I recently moved into a nice house with a good sized yard (just a little shy of an acre) in nice central location in my town.
The area looked amazing, didn’t have an HOA, no red flags at all.
Then after living here for about 4 months I realized two things:
I’m surrounded on all sides (neighbors on either side and backyard) by retired boomers who apparently need to walk into my yard and strike up a conversation with me any time they so much as see my open my back door (or worse, see me at my kitchen window washing dishes or whatever). There was once incident where I had invited my family over for a get together/small fire in my backyard and these boomers invited themselves into my backyard and chatted and helped themselves to the s’more materials off of my outside table while I had went inside to use the bathroom. My family did not invite them and had said several times “this is just a family night.” Just zero boundaries at all on these guys. It’s unreal.
The neighbors all have dogs but apparently no fences and let them free roam??? Which is problematic for SO many reasons in our area of town (again, pretty central - I’m like four houses away from a major - for our city - road) and the fact that the dogs come and bother my dog who I had leashed to a stake when he needed to go out. Sometimes the boomers even bring the dogs to my yard if they catch me bringing my dog out, which pretty much just means I have to bring my dog back in because their dogs don’t play nice. Some of them complained that I’m babying my dog too much and “just let the dogs be dogs.”
So I decided I could kill a few birds with one stone and put up a nice 6ft tall privacy fence. Keep the dogs and the boomers out, and keep my dog in and give him a lot more roaming space than he had with his leash on a stake. With the slope of the ground in the neighborhood, and all but one house being one floor, only one neighbor a few houses away (who also seems cool and I’ve still have had no issues and I think only one conversation with) with a two story home would be able to see into my back yard (or my kitchen window) without physically entering my back yard.
Fence went up a little over two weeks ago and I thought that would be the end of all my problems. I put up a couple of signs on the gates - the typical “Keep Gate Shut - Dog In Yard” sign and a “No Trespassing Please” sign. Very visible and close to the latch.
My god could I not have been more wrong. The second day I had the fence up, I was grilling a few burgers out with my dog thinking I was finally going to have the perfect home and one of them opened my gate and walked into my yard while saying “thought I was smelling something good! How have you been?” Then sat down in a chair while I was a little stunned and said “haven’t seen you too much lately” with a chuckle like he was trying to be funny. Didn’t realize he had left the gate open until my dog locked eyes with me from across the yard then bolted for the gate. Thankfully didn’t get far. I tore into the guy and he said I shouldn’t be bothered by neighbors being neighborly or dogs being dogs. I made it very clear that if I wanted him in my back yard that he’d actually know instead of just assume. He obviously got uncomfortable and I haven’t seen him since thankfully. But that’s only one of them.
Hoping it was a one-off occurrence, I opted to not put locks on my gate. Because surely someone being that oblivious to social norms was a one-off thing, right? Anyway, I figured I would give my dog more time in the yard and set him up with a nice dog house and give him some messy treats (peanut butter licks, sauced bones, crumbly things) to enjoy in the nice weather. He was loving it for the ten minutes I was sitting with him. Went to do some laundry and make a few calls and about an hour later I hear some barking and then him whimpering in the back yard. One of the neighbors thought they’d let their dog into my backyard to play, and their dog had snipped at my dog and took his treats away from him! Ooooooh boy was I about ready to get my crowbar, but decided it would be better for everyone involved if I just grabbed the dog and staked it in that neighbor’s front yard because they were apparently also gone by the time I grabbed the dog.
I put locks on the gate.
Left my dog outside now that I have a LOCKED gate while I ran to the store. Came back to a boomer trying to figure out the lock and had a nice long chat about reading comprehension.
Doorbell rang this morning, prompting this post. The neighbors had an “intervention” on my porch about how I should be more welcoming to them and take my fence down so the dogs could play. I told them I don’t want their dogs anywhere near my dog and while I’m sure they’re all great people I really want my space to be my space. They just couldn’t comprehend and I eventually just shut the door on them. I can’t believe I moved here and want to sell now.