I bought a townhouse 2 years ago and except for the occasional house party getting out of hand all seemed well in Pleasant-Ville. That was until the body corporate decided to erect a playground right behind my unit despite my attempts to prevent this. The last three weeks has been a nightmare, kids are playing until 21h00 at night disturbing the peace and invading my privacy by peering through the windows from the jungle gym platform. I tolerated it as best I could but a week ago I could take no more.
After wittnesing a spitting competition, a kid relieving himself behind the slide and constant screaming I decided enough is enough. I walked to the playground and told all the kids that it was time to go home and that they can return the following day but only if they behaved and did not make exsessive noise.
A half an hour later there was a knock on my door, it was the next door and upstairs neighbours. As soon as I opened the door they went off about how rude I am to the kids not letting them play accompanied by a whole dictionary of swear words telling me that I have no right to tell their kids what to do.
Needless to say, I was not going to stand back and be insulted in this manner and picked up my baseball bat (kept close to the door for such emergencies) and kindly advised them to step of my property or face the consequenses. Since then the parents have been encouraging their kids to be as noisy as possible and the tension between me and my neighbours has become unbearable.
Since then I've been questioning myself - Was I out of line? How could I have reacted differently? Just for the record, I have a child of my own - a well mannered two and a half year old that understands not to cross privacy and nuisance boundaries. I have decided to sell my townohouse as the swearing neighbours and unruly kids will certainly be a bad influence on my boy. I am not happy about the fact that I am a owner that pays rates and taxes that has to move out because of TENANTS getting the upper hand of this situation.
What would you have done in this situation?
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