Nice house – just a pity about the neighbours

The corner-cutting wheelerdealer responsible for turning the flats in my building into liveable apartments decided to scrimp on sound proofing. I’ll never forget my first night in my new flat. I had just turned off the light when the windows began rattling and the ceiling thumping – the upstairs neighbours were celebrating having moved in with a good romp in the sack.

Eleven years on, they have long moved on, but no matter who resides above me, it still sounds like horses live up there. The result is that I often fantasise about escaping flat life into the paradise of the detached house.

Well, two astonishing “neighbours from hell” stories this week have forced me to change my tune. There is, apparently, just no escape from the hell that is other people and, specifically, the nightmare neighbours next door.

Having moved into a quiet cul-desac in Lancashire five years ago, Jennifer Anderson and David Smith were expecting a peaceful and comfortable life. Instead, their elderly neighbour, a wealthy pensioner by name of Barry Carr, set up cameras to film them day in and day out, and beamed a false camera with a red flashing light into their kitchen. He blared the songs Jealousy and Strange Lady in Town by Frankie Laine on a loop through a loudspeaker. He littered his garden with chattering false teeth. Weirdest of all, he daily positioned a clay figurine of a fat lady, dressed in a blue striped dress just like Ms Anderson’s, in front of their house. Mr Carr has now been given a suspended jail sentence.

Similarly, the news of a “childish and petulant” couple in Somerset also beggared belief. For years they have deliberately been blocking their neighbour’s yard – also his access to the public highway – with plant pots and other items. This bizarre campaign has involved 200 police interventions and a possible court bill of £200,000.

The sound of a bed creaking upstairs? I’ll take it any day.