Nasty neighbours

Well, you have done your best, but if the old lady has given her agreement to somebody using her parking place, there probably isn't much you can do.If anything happens to that car then the driver has been warned it's park at your own risk, like any car park.
Ignore her shouting at you, and hopefully she will soon give up.

It's not her parking space she said they could use it's the visitors space. My daughter had to park a few roads away with my grandson when she came at the weekend because the visitors spaces were taken up one by this neighbour. She has her own car in her space. We all pay a service charge for the spaces.

I do sympathise with you, we have had problems previously with a neighbour allowing people to park and block our view of the communal gardens, even though this is against the terms of the lease. I know how upsetting these issues can be as it sometimes reduced me to tears. Do you have Managing Agents, ours wrote a letter to our neighbour and it has been a lot better, they also said they can take legal action if needed. Hope your situation improves.

You must have some sort of residents association/management group. I have a similar 'parking' arrangement where I live and there are occasionally people who abuse the rules but these are dealt with collectively by the association. Many of the properties here are let out so often new tenants have not rad the small print in the tenancy agreement. Is there nothing in the agreement for service charges / leasehold that clarifies the parking rules?

I appreciate it is frustrating, but not worth getting yourself too worked up about especially if it is having detrimental impact on your health.

Thank you all for your help. You are right I must take a deep breath and ignore, will get daughter to 'double' park end on to my car when she comes.

Because the flats are all privately owned we all share the freehold we employ a managing agent who collects the service charge and does what we all Agree at the AGM. My hubby is the director (has a background in company law) and the other director is in her 80s. We are late 50s and are the youngest Hubby does an excellent job of keeping the peace (which is not easy) and legal stuff.

Going to take some Kalms and eat chocolate cake and hope to win lottery so we can move . (Oh and smile sweetly at the neighbours)

I just put directly worded but polite post-it notes on the windscreens of cars that are not supposed to be using our visitor space or park in the turning space!

Only residents' occasional guests/visitors may use this parking space. It is not intended for regular parking.
Thank you for your co-operation and understanding.

or

Parking in this area causes obstuction and makes turning dangerous. Do not park here again. Thank you.

So far i have not had a brick through the window or my car keyed

Where my son lives, the management committee has put signs up saying that cars parked illegally, ie, with a permit, will be clamped. All tenants have a permit which is displayed in their car. My son has a couple of visitor permits which we display when visiting. However, parking isn't being monitored by a clamping company but it sure does stop designated parking spaces being taken up. My son was recently elected to the committee so that is how we know parking isn't monitored.

If not in place already, it might be a good idea to have disclaimer signs in the car park.

Sounds to me as if your elderly neighbour isn't very well hence the unpleasant behaviour. Wishing you well and good luck

Ps, sorry meant to write* "without a permit"* not "with a permit" - can't edit original message

I'm with Penstemmon. You need to write to your property management group and explain the problem giving them the name and address of the 80 year old so that they can write directly to her. This is what they're there for. This then removes you from the problem.
From hereon, you can just monitor the problem covertly and if there are further issues you just report them back to management. You are paying them a fee to deal with such things.

I know it's hurtful and hard to deal with an unpleasant neighbour but hopefully you won't need to if you go through the property block management. Hope this helps. xx

My son experienced the same sort of problem with a neighbour so he approached one of the private parking companies. They warned the neighbour that if he continued to park encroaching on my son's space then they would be clamped with a hefty release fee. The problem went away and you should try the same approach.

I would also mention that putting anything sticky on someone's windscreen is illegal unless you are a parking warden

Be careful about threatening to clamp, I believe that it's illegal on private domestic property. If you own the freehold, can you draw up new leases which set out clauses covering parking?

This is one of the very reasons I'd never live in a block of flats. This petty mindedness and noise from neighbours, would be hell.

Thank you everyone for your replies. We are a collective so we employ the management agency, we are only 9 flats.The management agency is not in control - we all have control. We have signs up saying vehicles will be clamped, and we have put notices on the car with the Management headed paper, but then it transpired she had permission from this one flat owner.

We can't enforce anything because we are a collective, the other flat owners are upset but don't want confrontation with the driver of the car and her boyfriend as they are particularly forceful (rude, abusive) Other flat owners avoid the older lady who gave permission because of her irratic behaviour. Her son doesn't visit often but Hubby has said he'll have gentle word with him if he sees him visiting - but of course we haven't seen him recently.

After more discussion with Hubby last night and on reflection, we going to ignore and not address the parking problem at present because this is unsavioury neighbours taking advantage of a single lady who is obviously having mental problems. We have decided to be kind and supportive of her, offer help if required, smile and nod alot when being shouted at, and Hubby on the case of keeping an eye out for the son. (Hubby has also said I have to chose not to get upset - I'm trying )

I once got a call from the police giving the correct reg of DH's car. It was parked in our carparking space but a neighbour had reported it as being illegally parked and didn't know it was DH's as it's usually mine parked there. The neighbour never apologised but 11/10 to the neighbour for being vigilant - and to the police for checking it out

I do sympathise with you MrsPeel. We used to live in town centre with 3 other flats, each of us with designated parking space and one visitor's space. The visitors spot was regularly taken with non visitor cars and even our designated space was sometimes bagged, despite restriction notices. When our space was taken I got into the habit of parking behind offending vehicle, blocking them and leaving my contact details. Needless to say I was slow to appear when they wanted to leave so they weren't regular offenders. When we had visitors they parked behind our car as it wasn't worth the stress of sorting it. I'm sure your approach is the right one as life is short and these situations eventually resolve one way or another.

Ah, the joys of living in a flat and the car parking issues. One of the reasons why we moved back into house.

I agree Tigger, I'm working on it. A nice little house with off road parking

When the unauthorised car is not in the parking place I might be tempted to find another car to be parked there and nobody claim it!

I would think that if you have a sign saying 'Park at your own risk' they wouldn't have a leg to stand on if they got their car damaged. It is a visitor's car space isn't it, so it is shared by all.

The freeholder/landlord is the one to approach about your problem. Within the terms of management of your block of flats there is detail of the management and that is where you start your approach to get this sorted out. It is not for any one individual to decide what can be done.

Thanks CardiffJaguar but all flat owners hold the freehold equally. There is no landlord we are a a limited company. Decisions are made at the AGM together when we all agreed neighbours could not use the carpark. One flat owner (who owns 1/9th of the freehold) decided to go against this. So if one flat doesn't comply an extraordinary meeting would have to be called or we could wait for the next AGM. Or the directors could speak to the individual not complying, which they have done and have been shouted at. Plus the offender has had official notice on headed paper but they have argued they have permission off this one flat owner and have continued to park there. The management company does not make decisions they arrange contractors at our instruction, prepare and file accounts (after being agreed by the owners and signed by the directors). It works well until in the main, until now.