Laura Whitcombe

Nuisance neighbours sink UK house prices by £17,000

How I long for a detached house with a drive – and, more importantly, no neighbours.

My current abode is a three-bed semi with no off-street parking. It’s a free parking street but before you think I’m boasting, it’s also close to three primary schools, has a corner shop and most of the residents seem to be building loft extensions.

Taken together, it adds up to pretty painful parking. It gets even worse when one of the tank-driving neighbours is home as he frequently takes up two spaces, which is particularly vexing when I’ve got a boot full of heavy groceries and there are no spaces near the house. Then there’s the bloke across the road whose drive is so overgrown he can’t park in it any more and so deprives the rest of us of another precious space.

The problems of your house and garden actually being joined on to other people’s are a whole other source of irritation.

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