My husband and I have been living in our house for about three years. About 10 months ago, a woman moved in next door. We live in a gated community with tons of pine trees. We have a property owners association (POA).
In December, the woman next door told us she was having some trees cut down that her insurance company told her were hazardous. She asked if we wanted to get an estimate for having a tree that’s on our property, but on the property line next to her house, cut down. We said sure. When we got the estimate, we told her we’d decided not to cut it down.
A few weeks later, we received a letter from the POA saying our neighbor complained about a hazardous tree on our property. They did not ask us to do anything about it. We wrote back saying it was healthy, not a hazard, and we would not be cutting it down.
About two weeks ago, we received another letter from the POA saying that our neighbor was complaining that pine cones were dropping from the tree and damaging her property. They asked us to trim the branches that breached the property line. They gave us 7 days to do it and said we’d be fined $50/day for every day we delayed after that 7 days. We wrote back and asked for a meeting with the POA manager and president.
They met with my husband on Friday. The resolution was that they would have the POA landscapers come out and trim three branches. They were very sympathetic and, after looking at the situation, basically said that the neighbor was being pretty silly, but in order to keep the peace, this is what we should do. We said fine, no problem.
They notified the neighbor of the resolution to the problem. She then called us and, very profanely, demanded our homeowners insurance information. She said a pine cone had fallen on her daughter’s car and dented the hood :rolleyes: . She said she’d sue us if we didn’t stop “being difficult.” She also said that she’d lived there for almost a year and was sick of “all our crap.” Keep in mind that this is the second time I’ve ever spoken to her and the first was to tell her we’d get back to her about the estimate. My husband has been over there helping her with landscaping, putting together tools, and letting her borrow our tools. It’s just the two of us in our house and we’re not at all loud or anything like that.
I didn’t give her any information. I called our insurance person who said it was all bullshit (he actually said that) and to not call her back. He said that’s what her car insurance is for and that there’s no way our insurance would pay for something like that. I also spoke with my brother, who’s an attorney in another state. He said not to bother calling a local attorney, to not file an insurance claim, and to discontinue all contact with the woman. He said to go ahead and do what the POA asked us to do (we’ll actually just cut the whole tree down).
Meanwhile, after consulting the POA president and our builder, it turns out the brick fence she has is actually about three inches over our property line. They think, since she’s really been nasty about this whole thing, that we should push the issue and have her move it over three inches (a real pain in the ass for her).
How would you all handle this situation?? It’s really stressing me out! I’m a grudge holder and would love to really mess with her, but it’s probably better just to cut the tree down and leave it alone. My husband is leaning in that direction, but believes that it will never be over because she’s basically a bitchy, nasty woman.