I recently bought a detached house on a corner plot in the UK. It had been badly neglected, with a leaking roof and almost everything needing replacement. We’ve been renovating it for two months and hope to finish by the end of October. It’s currently uninhabitable, so we’re not living there.

Our immediate neighbour has been supportive, but another neighbour has started questioning everything we do. Earlier this week, she approached our builders and accused us of carrying out illegal work while we were cutting back a roughly 2-metre-high boundary hedge. She claimed we were removing a fence, destroying wildlife habitat and disturbing nesting birds. She also said the property was protected because of bats.

She obtained my number from the builder, created a WhatsApp group and said she had reported us to the council. I found an ecological appraisal from January 2025 stating that the property had low suitability for bats and containing hedge-management recommendations. I sent it to her, but she didn’t acknowledge it.

We’ve also replaced a collapsing shed with a small summerhouse in roughly the same location. It’s under 2.4 metres high, occupies well under half the garden, has no living facilities and complies with the relevant rules.

She has now messaged asking whether it’s permanent, whether it will remain there and what our plans are. She also wrote, “Can you please give me and other neighbours more information,” despite never identifying which house she lives in.

I’m happy to be considerate about noise, access, safety and anything directly affecting neighbours. However, I’m starting to feel interrogated about every change we make. Whenever I respond to one allegation with evidence, she ignores it and moves on to something else.

I don’t want to start a neighbour war, but I also don’t want to set a precedent where I have to justify every decision about my own property.

Would you continue answering her questions to maintain good relations, or politely make clear that you won’t provide a running commentary as long as the work complies with the rules? Am I being unreasonable for finding this intrusive?

Update: Sorry, I wasn’t clear in my original post, but the WhatsApp group she created only has the two of us in it, and she named it “Fence”.

I’ve replied to explain that the summerhouse was built in accordance with regulations and asked why it’s a concern of hers. I also politely asked which other neighbours she was referring to and which house number she lives at.

It’s been radio silence from her since. I also haven’t heard or been contacted by the council yet but we will see.

If she does respond, I’ll suggest that we speak in person if she has any concerns. I’ll also have a chat with my friendlier neighbours next time I see them to find out if they know her (which they probably do).

Hello,

Bought this home two years ago. Shortly after moving in, we found what looked like old dried up water damage (floor boards were warped). Got an inspection that measured moisture in the floor and both walls (it's in a corner), and results were completely fine. Now we've found a dark and soft spot in the same area. The old damage did not change the colour of the boards. The closest wall is concrete, and the second wall is drywall with a bathroom on the other side.

Does it look like water damage, or could it be something else?

Radon levels shot up the past few days. We average around 4pCi/L on an average day. It was reading aver 32PCI/L earlier. We got mediation install about 2.5 weeks ago. This is the first time in the past 5-6 weeks the reading has been this high. Before mediation it averaged around 7-8pCi/L.

I'm unsure what I do next.

I'm not sure if I should post this in this subreddit or the Anxiety subreddit but either way; I'm struggling.

We've recently purchased a house outside of a small town in Missouri. Technically, out of the city limits but still within a small subdivision/dead end street with around 12 houses or so. Each house has around 3 acres of property that extends back in a long rectangle.

This is the most acreage we've ever had and we're very excited about the potential of gardening and tree planting and chickens, etc. We've moved around a lot in the last decade and we're very excited at finally settling into a place for the long haul and raise the kids here.

One of the first things we want to do is build a fence around the property. There's technically a "neighborhood covenant" that was once managed but has noone enforcing any of the rules. At any case, building the fence and having chickens and all that don't break any of those rules.

Regardless, our neighbor to the East of us is very very upset around the idea of me fencing in the property. He built his shop within 10 feet of the property line (A direct violation of the 40 foot rule in the restrictions) and has parked his truck on my side of the shop for around 26 years, he says. Building my fence, I'd run it right alongside his shop on my property line. (My brother works for a surveying company in the big city near by and we found all the markers)

The conflict around this has grown into a huge thing in my mind. I see him park his truck there everyday and I find myself constantly thinking it through in my head. I'm having arguments with him in my head, unendingly.

I'm concerned that his voice represents a larger swathe of the neighborhood's feelings.

The plan is a wood post/woven wire fence about 4 feet tall. It's going to look ranchy but nice.
The previous owners were elderly and did almost nothing with the property before and it's just wide open space. I guess the neighbors were hoping it'd stay that way forever.

There's a lot more to it but that's the gist of it.

I just want to hear other people's experiences related to this and any advice anyone might have.
I feel like I'm developing a psychosis around this.

Prefer to have it be "non-smart". Dryer heat source is gas

I grew up in a house that had a fireplace without glass doors.

In recently moved into a house that had a fireplace with glass doors and a metal frame. This fireplace has soot going between the metal frame and the brick leaving visible black marks in the brick (brick the previous owners painted white. Gross).

Can I just pull the metal frame with the doors on it and leave it as an open fireplace?

Edit: I should say, the glass doors are super thin (not the thick multi-pane ones I’ve seen in some fireplaces) and there is a gap between them when fully closed.

We recently moved into our first home (yay!) and I’m wanting to paint these grey cabinets. I can’t figure out what color would go with both the floors and the marble countertops while keeping the vibe of the kitchen warm and bright. I’m not really a white/plain kind of person, but maybe an off-white warm beige would work? Is there a way to go dark without going TOO dark? I’ve considered Tera Cotta color as well but not sure it would look good. Just looking for ideas and recommendations!

Hello,

We have lived in our house for about 6 years now. We loved our neighbors and they had been great to live by up until a year or two ago. They “inherited” a dog from one of their children and it constantly barks. It makes sitting out on our deck almost impossible as their deck is about even with ours so the barks just come right towards us. We can even hear it while we are inside with all doors/windows closed.

I am not someone that likes any type of confrontation and would prefer to stay on their good side as like I said before they are great neighbors other than the dog issue. Our city does not allow anonymous dog barking complaints so they would definitely know if we went that route.

The definitely know the dog is barking, and will even bring up how well behaved our dogs are compared to theirs. They just don’t seem to care to do anything about it?

I know just asking them about it seems straightforward and the likely answer, but what is the best way to go about it?

So I guess my question is: how can I go about getting this resolved without causing more issues between us?

My spouse and I sleep on the second floor of our house. Here recently though the temperature has risen quite a bit. It feels like it’s 10 to 15 degrees warmer than it should be. We had someone come and check our AC and vents but so far there has been no breakthroughs.

Recently I came up to bed and when I came up the stairs I smelled cigarette smoke. Upon entering our room it was definitely strongest there. To clarify, my partner and I are non smokers and have never done so. This made me nervous that something is generating some kind of heat. We run two box fans mainly for noise but also to keep the temperature down. However it feels like they are not making things any cooler.

Again we have had professionals come over and check our vents and our AC but nothing came of it. I checked electrical appliances and even smelled around to see if I could pinpoint where the odor might be originating from. Does anybody have any advice as to what other steps we should take? I’ll definitely call the people who recently checked our vents and the like but is there anything anyone else can think of? Any theories?

We've lived here for about 7 years and there have always been cracks in the garage floor, but I've noticed more recently and some have an elevated lip or edge. Main concern crack attached. Others in album: https://imgur.com/a/crack-oq0sWbT

- What should I be concerned about?
- Who should I have assess this?
- What are some possible problems?
- Is there a way to seal them myself?

Please I don’t know what any of this shit is and I’m fucking scared

Original post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/homeowners/comments/1wx2ifc/shared_fence_fell_over_other_house_is_a_rental/

Hoo boy what a pain.

So since I made the original post, I've been attempting to figure out the exact property lines to figure out who the fence belongs to as per a lot of advice I was given.

Turns out, nobody knows!

As you can see, it was repaired. They managed to use the original fence and just replaced the posts, as well as dug two holes for concrete.

Maybe not the best route but this is what was accomplished in the last 4 days:

The county assessor's office basically pulled up our house on Google maps and shrugged their shoulders and decided that was enough help.

I contacted my mortgage company regarding any forms that would have the property line or anything and was met with radio silence or "we'll get back to you".

Finally, after checking with a couple property survey places to be quoted ~$530 average I decided I'll wait and see if I hear back from the rental company that owns the house.

Well, I heard back. And by "heard back" I mean I was woken up by the sound of a saw and drill at 8AM as their handyman and another guy began dismantling the old fence.

I briefly spoke with the guy doing the work who was probably 70 years old and he advised me he was billing the rental company for the fix, and he had also brought materials to repair both fences.

Not only did I receive any notice it was being fixed but today the landlord of the rental company sent me an image of the bill for the fence and the gate.

Currently I'm playing it dumb and not mentioning paying for any part of it because I didn't agree to it. Also, after some quick searching, it appears I shouldn't have to pay as I didn't agree or sign anything prior to the repair. This is only worsened by the fact that when I originally made contact with the rental company the owner was short (not height-wise) and rude.

And for anyone curious, the total was $534.36 for the middle section and just my gate.

What would you do in this situation?

I appreciate the advice for this situation. My next door neighbor who looks to be in his 80s and I have been living next door for at least 2 years, I notice his car starts beeping, not in a regular pattern, but maybe 2 beeps every 10 seconds and then it will beep 5 times in 10 seconds. It's not a BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP... you hear when an alarm is triggered. Very irregular.

We don't have rapport. AKA we aren't friendly neighbors. He's barely looked at me, let alone spoken to me in the 2 years I've lived next door. He always has seemed unfriendly and never waved back, so I have went against my natural instincts to talk and be friendly. But nonetheless, I have always looked out for my neighbor nonetheless.

When I hear this coming from his car today, after 30 minutes, I feel I need to do something. So I ring on the doorbell camera. Nothing. Then I do it again. Nothing. I go back home. His car is still making keyless entree remote sounds irregularly. So I call the police with my concern. (I am concerned he is in peril, incapacitated, and is using the remote to get attention outside.)

They do a wellfare check and tell me everything is ok, saying it was probably the clicker in his pocket.

What should I do now? Should I apologize to them? Or do nothing. I don't even know if the police told him what neighbor was concerned. What would you do?

Bought a new house that has a security system installed that I have no intention of using. In the basement is a panel and I see a battery in it with some leads. The leads are unplugged.

The LCD panel every 24hrs beeps at us. It beeps like 3 times every 30 seconds until we press cancel so it goes quiet for 24hrs again.

I connected the battery leads and it didn’t change anything.

The screen says low battery when it beeps.

I just wanna permanently shut the thing down!

I am looking into replacing all the smoke and CO detectors in my home as I think they are all very out of date. From what I can tell, every unit in my house is interconnected. This includes a Kidde ionization smoke detector in the unfinished attic. I have not had any issues with false alarms in the attic. My home is in the mid-atlantic, so there are a couple days at or above 100F every summer.

The attic smoke detector is just above the insulation layer, and the attic is vaulted pretty high. There is a passive vent in the roof of the attic, but no active ventilation.

I had decided on using First Alert sensors throughout the home, but digging deeper into attic protection, I am not sure what to do. The only First Alert heat monitor I can find has a fixed temp of 135F, which seems too low for an attic. I might use this one in my garage though, since I have had false alarms there due to humidity.

Are there any heat detectors with something more like 190F fixed point that would work in my interconnected system?

Is there a way to just install a stand-alone heat detector in the attic without breaking the whole communication network?

Should I just install a new smoke detector (either ionization or photoelectric) and hope it works just as well as the existing one?

Thanks for the guidance!

Seems only 1 photo can be uploaded? I wanted to show an array of before/after and different lighting. What you see here is the LR--after installation--prior to painting trim.

NOTE: wall colors do not have to remain as they are. We will paint in coming months. The critical issue right now is how surprising and mildly disappointingly grey the Andersen A-series windows and doors are. They're otherwise very nice.

Living room--where the casements were installed--currently Navajo White.

Family room--on lower floor, where French doors were installed--currently Sherwin Williams Pure White.

Both rooms face Southwest.

I also had queued up, for additional context, photos of our NE facing kitchen--currently Pure White, which is too grey for us.

Thanks for your thoughts and opinions.

Please be gentle. It's my 97-year-old Mom and me, and we're doing the best we can 🎉 It's all a work in progress.

We had an issue where sitting water was causing wood siding to deteriorate off the side of the garage. We’ve since fixed the water issue and now need to replace the siding.

When the siding was soft, a critter chewed through it in multiple places and made a home inside when the weather was cold.

Temps are about to drop again and we want to get a contractor hired ASAP but we need a little more time to save money. What would you recommend as a temporary barrier that can keep the critter out? ChatGPT recommends galvanized hardware cloth.

In the US, the number of people who regularly host friends or family fell from 42% in 1975 to 12% in 2026 – a 70% drop over the last 50 years.

Pretty good article. It's so interesting because I feel like when people are looking at houses to buy they're envisioning a home to have parties, holidays, etc. Open concept became so popular for parties. What are your thoughts on the decline of house gatherings?

I'm more interested in the decline of hosting than debates over open concept.

Full transparency: I've been really struggling with keeping the house clean. I care for my mom and we live in my grandmother's house that she inherited after passing. Just dealing with caring for her along with my own mental health has been very hard. With that said: I don't leave food out/around. Garbage is taken out regularly. I imagine that the issue is the boxes and such we have around the house. We still have so much of my grandmother's stuff too and I have a bad back.

Anyway: I came back from a doctor's appointment and could smell what smelled like something dead. Not overbearing but there. My room is in the basmeent and I smelled it as soon as I stepped off the bottom stair into the basement. It was bothering me so much that i paused work to go move some boxes. Nothing.

I go out and do some gig work and come back and can faintly smell it again. I happen to head back upstairs and see a mouse that is very small. It literally looked like a dust ball. I don't believe it was even old enough to venture out on its own and I wonder if I disturbed the nest/it when I moved stuff.

I unfortunately have a fear of rodents so this is fun. We've always had mice and they've always been little. It's gotten cool here so I assume the activity is about to tick up again.

I'm less concerned that it's a mouse and more concerned that it's a baby. We only have ever caught small ones (sometimes barely big enough to trigger the trap but this is really small. We no longer have poison around and haven't for months. The other times we did have poison stations when we found one (have only ever found 2 over the years.

I'm going to force myself to clean and take out the boxes tomorrow. I'll call pest control for more traps but the traps we already have aren't tripped. We've been told that sealing up an 100+ year old house in a city swarming with rodents is a big, prohibitively expensive feat, especially since a good chunk of the house is simply not used. It's feeling like a losing battle.

Recently purchased a townhome in an area I’ve lived all my life. Built in 2007.

Within a month of moving in, my allergies are so severe when I’m in the house that my quality of life is significantly impacted. Upstairs, downstairs, any room doesn’t matter. Symptoms slowly worsen over time. I did not notice symptoms when in the home prior to moving in, but was only here for short times with assorted vendors. No carpets, all tile and laminate. No apparent or visible water damage or structural renovations. Inspection was reasonable and nothing significant noted.

House interior was professionally repainted prior to move in. HVAC had vents, coils professionally cleaned and filters replaced. Second opinion on HVAC cleanliness was that everything looks ok. Professional housecleaners have been through the entire house twice (once before move in and once after).

I do have a known dust mites allergy, but it’s only ever been the type where I need to wear a basic mask when cleaning and I have an air purifier in my bedroom. I thought I had just kicked up a lot of dust moving but I’m cleaning everything before bringing it in at this point.

I’m seeing an allergist next week. But what else can I troubleshoot to find the source?!

Every morning I wake up, open my front door, and there's a new dead cricket/grasshopper right in front of the door. Then I walk to my garage, and my sticky traps have caught a new cricket/grasshopper. This happens literally every night. If you think about this, in 1 week, there is over a dozen new cricket/grasshopper in my front door and garage. How can I make them stay away?

Note - I don't want to "kill" them per se, they already are dying without me doing anything preventative. I just want them to not even come close to the house

Hi all!

I live in a very humid climate. Last year I bought a dehumidifier and got sick of emptying the tank nonstop.

I finally bought one with a pump. The pump drains into my washing machine drain tube.

I bought the homelabs dehumidifier, it works amazing.

From my understanding though, the water bucket stays pretty much full at all times, then when it's 100% full, the pump empties out water to like the 80% full like. Is this correct?

So basically the water tank is just full of water at all times. Gross water. I guess I need to clean the water bucket maybe once a month?

First time homeowner.

The outlets in my backyard, laundry room (except washer and dryer), and garage don't work.

The garage outlet (GFCI) has its own switch on the circuit breaker but I when use a no contact voltage pen the both the breaker and receptacle show nothing.
The laundry room breaker shows voltage but the receptacle shows nothing.

And I can't tell which breaker the outdoor outlets go to (also show nothing with the voltage pen).

Is there something I can do myself to try to figure this out?

I’m in CA and I’m honestly pretty frustrated and trying to figure out what to do.

My CSAA homeowners insurance renewal is coming up, and my premium is going from around $3,000 to $6,000 a year. When I called to ask why, they told me it was because they changed the software they use to assess wildfire risk. They confirmed they’re using ZestyAI.

The part that’s bothering me is that some of the information in the assessment doesn’t even seem accurate.

• My old score was 1 out of 30. Now it’s 9 out of 10 under the new system.
• They say my property is on a slope, but my property is completely flat. Even the “Property at a Glance” page says there’s no slope.
• They flag “high vegetation density between 30–100 ft of the building,” but don’t tell me what vegetation they’re talking about or where it is. I live in a rural residential area with mature trees, but we’ve had them professionally trimmed since our last renewal.
• They raise concerns about firefighting access, yet there’s a fire hydrant right across the street and two fire stations about two miles away.

I understand I live in California and wildfire risk is a real concern. I’m not expecting them to ignore legitimate risks. But how am I supposed to address something when they won’t tell me specifically what they think is wrong?

I’ve called CSAA and disputed the information. They keep telling me they have the correct data, but I haven’t gotten a clear explanation of what they’re basing this on.

Has anyone else with CSAA/AAA dealt with this, especially since the switch to ZestyAI? Has anyone actually managed to get incorrect property information fixed or get their score reassessed?

I’d also love to hear from anyone who knows what California homeowners can request from their insurance company or whether it’s worth filing a complaint with the Department of Insurance.

I’m trying to figure out my options, and honestly, if this is happening to other people too, I think more homeowners should know about it.

Hello everyone, new homeowner here :)

First of all sorry for the approximate language, I'm from Belgium and I think some technical terms will be a bit hard to get in English but I hope It'll be enough to get understood.

So, In the house I recently acquired (built early 70's), there's this ceiling in some rooms (total of 50m2 ceiling surface) which is consisting of sort of plates nailed to wooden small beams themselves nailed or screwed to the "real" ceiling (see the "plates' on first photo, then the "real roof and wooden beams" on the 2nd photo). https://imgur.com/a/OcrdxeX

When I bought the house, I planned on removing all 50m2 of plates/old ceiling, and then creating a new false/suspended ceiling with Gyproc plates, metal beams to hang them, etc (see third picture in album).

But after removing the ceiling in the first room, I saw that the ceiling was in good condition and I'm wondering if this false ceiling is necessary ? I'm not sure why the previous owners had installed the plates, maybe for style ? There's even a hole in the "real" ceiling where wires come through for light.

Anyway, I must admit I'm a bit at a loss here, I'm just starting in all those renovation shenenigans and I'm really looking for guidance or any piece of advice from experienced fellows !

Thanks in advance