A new website promises to help you find your dream home in your dream neighborhood. It does so, by tracking and locating “rotten neighbors”.
RottenNeighbor.com is being marketed as a tool for home buyers and real estate agents. It is open and anonymous. You can post anything about your neighbor and he or she can post anything about you.
At Royal Oak Drive and Gladshire Boulevard in Delaware, a house sits on the market. Potential buyers might feel discouraged to buy it, because of an anonymous posting on the website. It describes a nearby neighbor as “a disgrace to the community… filthy, rude and obnoxious.”
In another Delaware neighborhood, one posting describes an entire community as the “white trash slums of Polaris.”
Another posting gets right to the point: “Thankful we’ve moved.”
The real estate business has never seen or heard of anything like RottenNeighbor.com and while it may serve as an effective tool for home buyers, homeowners should consider the consequences of disparaging their neighbors in public arenas such as this. Homeowners need to realize that these types of remarks do not paint a pleasant picture of the community and they are sure to reduce demand for homes in their neighborhood which in turn translates to decreased property values. Furthermore, unruly neighbors are unlikely to appreciate this approach and the chances of a positive response to such critism is very low.
The first step in dealing with an unruly neighbor should be to simply approach them and discuss your concerns with them. If you find this to be to intimidating you might consider bringing along another neighbor for support. If this initial effort fails to yield the desired result or if you’d simply prefer to remain anonymous you might consider contacting the President of your Homeowner’s Association. Homeowner’s Associations serve many functions one of which is maintaining the quality of living in the neighborhoods they serve. You have the right to the enjoyment of your private property as well as your neighborhood as a whole and if a member of your community is interfering with that enjoyment, or failing to maintain their property to the standards of the overall community, you should initiate efforts to let this individual and other members of the community know this type of behavior will not be tolerated!
For most, their home is the largest financial asset they will ever own and an investment in their families future, as such it’s value should be protected. Unruly neighbors, in their various forms can drive down property values and should be delt with swiftly, but appropriately! Publicly disparaging your neighbor is not an appropraite approach to resolving such matters and both you, and your community would be better served if you were to employ the alternative approaches mentioned above.
As for home buyers looking to acquire this type of information on the neighborhoods and homes they are considering, RottenNeighbor.com isn’t a bad start however, I’d also suggesting knocking on doors and getting to know the new neighbors for yourselve!
Additionally, home buyers might check out local police department websites to review crime statistics or to search for potential sexual offenders in the area. Finally, you might also contact the local homeowners association.
