the woman and it did calm things down
but not for long. He is chopping wood indoors up to and after mid-night (its an
old property and it is just horrendous), he came home drunk two days after the
smashed windscreen incident and put on the music system and radio on so loud
there was not a room in the house you could escape to, he shouted obscenities,
took a metal instrument and was hitting the adjoining wall, then went to his van
and took his tools out and proceeded to hit the wall with a hammer and then
started to drill the wall. We called the police on a 999 call and half an our
later they arrived and could do nothing about it, at this point I was determined
not to leave my husband even though I really should have gone to A&E as I
thought I was going to have another heart attack. All that I have written it not
half of what the woman and he has put us through. We love the place we are
living in and have told the Agents that it is either them or us (they have told
us that we are exemplary tenants and do not want to lose us). What else can we
do.

Thomas Judge · Accepted Answer

Hiya, You seem to be doing the right stuff. The advice I always give is:- 1) Try
and solve the problem with your neighbour in a friendly way, without involving
the local authority in the first instance. Often or not, your neighbours won't
know they are causing a nuisance and will probably be more considerate in
future. Never approach your neighbour when the noise is actually happening. You
are more likely to be angry and have an argument with them. 2) If talking to
your neighbour directly doesn't work, then the next step is to try mediation.
Most local authorities will be able to provide a free mediation service between
yourself and your neighbour, where a neutral party will come round and look to
negotiate a peaceful settlement. 3) If all reasonable steps have been taken to
sort the matter out privately, the next option is to contact the Environmental
Health department in your local authority. By law, the local authorities have a
duty to deal with any noise that they consider to be what's known as a
'statutory nuisance'. Your Local Authority (Council) has a duty to perform an
investigation when they receive complaints about noise from any form of
location. So whether you live next door to a pub or club, a noisy family or
neighbour, have noisy machinery/vehicles and equipment in the street, a factory
or any form of business close by, your local authority are obliged to
investigate fully. Legislation is under sections 80 and 81 within the
Environmental Protection Act of 1990 (as amended by the Noise and Statutory
Nuisance Act 1993) and your Local Authority will have a responsibility to look
into and deal with any noise sources that are considered to be a statutory
nuisance. Your Local Authority will have at its disposal different capabilities
and resources in place that they can use to deal with and investigate neighbour
and anti-social behaviour problems. 4) If the local authority decide not to
intervene, or for whatever reason you do not wish to involve them, you can take
your case to a Magistrate's Court. You must have already taken steps to deal
with the matter privately before you can bring it to court. You can complain
under Section 82 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 directly to the courts
about a noise problem. You will need to convince without doubt, to the courts
that the noise problem you are experiencing constitutes a statutory nuisance. If
this route is for you and you are convinced to take action under Section 82 of
the EPA 1990, you are required to give a minimum of three days notice in writing
to the person who is responsible for the noise you are taking action over. In
that written record you are required to list details of your complaint and you
must ensure this is delivered via hand or recorded delivery post, dated and that
you keep a copy. The Magistrates Court will then work with you and inform you of
further procedures and expectations and will also decide if a summons can be
issued. I would strongly advise you to take detailed and further professional
advice before embarking on this option either from your Local Authority, the
Magistrates Court or a qualified legal professional. This is a more complicated
route for individuals involved in making noise orientated complaints. Also be
aware that you will be liable for all costs relating to taking your own action
through this route. You need to check this out fully in advance with the
relevant professionals to avoid running up costly bills. You will not be able to
gain legal representation for a case of this type through the legal aid scheme
but it's possible you could be eligible financially within the 'Legal Help'
scheme which could provide free or partly assisted legal advice/assistance.
Again it's very important you ask the Court or your local Citizen's Advice
Bureau for more advice, help and information. 5.) It is possible that you could
instigate a civil action concerning noise nuisance at common law and attempt to
get an injunction to restrain the perpetrator from continuing with the source(s)
of the noise nuisance. You could also issue a claim for loss/damages in place of
this action or alongside it. 6.) If they are tenants. It's possible there could
be a clause within the contract/agreement for their tenancy that prohibits your
noisy neighbour from making higher levels of noise in between certain hours
(11pm - 7am for example) or something similar. So, in doing so they could be
risking or breaking their tenancy agreement. You are not entitled to know about
or see a copy of your neighbours tenancy agreement, but it is possible their
landlord, especially a private landlord may divulge or show you this
information. They may refuse however on the grounds that your neighbours privacy
and confidentiality could be breached. All different types of landlords -
whether this is the council, the local housing association or private landlords
have measures where they can instigate appropriate action against a tenant who
is wilfully and regularly in breach of their tenancy agreement. Injunctions can
be put into place (very effective measures to prevent and reduce nuisance from
next door, but at the same time allowing people to retain tenancy in their
homes). If the landlords originate from within a housing association or local
authority, they are then able to ask a court to put a 'power of arrest' into
this kind of injunction which is enforceable if there are any instances of
violence, abuse, threatened violence or actual violent behaviour. Ultimately,
your neighbour in these circumstances can face eviction in the cases of people
who consistently persist in making their neighbours and community's lives a
miserable existence and flaunt the conditions of injunction enforcement's. I
hope this helps Please remember to PRESS ACCEPT

Myself and my husband have lived in our privately rented accommodation…

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