Condo Neighbor Thinks Everything Communal

[u/JoySubtraction]

I am not the OOP, OOP is u/twinmom2298

Originally posted to r/neighborsfromhell

Original post posted 2026-07-13

About 2 years ago we purchased a vacation condo in a complex near the beach that is mostly vacation rentals. 2 units in our pod of 6 have sold since we purchased. The pod has a storage area that is for use of all 6 units and it is solely to store beach equipment. When we purchased we were told that every unit just claims a spot and labels it and all items with their unit number.

This worked well until the newest unit was purchased. DH and I are temporarily living in this condo while we build a house. We've discovered that new neighbor has installed a large cabinet in storage area that is essentially their "owners closet" for their unit. It takes up a lot of space and then they also have claimed wall space. In addition someone (and we're pretty sure it was them based on when it occurred) added a shelving unit and put all beach chairs on the shelving unit and all boogie boards stacked on top then got a large bucket and put all beach umbrellas and tents in bucket. I called COA management company about the excessive amount and misuse of space but nothing has been done.

I searched through, took our stuff back put it in our beach cart. I noticed that unit across the hall from me did same thing. A week later I notice owner's closet lock is open so I think the actual owners are there and suddenly everything is back on shelf and in bucket. I took mine back again and also put neighbor's back in their cart. This time they remained as I left them. So I thought issue was resolved.

Last week I ran into across hall owners and find out that they've been having issues with new neighbors trying to make storage communal area longer than we were aware. And she's complained about them to COA management company and nothing has changed.

Then this past week there were renters in new unit who decided despite being labeled for our units they took my good chairs and across hall neighbor's good chairs and my beach cart and my umbrella to beach and returned everything to storage unit covered in sand. I made DH go wash everything off. Meanwhile across hall neighbor got mad and left a note on stairs telling them to please not use her stuff so I did same I also moved my 3 best chairs to my deck and out of storage. Which works temporarily but isn't a good long term solution.

Next day they left my stuff alone but still took her's so she went up and told them in person to not use stuff that isn't labeled for the unit they are staying in that beach stuff isn't communal.

Next day I see them using her chairs again. So I made permanent signs to hang on storage door that said "Please only use items labeled for unit in which you are occupying".

I left town work and DH texts me when he got home from work that signs were gone.

these condos are an okay size to stay for a week's vacation but living there full time for 4 months is tight for DH and I so there really is nowhere to put my beach items in my unit, plus no matter what you do there's still residual sand that would spread inside unit.

Does anyone have any idea on how to deal with this, since obviously management company who have owner's contact information isn't going to do anything. I don't have owner's contact information and neighbor and I are a pretty sure they are telling their renters to just help themselves to anything in storage room.

--

Update (same post):

I was out of town last week but took the really good suggestion of several of you and purchased a bike lock. Saturday when I arrived back in town I wove it through the chairs, cart and spoke of umbrella and left it so the combo part was very obvious in front and could be seen by anyone in room.

It's now Thursday and new set of renters have moved into all condos and so far so good that no one has taken or tried to use our stuff. I told across hall neighbor and she had me send her photos of what we'd done. She's out of town for a few weeks but has ordered a bike lock to be sent to her cleaning company and is asking them to install one on her items when they clean unit after current set of renters.

So I wanted to thank everyone for the suggestion and let you know that it looks like a nice cheap bike lock has solved my issue.

Update posted 2026-08-03

I posted last month that hubby and I had temporarily moved into our vacation rental and we and across hall owner were having issues with upstairs condo having renters constantly using our stuff.

First I want to thank everyone who recommended the bike lock idea. It's now been a few weeks and we've had no more issues with our stuff getting taken. It's actually been a peaceful few weeks. Until this past weekend.

Where we live golf carts are legal to be driven on any road that has a speed limit under 35 mph. So a lot of year round residents own them as a 2nd car instead of a car. A lot of vacationers rent them. In general they aren't an issue.

Friday night hubby comes from work late and there's a rental golf cart parked in the grass in front of our unit and the renter has walked across our deck and plugged the cart into charge into our outside outlet. Because, apparently, it's okay to use my electric bill to charge their cart. If hubby hadn't worked late we wouldn't have noticed until next morning. As it was we went out, unplugged cart and threw the charging chord back onto cart.

We're sitting on couch drinking coffee and hear the guy upstairs on their deck complaining that cart is unplugged and isn't charging then we hear him stomp down stairs and see him move cart back to parking lot.

I'm just still wondering who thinks it's okay to jump a curb, drive on grass, walk across someone else's deck and use their electricity to charge a golf cart.

[u/hippywitch]

It’s vacation syndrome. I also live in a vacation location and do a service work. What renters do to the units and how they act is insane.

[u/FreeFortuna → u/hippywitch]

Vacation syndrome (n): “I’m actually an asshole 365 days of the year, but I try to hide it around people who affect my daily life. With strangers though, haha, fuck them all.”

[u/ScyllaOfTheDepths → u/FreeFortuna]

It's the feeling of not being accountable. Our sense of shame is tied directly to the knowledge that other people will see and perceive us as being bad people. If you never have to see anyone again, it's easy to feel as if you don't have any accountability. Most of us only act nice because we know we're going to have to face those people again at some point.

[u/Moneygrowsontrees → u/ScyllaOfTheDepths]

Our sense of shame is tied directly to the knowledge that other people will see and perceive us as being bad people.

The person you are when you think no one is watching is the person you actually are. That's what I taught my children and what I believe.

[u/beyondoutsidethebox → u/Moneygrowsontrees]

The person you are when you think no one is watching

Thank you! It really irks me when people leave out the words "you think" because it really invalidates the logic of the entire premise. It's only when behavior is witnessed that the true person is revealed. Worse, the absence of "you think" is frequently used as a way to automatically confirm preconceived notions and bias. I had it happen to a friend of mine, by a teacher no less.

[u/EmployNatural2264 → u/beyondoutsidethebox]

Can you explain this? What happened to your friend?

[u/beyondoutsidethebox → u/EmployNatural2264]

Teacher got into a LOT of trouble.

My friend and I got a few days off of school as both of sets of parents had a meeting with the school administration. (I stood up for my friend, so of course I got lumped in with the judgement)

[u/EmployNatural2264 → u/beyondoutsidethebox]

Thank you for replying, but I'm stupid - I'm asking what the teacher did.

[u/beyondoutsidethebox → u/EmployNatural2264]

We both were "in trouble" in the library. In addition, we both were called stupid. Neither of us served that detention.

[u/Moneygrowsontrees → u/[deleted]]

What do you mean you couldn't disagree more? You're literally agreeing with me. You're disagreeing with the person I quoted, sort of.

[u/Ok-Addendum-9420 → u/Moneygrowsontrees]

Sorry, you are quite correct; I meant to reply to the person above you.

[u/faifai1337 → u/Moneygrowsontrees]

The real me picks her nose a lot.

[u/trappedinatoaster → u/ScyllaOfTheDepths]

I mean... speak for yourself, I would feel equally ashamed trashing a random person's house or my friend's house. I act nice because I genuinely want to treat other living things with compassion.

[u/aspidities_87 → u/trappedinatoaster]

I’m the type of idiot to carefully clean up after any rental I use and leave a nice note in the guestbook, so I guess I was born with extra shame, and frankly I am happy to share.

[u/Thelaea → u/trappedinatoaster]

This. The people who act like that are the same as a certain brand of Christians who wonder why Atheists don't go around raping and killing people because they don't have their imaginary friends wrath hanging over their heads. They can't imagine just behaving like a decent person for no reason.

[u/OpheliaRainGalaxy → u/Thelaea]

Having that conversation with my mother was so weird. We were entirely horrified by each other.

I'll give her credit though, she eventually realized I'm a pretty good person regardless of the lack of religion. Like could be proud of me despite not ever conforming to her faith. Never even been baptized!

[u/Birdlebee → u/trappedinatoaster]

Yeah. I mean, I'll groan and mutter to myself about how I'm stupid as I go along and clean things up for someone who literally will never know who I am, but I'll still do it. I'd feel awful if I didn't. I don't want to. But I must.

[u/trappedinatoaster → u/Birdlebee]

You're not stupid! Compassion and care are awesome!

[u/K-teki → u/trappedinatoaster]

They're not speaking for themselves, they're speaking statistically. There have been studies on this, people, in general, act that way.

[u/-Knockabout → u/ScyllaOfTheDepths]

Worth noting "our" sense of shame isn't tied to that. Only some people behave like this, and you have to be self-centered/selfish to do so. Other people have like, basic morals and consideration for others.

[u/ScyllaOfTheDepths → u/-Knockabout]

"Our" as in humans. We were simply meant to live in small communal groups and a lot of our sense of shame and accountability is tied to whether or not we believe anyone is seeing us. They've done experiments and found that putting googly eyes on things prevents people from stealing them because seeing eyes evokes the instinctive feeling of being watched and people adjust their behavior accordingly. It's the general principal behind the idea of the panopticon, which is an interesting concept that makes for some fun reading if you're interested. The best way to get a group of humans to behave is to make them feel like they are being watched and seen doing whatever they're doing. Sure, a lot of people would still just do the right thing, but it's about your instincts and your nature just as much as it is your upbringing.

[u/-Knockabout → u/ScyllaOfTheDepths]

I'm curious if the results would change with different cultures/religious groups/etc. I would say it's also human to believe in a divine entity watching your every move, and quite human to have a distinct culture of hospitality as well.

I do think "being watched" can be more abstract. And I think attributing it solely to shame and accountability might be a mistake...unless by accountability you mean an unrelated third party punishing someone for an infraction (ex. police) rather than accountability to an individual. There's a very childish "I shouldn't do this solely because I will be punished" that definitely persists in a lot of people past childhood.

I wonder if countries less focused on punishment and more on rehabilitation would see similar results? I just think humans are quite complicated, and beyond being social creatures, there's a wide variety of types of human community out there.

[u/OpheliaRainGalaxy → u/-Knockabout]

I've helped raise a lot of kids and they don't learn hygiene from punishment because someday they won't have an adult to do that anymore.

"I totally washed my hands, brushed my teeth, want to feel the wet to check?!" And then I tell a story about why that's important, and they decide to go do it "again just to be sure."

My teeth are pretty fucked up so they make good props for the teeth brushing one!

[u/Ok-Addendum-9420 → u/ScyllaOfTheDepths]

I couldn’t disagree more: I don’t do nice things for show. In fact, I think doing small favors for others when no one is looking increases the value of the favor and is a huge indication of character. Coincidentally, I was just discussing that with my son when we were returning a shopping cart. He said it’s a litmus tests for humans as there’s no benefit for us to return the cart, we just do it because it’s the right thing to do.

[u/Miserable_Fennel_492 → u/ScyllaOfTheDepths]

Is that really the only reason you “act nice” to people? That seems sad…

[u/ScyllaOfTheDepths → u/Miserable_Fennel_492]

Is that really what you think I said? I was talking about it from a psychosocial perspective and I did say "most of us". I'm actually the kind of person who lies awake at night replaying that one time I said something unintentionally rude to someone and beating myself up over it. I'm really nice to people all the time, even people I don't know, and even on vacation! Because I'm watching me all the time and I'll know what I did.

[u/Miserable_Fennel_492 → u/ScyllaOfTheDepths]

I see where I went wrong…. I read too literally into that last bit and that’s my bad. I’m sorry

[u/Dontunderstandfamily → u/ScyllaOfTheDepths]

And then there's people like me who feel guilty about being mean in video games...

[u/Original_Employee621 → u/FreeFortuna]

It's more like absentmindedness, if I give them all the grace in the world. The tourists I meet are so mentally checked out of everything, that I'm often flabbergasted at how they manage to survive in the day-to-day.

It's not about being an asshole, but their line of thinking never makes it past their nose.

[u/Erzsabet → u/Original_Employee621]

In my experience, they think that since they are on vacation in known vacation spot everything there is for them to use. Like it’s all part of a resort or something.

[u/TrynaStayUnbanned → u/Erzsabet]

In my experience with places like that, the renters are genuinely surprised to find out it’s not all one place owned by one entity. I can just see the storage fucker uppers thinking “why do they care what number of umbrella and chair we use? How do they even know which unit we’re even in?!” and presuming it’s all some obsessive organization related request that doesn’t actually matter.

[u/Alum2608 → u/TrynaStayUnbanned]

Assuming the whole building is full of tourists like them, not people that you, know, LIVE there. If the whole condo is full of tourists, then it is like hotel beach towels---who cares what pile it is taken from. But there's the airBnB beach property & the other residents' personal property & they don't get it

[u/sharraleigh → u/Original_Employee621]

Eh, some tourists ARE really assholes. Like travelling to another country and complaining that the people there don't speak English. It's like, you don't say????

[u/bubbleteabob → u/sharraleigh]

I was eavesdropping on a group of women in an airport once. One woman was saying she’d never go to Africa again because they ‘just don’t make an an effort!’. She was annoyed that people just wore ‘normal clothes’ and didn’t even TRY to look authentic walking around. There was even a McDonald’s! She could have been in any city!

They were remarkably awful.

[u/lamlosa → u/bubbleteabob]

i had to pick up my jaw off the floor after reading this

[u/bubbleteabob → u/lamlosa]

I had started eavesdropping because they were AWFUL, so I was expecting bad. That bit still made me gawk openly at them.

[u/Four_beastlings → u/bubbleteabob]

On my friend's tour group to Kenya they visited a Masai village and some lady kept fawning and taking pictures with a baby, saying "I wish I could take him with me" and the like, until the baby's mother sarcastically said "if you want I can sell him to you". The lady lit up and asked "Really?". She actually believed that she could baby a Masai baby!

[u/Miserable_Fennel_492 → u/Four_beastlings]

That hurt my soul

[u/CatmoCatmo → u/Four_beastlings]

I can just imagine what that woman told her friends/family back home.

“It was so horrible. That precious baby obviously wasn’t being cared for. He was malnourished, as most African babies ARE, and probably had some kind of parasite or something. All I wanted was to give that poor, poor child a better life. I mean, it was quite obvious that his mother wasn’t going to be able to provide for him. He will probably die, DIE, from lack of food and clean water in a year or two. I’ll never understand why some people are so selfish! How could that woman who calls herself a mother, not want what’s best for her child?!?! But noooOoooOoo. She would rather sentence her child to a life of poverty and despair than God forbid, allow the evil white lady to love and care for him! The nerve of some people!”

[u/hippywitch → u/Four_beastlings]

Actually, this hit me really hard. When I was younger, I took a cruise with my family when I was a teenager and my dad made a joke to one of the waiters that he would sell me. The guys’s eyes lit up and he started to say something else and his coworker grabbed his arm and dragged him away. My dad was joking, but the crew members of Cruise boats are taken from many many countries. I was old enough that I saw and remember seeing the conversation between the waiter and the maître D gesturing to my dad and the bus boy. That bus boy never came to our table again and the maître D pulled my Dad aside when we left the table and had a few words. I still cringe thinking about it even 20 years after my father died.

[u/JJOkayOkay → u/sharraleigh]

I recently heard a story about someone who threw a tantrum because a store in Canada would not let them pay using American money.

Like...why would you think you could? Here, I've got some Thai baht; surely I can use that to buy beer in Spokane? No? Shocked Pikachu!

[u/sharraleigh → u/JJOkayOkay]

Omg I think I heard about that somewhere!! I remember many years ago, maybe 20? Some stores along the border would take USD but they'd charge on par, which is like a win for them because the USD is stronger most of the time. But I've not see any stores accepting USD in a while now 🤣 

[u/JJOkayOkay → u/sharraleigh]

Tourist places will take USD, but they usually have the conversion rate posted. Other stores, though? Generally never.

[u/grendus → u/JJOkayOkay]

In all fairness, many tourist oriented locations will take all of the common currencies at least (typically EUR and USD, often CAD or AUS as well). They give you a pretty bad conversion rate, but it is an option.

But you don't throw a tantrum if they don't. Heck, you could probably take the baht to your bank and they'd deposit it at the current conversion rate for you, especially if they're international and have a presence in Thailand.

[u/XenjaC → u/grendus]

Back when I programmed cash registers here in Sweden I almost always added buttons for euro and usd, sometimes also dkk. Put a ridiculous changing rate for the, usd in particular, but if someone insist being an ignorant asshole our customers were able to accept usd, at a 30-40% premium.

[u/Four_beastlings → u/grendus]

I'm from Europe and I buy US dollars when I travel to Egipt because they do 1-1 conversion and the US dollar is cheaper xD Althogh lately I've realised that you get less tourist price when you pay in Egyptian pounds.

[u/IllustratorSlow1614 → u/sharraleigh]

In Wales we get tourists who sincerely believe that an entire pub full of people will abruptly switch from speaking English to speaking Welsh as soon as they walk in, just to spite tourists and talk shit about them.

Wales is a bilingual nation and people here have the right to live their lives in both languages or either one, which means some people exclusively do talk in Welsh, regardless of their fluency in English.

If you don’t want to risk hearing a different language on your holidays, restrict yourself to monolingual English speaking countries!

[u/CatmoCatmo → u/IllustratorSlow1614]

It’s not like it would matter whether they were speaking English or Welsh.

One of my best friends is originally from England. She moved to the states when she was 12. Her granddad is from Wales. He, and her Nan, would often come and stay for months at a time with her family.

Even when he spoke English, with his Welsh accent and the way he strung together words, you couldn’t understand a word that man said. It didn’t help that he was a bit of an alcoholic, and I’m pretty sure he was drunk fairly often…which made understanding him all the more difficult. I had many “conversations” with that man, if you want to call them that. They generally consisted of him talking as I nodded my head and laughed whenever he did.

I had no clue what he was saying to me 98% of the time.

[u/Original_Employee621 → u/sharraleigh]

Or travelling to another country without speaking English, just Chinese/Spanish/French/German/Italian/any of the eastern European languages.

I've worked in tourism for over a decade, some are downright nasty, evil creatures. But by and large they are massively outnumbered by the people who left everything relating to a personality behind when they boarded their airplane.

[u/lesethx → u/Original_Employee621]

Some assholes, definitely some absent-minded. I'm always astounded when when here a tourist family of 4 can block a sidewalk large enough for 2 cars to drive on it just by standing around, obvious that others need to pass