Nothing tests your patience quite like watching a small problem grow bigger right after you’ve politely asked someone to fix it.

One resident flagged an issue with their neighbor’s growing shoe pile scattered across a shared hallway, identifying it as a legitimate fire hazard.

But instead of improvement, the pile kept expanding, two more pairs and counting, with zero urgency to actually address the problem.

Complicating things further, the neighbor in question also happens to sit on the HOA board, making confrontation feel a lot more complicated than it should.

You’ll want to keep reading for this one.

Asked her to move the shoe pile, got attitude instead

Common hallway. 18 shoes, not in their pairs, just kicked off and left to lie where they land.

When the renter tried to confront the neighbor, the neighbor couldn’t have cared less, despite her perfectly logical reasoning.

Confronted her about it last week when it was only 7 pairs. Her response: “He’s moving out in 2 weeks, are they in the way?”

Umm, yes? They’re a fire hazard, in a shared hallway, that isn’t yours.

The neighbors somehow responded by leaving even more pairs of shoes.

Since then, 2 more pairs. So that’s how we’re doing this.

It’s a common area, not your mudroom, and I shouldn’t have to explain egress paths to a grown adult.

Two weeks apparently means “let it multiply” in their head.

The renter is so fed up they’re not even sure what to do next.

Tracking to see how high this goes before move-out day.

Been going on for months.

Trying to pick my battles, seeing as the owner of the unit is also on the HOA board, smokes in their unit which permeates the hallway, and also slams their door.

Yikes! This renter needs to get out of this place.

What did Reddit have to say?

Playing dumb is a solid option here.

If the renter can’t get through to the neighbor, maybe the fire marshal can.

This user has a bright idea.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a person who is thinking of alerting the city to their neighbor’s campers being lived-in while parked on the street.

This user also agrees about going the fire marshal route.

Eighteen shoes in a shared hallway is just objectively unhinged, fire hazard or not.

This renter brought it up nicely the first time, and instead of a fix she got attitude and somehow more shoes. How does that make sense?

The HOA board thing definitely makes this messier since nobody wants to be That Person filing a complaint about their neighbor who technically has some pull, but a fire hazard is a fire hazard no matter who owns the unit.