Am I wrong to ignore complaining neighbor?
acdesignsky
17 years ago
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acdesignsky
17 years agolast modified: 9 years agomoonie_57 (8 NC)
17 years agolast modified: 9 years agoRelated Discussions
reclusive neighbor ignoring pruning needs
Comments (4)I am an urban planner and an arborist. I would wager there are zero cities in this country that would allow you to go onto your neighbor's property and prune in this situation. If you get him to agree to your paying for pruning, you'll want it in writing as this is fraught with problems. The issue is whether it is a hazard to the wires, whether vermin use it as a travel corridor, whether the fruit is a nuisance impeding your health, safety or welfare, and lastly whether the plant negatively impacts your quality of life/property values. Second, it is common to have older laws that allow you to prune up from your property line, even though this is generally detrimental to the plants. As an arborist, I don't recommend this and I doubt you'll find a certified arborist to do this (altho in this economy, who knows, and the tree may be senescing so maybe someone would justify it to themselves). Third, there may be an ordinance on the books that allows the city to allow pruning by a certified third party (utility pruner) to fix the hazard. These are your general options without looking at your city's municipal code. This situation is common and part of dealing with people and neighbors, has gone on forever and will continue into the indefinite future. This is why we have zoning and property laws and ways to remedy grievances, but the grievances have limits. Good luck. Dan...See Moreangry ignorant neighbors downstairs?
Comments (7)I'm going to be blunt here. Neither side in this matter seems to be dealing with the situation well. Remember, I don't know you or your neighbors and can only work with the information you have given us in your posts. I will also say that living below small, running children is hard--they make a lot of noise, and it can be very bothersome. If they are banging on their ceiling in the middle of the day, it most likely means that the noise is loud enough to interrupt their regular activities. The downstairs people won't admit to your face that they are upset with the noise--they keep saying it's the other person who is upset. It's a shame they won't come to the door and discuss the matter--you all might be able to work something out if you could only talk about it. But on the other hand, veggieturnover, you don't mention a single thing that you have done to reduce the noise level coming from your apartment, other than that you sometimes try to get your daughter to tiptoe, but you admit that you can't do that all the time. You're complaining to the office. I'll bet they are too. Ideally, you should ask the office if you could move to a bottom floor apartment. Then your kids could run around as much as they wanted to. It would take a lot of stress off you and the kids. If that's not possible, you can do some things to reduce the noise that is traveling through your floor. 1. No shoes on in the house. Especially on the kids. 2. Add soundproofing to the floors. Nothing fancy, just some area rugs and padding underneath them to block the footfall sounds. Even if you have wall-to-wall carpeting, put some area rugs down over it in the areas where your daughter runs the most--the hallway perhaps, and the living room or wherever she plays the most. 3. Get the kids outside the home daily to run around somewhere where their noise won't be noticed--a playground, a mall play area, a kids' gym. If the kids are tired out from running around outside, they may run a little less indoors. 4. Set "Quiet Hours," even if your lease doesn't require them. Say from 8 pm to 8 am, during which time your entire family tries to be as quiet as possible, even the adults. Carry your daughter around if that's what it takes. 5. Go to the office. Explain that you are aware that your downstairs neighbors are unhappy with your child's walking/running. Explain the steps you have taken to reduce the noise and ask if they have any other tips you can use. They have dealt with this problem before and might have some suggestions. 6. If you can't talk to the downstairs people to explain what you are doing, write them a polite note, in which you admit that your family makes some noise. Then list the steps you are taking to reduce that noise. Sometimes landlords don't address problems like this. They just don't renew the leases of problem tenants. Based on the description you have given, you sound like a problem tenant. If you want to stay in that apartment for a second year, try to get along with your neighbors....See MoreProblem neighbor, or am I the problem?
Comments (13)Look, cottage industries do not fall under zoning codes. People are allowed to "work from home". Do you think that website designers and software deveopers need to work in a commercial area? What about phone answerers? Seamstresses? Tax preparers? An architecht who does drawings at home? What about all the prople who sell on eBay for a living? I have a friend whose job it is to shop for potatoe chips and cookies and then take them home and count the contents and weigh them and count broken pieces and type up a report and send it in to the company as a quality control report. Is she going to get kicked out of her home for doing this?!?!?! Geeesh. Of course not. Another friend writes for magazines from home. If everybody had to get an office or studio to do these things, cities would be ghost towns. Zoning is to regulate traffic and congestion into an area. You can't run a buniness out of your home that brings in either pedestrian traffic or vehicular traffic. Or causes a nuisance with noise or odors or anything else that residents may complain about. I have a neighbor who is running an illegal day care center out of her home. Cars are coming and going all day long with pick-ups and deliveries of children and babies. There are screamming children running around in the yard all the time and a row of strollers with babies lined up outside on days when the weather is nice. Now that is a business that is breaking zoning laws. My parents next-door neighbor is running some sort of business that involves a gigantic semi driving into the alley and unloading crates of who-knows-what a few times a week. That is breaking the zoning laws. Some neighbors finally complained and reported it, as the loooong semi would block access to everyone's garage and the driver would just tell people to "hold on" and wait while they unloaded the truck sometimes making people late for work or just making people idle their cars waiting or having to back up out of the alley to let the truck out. That is breaking zoning codes. What is the diiference between a hobby and a business? Huh? If someone paints watercolors as a hobby it is OK, but if they take them to a gallery and sell them then no? If you sew your DD a dress it is OK, but if you sew five of them and sell them on eBay, then all heck will break loose with the LL and the zoning codes? If a guy records himself and get paid for it......? Going after this guy by trying to use zoning laws won't go anywhere. This is a tenent/landlord issue. The guy is just a jerk expecting everyone to tiptoe around him. I like Talley's sample letter to sent to management. It could just be CC&P and printed out and mailed to them....See MorePrice of granite...am I totally ignorant?
Comments (33)My knowledge is based on my sister's recent purchase of granite for her kitchen and 2 baths reno and she lives a bit south of Charlotte, NC. She chose her fabricator based on past experience with him for a Silestone countertop. They talked about price ranges in her budget. He told her what granite slab yards he like to work with but which yards she went to were her choice. To stay within her budget he told her not to go higher than Level 3 granite. Slab yards usually are not fabricators but sell directly to fabricators. The price of the job is based on the fabricator, not the slab yard. The slab yards usually price their granite in levels, or grades, and assign a letter or number. When my sister went to the slab yard, she told the salesperson not to show her anything above Level 3 so she wouldn't be tempted to go over budget. Once her choice of stone was made, the fabricator took over from there. He templated her counter areas, then she went to his workroom to help him layout the templates in order to capture the patterns of the granite she most liked. I recently called this fabricator because I am putting together a budget for a new home. He told me that his cheapest price is $50 per sq foot which gives a choice of about 20 granites. The next level is $60/sq foot, then on up to $65 and $70. He gave the example of Red Dragon granite being $70 sq/ft. This price includes measuring, templates, cutting, complete installation and sealing (as needed)....See Morepkguy
17 years agolast modified: 9 years agoElly_NJ
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4 years ago
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