If you live in an HOA, it’s important to know the rules, and one of the rules is often to get approval before making any changes to your property. This includes things like paint color, what you can plant in your garden, and if you can add a fence.

In this story, one couple just moved into an HOA neighborhood. They love the house, but the next door neighbor, not so much.

They got approval from the HOA before adding a fence around their yard, but their neighbor keeps complaining about the fence. Now, they’re worried she might retaliate.

Keep reading for the whole story.

Neighbor upset about fence we installed with HOA approval

My husband and I just moved into our home on February 3.

This is basically our dream home and we’ve worked really hard to get here, so this situation is pretty upsetting.

The neighbor wasn’t very friendly.

Shortly after moving in, we had a property survey done because we planned to install a fence for our dogs. The fence was approved by our HOA before installation.

The first interaction we had with our neighbor (we’ll call her Nellie) was when my husband waved to her at the mailbox and she just stared and didn’t respond. Not a big deal, but that was the first sign something might be off.

A couple weeks later our fencing contractors started installing the fence. Nellie came outside and demanded they stop working.

The contractors told her they had homeowner approval and HOA approval and continued working.

Nellie thought complaining would work.

She then called the head of the neighborhood committee to complain.

The committee head actually called my husband afterward and said she was being unreasonable and seemed surprised by her behavior.

Fast forward to this week when the fence was completed. My husband was in the backyard with our dogs and Nellie came out to the fence and introduced herself. She immediately said the fence “is not going to work.”

She had multiple reasons she didn’t like the fence.

Her complaints were:

• the fence doesn’t match her fence

• it’s about a foot taller than hers

• it’s close to the property line

• we didn’t come talk to her before installing it (she said that would have been the “neighborly thing to do” and that it was disrespectful not to ask first)

This neighbor sounds so annoying!

For context, her fence is actually right on the property line and ours is a few inches inside our property based on the survey.

She also complained about our dogs barking around 7am and said it was unreasonable that we allow our dogs to go in and out through a dog door instead of walking them. She also said it’s not acceptable that our dogs might be outside when she has guests over.

She mentioned she’s part of the neighborhood committee and said she’s going to “see what she can do.” She also said she doesn’t think we’re a “good fit for the neighborhood” and mentioned she’s lived here for 21 years.

HOA approval has to count for something.

My husband told her the fence was HOA-approved and based on a survey. He also said we plan to install cameras in the backyard so we can monitor if the dogs are barking excessively.

She responded by saying we were “being too analytical.”

At one point her husband came out and the conversation became a little more reasonable in tone. He said they are devout Christians and seemed frustrated about the situation, but nothing really got resolved.

We’ve already told the HOA chair we’re fine with them coming onto our side if they ever need to access their fence for maintenance.

She’s not sure what to do about this annoying neighbor.

So my question is: how would you handle this going forward?

We want to be good neighbors and we’re not trying to cause problems, but we also followed HOA rules and installed the fence on our own property.

I’m also starting to worry she might start calling animal control over the dogs barking.

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Any advice from people who’ve dealt with difficult neighbors like this?

The neighbor does truly sound awful. If the HOA approved the fence, I don’t think there’s anything she can do about it. It would be awful if she called animal control on the dogs out of revenge though.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about someone who asked their neighbor to move their fence off their property, then learned the neighbor was trying to claim their land as theirs instead.

Let’s see what Reddit suggests.

Here’s a suggestion to ignore the neighbor.

This person wouldn’t worry about the neighbor either.

Another person thinks they’re doing everything right.

This person points out why good fences make good neighbors.

They got a survey and checked with the HOA. They did everything they needed to do before installing a fence. Their neighbor may not like it, but she isn’t going to get her way. The fence will stay.

I can understand why they’re worried about their dogs, but if they install a camera, they’d have proof if the neighbor lied about anything.

Ignoring her is probably the best things to do.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a tenant who decided to stop returning his neighbor’s misplaced laundry after two years.