I’m not sure if this is the right place to put this, so moderators, I’m looking for advice on how to handle my crazy next door neighbor. Please don’t nitpick my sentence structure and grammar. I’m so upset right now, I’m shaking as I type. I don’t know where else to turn. You all are the smartest group of people I know, so I’m hoping to get some reasonable advice. I have been put in a situation and I desperately need some guidance.
I need to tell some background. In 2001, I bought a house in Dearborn Heights, Michigan. At the time, I was about to be married and had no children and didn’t plan on having any. My only criteria was to find a nice house close to my parents and closer to work.
Next door to me lived an older couple. The wife died soon after I moved in and the husband ended up selling the house in 2005. He sold it to a Lebanese couple with an infant daughter. The husband was in his 30’s, American born and his much younger wife came from Lebanon and spoke very little English.
It didn’t take long for me to develop a distaste for the husband. Every time I went outside to my yard, he’d come outside too. He’d approach me while i did yard work to lecture about the evil Government, dirty politics and conspiracies. He used to diss the United States and talked about how Lebanon is the greatest country ever, how Islam is the only true religion and Jews are bad and blah blah blah.
Of course I asked, “Why don’t you live in Lebanon since to you. it’s a better country than the US?” “I want to suck everything I can out of the US.”, he answered with a smug laugh. I could only tolerate so much of his anti-USA stance and bothering me every time i went to weed my garden, so I eventually told him, “I have no choice that you live next door to me, but I don’t have to talk to you. Don’t speak to me anymore because I will be ignoring you from now on!” And for the most part I did.
So fast forward a few years later, I was divorced, reunited with an old flame and had an unexpected, but much loved baby boy 5 years ago. In the winter months, things were always relatively quiet with the crazy next door neighbor, with the help of closed windows and staying indoors most of the time, but in the summer things were loud and annoying.
I could write a novel about how weird this guy is. I observed a lot living next door to him. He and his wife argued A LOT and the cops were called to their house countless times. I also feel like he was physically abusive to his wife, because I would hear slaps and shrieks of pain from his wife coming from their house, but I was never an eyewitness to it. The police won’t come out unless you’ve actually witnessed a physical assault. Since all three of my bedrooms face their house, they kept me up many nights with their screaming matches.
He is the kind of person whose voice carries far, so I could always hear him constantly yakking from his house or he’d pace up and down in his front yard, wildly gesturing with his hands while talking loudly on his phone. he’s the type of person that likes to draw attention to himself. He always spoke to others in Arabic, so to me, not understanding the language, his loud ramblings were just constant, annoying background sound that I had to learn to live with or just shut my windows in the hot, summer months.
Of course, he always had some drama going on. People would pull up to his house, bang on his door and yell at him, threaten him. One time, when he had a job, his wife was overseas with their daughter for a couple months and some of his co workers stole his house key, made a copy, waited until he stepped out of the house, went inside and planted two huge dead fish in his heating ducts. Basically, this guy is just bad new all around.
He eventually quit working and is now “disabled”, collecting SS benefits from the evil USA. I felt so bad for his wife. I would occasionally hear snippets of their arguments in English. Her yelling “I HATE YOU!!” Him yelling back, " It is your duty as my wife to fuck me and give me a son!" Just hateful stuff! I can only imagine what they yelled to each other the other 99% of the time in Arabic.
Their daughter was now about 6 years old and the wife did eventually give birth to a son, but she finally had enough and left him. Funny enough, the wife’s family is living in Lebanon, so she took the kids and moved in with her crazy, ex-husbands own mother. He is so unbearable to deal with, his own mother chose to take in the wife and kids and have very little to do with her own son.
As my little boy grew up, we’d spend time playing outside and of course the jackass next door would go outside to spy on us. He’d pretend he was tinkering with something in his backyard, but I lived there long enough to know he ALWAYS came outside every single time anyone in my house was out there, because he’s nosy, lonely and bored.
I did my best to ignore him all these years. He’d occasionally make an attempt to talk to me like nothing was wrong, especially after his wife left him, but as far as I was concerned, he was invisible. I knew he was bad news and I was better off ignoring him.
When my son was a toddler, I would notice my neighbor would try to engage him when me or my son’s dad’s back was turned. He’d wave and smile and try to get my son to come to him through the fence. I never said a word, I’d just take my son in the house. But one day, when my son was 2, he got him to come to the fence and handed him a jawbreaker. A jawbreaker!! What business does a 2 year old have with a jawbreaker except to choke on it? I finally had enough and sternly told him to "leave my son alone or I will call the cops! He would just laugh in response.
I had to tell my son to stay away from the monster who lives next door. I would tell him, “If you are playing outside and the man comes outside, come back in the house.” When my son’s vocabulary improved, he started referring to the neighbor as the Monkey Monster. It stuck and became a thing, so that has become our name for him, Monkey Monster.
He has had issues with other neighbors as well. As soon as someone new moves in, he pounces on them and puts on the friendly guy act, but anyone with half a brain figures out pretty quickly that Monkey Monster is bad news. All the surrounding neighbors have learned to stay away from him and just ignore him. Some are afraid of him and some are just looking for a reason to beat the snot out of him. He’s been spotted roaming through neighbor’s backyards late at night. Some neighbors have said he has taken lightbulbs from their outdoor lights.
I’ve never caught him roaming my backyard at night because I have a really good motion detector light that lights up my whole yard when activated. Also, my son’s dad, who lives in my house is a smoker and goes outside regularly to have a cigarette. My neighbor knows this, so he would steer clear of my property.
As time has gone on, he has gotten crazier. He has way too much time on his hands. He does not work at all anymore and his wife has full support of their children. Apparently, she has shown ample evidence to the courts that her ex husband is not capable of tending to their children. From what I gather, he just gets occasional supervised visitation, maybe for an hour once a month. None of his family members ever come to see him except his poor mom who will drop by with some groceries out of obligation. I see the wear and tear on her face and can tell she hates going to her crazy son’s house. I’ve heard him yell at her so horribly, seething and spitting in her face while she just stares off into space trying to detach. She just wants to give him some food and get the heck out of there.
I thought for sure when his wife left him, he would have to move out of his house because he is not working and I know they had a huge mortgage when they bought it. Rumor has it that someone is paying for the house so he can live in it. I’ve checked the city records and his house is listed under a name of someone I’ve never heard of with a different last name. I guess his family feels it’s better to to keep him living there isolated away, than his family having to house him and deal with him everyday. You can’t reason with him, he’s verbally abusive and thinks he is perfectly sane. To him, the rest of the world is crazy.
He has a car that has broke down, but he can’t find anyone to pay to have it fixed and pay for his insurance on it, but after much abuse and prodding someone broke down and bought him a bike. He is constantly cruising the neighborhood on this bike, trying to engage with people and cause trouble. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen a random person show up at his house to furiously yell at him to “Stay away from my house…my kids, my wife…blah blah blah.” The cops are regularly at his door due to some complaint or another, but he NEVER EVER opens the door. He’s got trouble and drama where ever his bike can take him. Someone once tried to serve him with court papers and had a difficult time doing so, since he’ll refuse to open the door. If troubles a brewin’ he’ll lay low for a few weeks or just come outside only very late at night. The guy is crazy, but he’s no dummy.
So now, the only person that actually talks to him is the mailman. My mailman is named George. George is not at all intimidated by him. As soon as George comes around on his mail route, crazy neighbor guy will grab his jacket and walk with George for a couple blocks, door to door along his mail route and run his daily monologue about how the neighborhood is filled with FBI agents, drug dealers and Homeland Security. My neighbor is desperately lonely for someone to listen to his crazy ramblings and George is now his only willing audience. I will see my neighbor walking along with George, frantically waving his hands and screaming about how the CIA is after him and accusing George’s wife of running the Jewish Defense League, while George tosses his head back in gales of laughter at the outrageousness of it all.
I must add, the Chief of Police in Dearborn Heights lives a block or so away and regularly jogs through the neighborhood past my house. He is fully aware of the crazy neighbor and his antics. I’ve told my concerns to the Chief and he says they’ve checked his background and there’s nothing in his record to show he is dangerous. Just ignore him…blah blah blah. The police have been called to his house many times, they know of his reputation, but I sometimes wonder if he has some connections, because he seems to know personal things about people in the neighborhood. Many of us have questioned how he knows personal information. He knows where other family members of neighbors live, their jobs, names of distant relatives…etc. Of course, to my neighbor, the Chief of Police is part of the evil Government, so sometimes when the Chief jogs by he’ll stand on his porch and yell out" Government rat!!!" The Chief will just shake his head, give a quick wave and keep on jogging by.
So last year, I decided it’d be a good idea to move to another area. When I initially bought this house, I wasn’t too concerned about the school system or the family- friendliness of the neighborhood, since I was childless and assumed I’d remain that way. Now that my son is in the picture and starting kindergarten soon, I felt we needed to go to an area more fitting for him. I’ve lived in many different homes/neighborhoods in my life and this one, by far was the unfriendliest. Everyone keeps to themselves for the most part. I’ve tried to reach out to families that have kids my son’s age for him to play with, but they seem to never reciprocate. I don’t know why it’s an unfriendly area in general, but everyone tends to keep to themselves and can barely muster a wave hello to each other. It’s the strangest thing.
I decided on a city to move to and after a year long search, found a great house. We moved in late October 2014 and I feel like it was a positive step. In the three months we’ve been here, my new neighbors have been much nicer to us than my old neighbors ever were the 15 years I lived there. I’ve already been toasted with “welcome to the neighborhood” drinks, my son got a nice Christmas gift from another family and my front walk has been shoveled by yet another kind neighbor. They all took it upon themselves to come over and formally introduce themselves to us. I feel much more comfortable and accepted in my new home.
So finally, here’s my problem: I put my old house up for sale in October, when I moved to the new house. From what George the mailman has told me, my crazy neighbor is convinced the FBI will be moving in and he is trying to prevent that from happening.
When I go to check on my old house, I’ve found rotten vegetables sprinkled all over my front and back lawn (I think he’s trying to encourage rats), my light post located on my front law was smashed to bits on all sides. I knew my crazy neighbor had done it, but had no proof. The next time i drove over to check on the house, the old milk chute built into the back of the house was somehow pried open, letting a bunch of cold winter air into the house causing the furnace to run non-stop for days. Luckily, no squirrels or other little animals found there way into my home, but my heating bill was higher this month. During this time I talked to as many neighbors as I could letting them know about the damage being done to my house. While I walked from house to house, the crazy neighbor stood on his porch and watched me the whole time. I also went to the Chief of Police about my house damage and he didn’t seem the least bit concerned. Actually, he said I was holding him up from going to a Lions game. he didn’t want to be late. Then a few weeks later, I checked on the house again and he had completely smashed my motion detector light off my garage and left broken glass everywhere. Now with that light gone, he could snoop through my back yard undetected in the dark. I made police reports and took pictures each time i saw damage, but the police really have no advice for me and treat it like a big waste of time for them.
Every time my real estate agent puts up a for sale sign on my lawn, it disappears soon enough. My agent also said every time he stops by the house to check on it, my crazy neighbor steps out on his porch glares at my agents, puts his hands on his hips and spits aggressively towards him.
Potential buyers have been scared off because he’ll go outside and stare them down while they are browsing around my property. He has posted all these weird signs in his front picture window saying “STAY AWAY FBI” “PRIVATE PROPERTY” “KEEP AWAY SOLICITORS”. So anyone who comes by notices these signs and it spooks them off.
Things have slowed to a halt and I haven’t had many potential buyers lately, so I was getting discouraged. Finally, someone made a decent offer on the house and offered to buy it 100% cash. Yes! We agreed on a price and the closing was going to happen on January 30th. Well, the buyer had a house inspection done today on the property and apparently my neighbor stood outside, stared him down and kept flipping him the finger.
My real estate agent called me today saying he received a vague e-mail from the potential buyer that said had a few issues with the house and decided to back out of the sale.
I called another neighbor who lives next door to me on the other side and is a decent guy, to ask him if he saw anything during the house inspection. He told me the potential buyer knocked at his door asking, “What is the deal with the crazy guy flipping me off?" My decent neighbor was caught off guard and told him to just ignore it, he is harmless. He tried to talk up my house to help me with the sale, but the potential buyer didn’t want to talk about my house, only about the crazy guy flipping him off. I don’t believe the buyer found anything wrong with my house. He simply backed out of the sale because of my crazy neighbor.
The guy is not dangerous, he’s just annoying and nosy. If you confront him, he folds like a deck of cards. I almost wish he would do something dangerous or violent, so at least I could find a legitimate reason to have him detained or arrested.
I was so hopeful with the potential sale of this house. When I was told the sale fell through, it was like I deflated like a balloon. I am a single mom. Paying bills on two houses is financially grueling. This guy is affecting my life horribly, causing me a lot of stress and i have no idea what to do. If he knew how much he was hurting me he would get great enjoyment out of it. I really don’t know if he sincerely believes that the FBI will be moving in or he’s not that crazy and just enjoys bringing misery to others.
I am desperate for any advice. Is there some hidden law that says you cannot thwart a sale of private property, or some special kind of restraining order I could issue? My real estate agent seems at a loss of what to do. He has another agent working for him who is of Lebanese descent and thought he could send him to try to talk with my neighbor, thinking he may have more respect for someone of “his kind”. That would be difficult to do since my neighbor will not open his door to anyone, so you’d have to catch him when he’s outside.
My agent suggests offering a land contract to try to get more potential buyers to look at the house and hopefully one of them won’t be intimidated by the crazy guy living next door. What are the odds that will happen?
I’m very sorry this is so long and thank you if you made it this far. I wanted to provide as much detail as possible so you know what kind of person I’m dealing with. Hasn’t someone somewhere dealt with something similar? Is it perfectly legal to harass or scare people off to prevent a financial transaction?
I can only compare this to someone taking a risk and putting all their savings into opening up a business, like a restaurant. Everything you own is at stake, but your crazy brother is standing outside the restaurant telling patrons about how he saw cockroaches in there and his whole family got really bad food poisoning in an attempt to steer people away. Yes, you could get a restraining order to keep him away from your restaurant, but in my case, my neighbor is on his own property the whole time he’s ruining my life.
I have nowhere else to turn and you all are smart people. If you were me, what would you do?
