My aggressive neighbor kept stealing my parking space – I eventually retaliated, but now people think I’m wrong
A woman has revealed how she took revenge on her neighbor who left increasingly aggressive notes on her car during a three-year parking queue.
Earlier this week, the anonymous woman, believed to be from the US, posted on Reddit’s ‘Am I The A*****’ forum to ask if she had been wrong to turn her own back on a troublesome neighbor to get.
Shortly after moving into their new building nearly three years ago, she and her partner discovered that their assigned parking space was much too small for their car.
She explained, “Our bay window wall had a protruding pillar at the front, so you could only get in at an angle and could never drive straight out because you would hit the pillar.
“If there was a car parked next to the bay, you wouldn’t be able to drive out at all and vice versa.”
The woman explained that her parking lot was never big enough for her car, which led to an awkward argument with her neighbor
“We knew that if someone was in the cove next to ours, we just had to park elsewhere and use our cove if there was room to fit in.”
A few months ago, the woman said their neighbor – whom she had given the false name “Patrick” – demanded they stop using their parking space because the angle of their car affected his ability to park.
After his “aggressive” notes failed to intimidate the pair, he also began parking across from their spot.
She continued: “Instead of parking elsewhere as we would when he was visiting, he parked 1/3 into the bay, deliberately blocking us and preventing us from leaving our home.”
After a while, she chose to pay for other parking spaces to avoid confronting him.
But recently she bought a new car and decided to start parking in her spot again.
She wrote, “Of course I was immediately blocked.
“At one point I had to crawl through my trunk, take my handbrake off and physically pull the car out of the bay. Enough!’
The woman’s neighbor began leaving aggressive notes on her car, forcing her to pay for parking elsewhere
Determined to stop being bullied by him, the woman decided to let him taste his own medicine.
She added: “I parked right in the middle of our two bays and completely blocked it from the area.”
Unsurprisingly, she found more aggressive notes from him when she returned to her car.
She said: ‘I had notes from him stating that “on behalf of all residents” (it wasn’t) I should park/move elsewhere (so I can get blocked).
“It was an attempt to put the blame on me in front of other cars as an excuse for what he did later – he had parked horizontally in front of my car, preventing all residents from moving.”
After this, she felt she had no choice but to contact her building’s management team – who have now implemented a first come, first served policy.
As a result, she now feels like people are blaming her for his parking, even though they don’t know how much grief she’s gotten.
Many posters said she should have settled this with her management company years ago and not let it escalate
Other members of the forum were quick to address the woman’s dilemma. While many agreed that the neighbor was wrong, the majority felt she should have handled it sooner.
One of them said, “You should have brought this problem straight to your building manager years ago. Especially when it escalated to you being blocked, which becomes a security issue.”
Another pointed out, “Park in your spot and only your spot and contact building management if anyone else is in your spot.”
Meanwhile, a third said, “Your building has brought you and everyone else into unnecessary conflict all these years.” The right person to yell at is your building management.”