"Love thy neighbor," the famous proverb says. Yet, according to a 2023 LendingTree survey, 24% of Americans say they dislike at least one of their neighbors. It turns out that sometimes, loving them can be really difficult. Especially if they're a thundering pain in the rear who leaves you passive-aggressive notes.
This list by Bored Panda is dedicated to exactly that. Who hasn't dealt with a petty neighbor at least once in their lives? Please share your luck with us if you're one of those people! But, for the rest of us, here are some relatable pics of neighbors making ridiculous demands and leaving notes so petty they get inducted into the passive-aggressive hall of fame.
#1 You're Welcome
Image credits: MrRaiders
#2 Unfortunately For You, So Am I
Image credits: b33p
#3 This Neighbor Note
Image credits: MrRaiders
In the past, relationships with your neighbors were almost as close as family. Sure, some of them were nosy and unpleasant, but there used to be a sense of community among the people in a neighborhood. A 1976 study even showed that friendships with neighbors did widows more good than relationships with their nuclear families and even their own children.
Those with friend neighbors said they were less lonely, felt more useful, and saw themselves as respected in the community.
Today, people wouldn't even call their neighbors "friends." According to a British survey, one in four people believe there's "no sense of community spirit" in their neighborhood. 75% think of their neighbors as acquaintances only. So, how did we go from being friendly with our neighbors to leaving them passive-aggressive notes in the lobby?
#4 Note That Got Left On My Neighbors Car After He Parked Crooked And Hit The Car Next To Him
Image credits: Dapper_John
#5 Stealing Plants
Image credits: zeb1
#6 Kids Are Having Fun With Friends So A Neighbor Reported To HOA That They Must Be Running A Childcare
Image credits: JustJJ92
Some people believe that today, we think of relationships with our neighbors in terms of etiquette rather than as social relationships. Community development specialist with the University of Missouri Extension David Burton says that we can try to blame outside influences, but the real reason why we're not friendly with our neighbors anymore is our own fault.
"People seem to have their favorite theory about why things have changed. I've heard the blame placed on things like fenced yards, homes without front porches, too much indoor entertainment, electric garage doors, and even air-conditioning. But those are all external sources of blame, while the actual responsibility rests with each of us and our choices."
#7 This Was Posted On My Neighbor's Door This Morning
Image credits: DoctorHoneyBadger
#8 Joy-Hating Neighbor Writes Psychotic Threatening Note
Image credits: L0v3Ly88
#9 Here’s A Good One… Last Month My Lovely Downstairs Neighbor Taped This To My Door
My son was apparently laughing too loud playing at the park outside with his friends… Let’s hope her lease ends soon because this is the third letter she’s put on my door about his “laughing” I’ll see if I can find them. She’s 65 with 15 cats and we can smell her cigarette smoke through our vents nightly and have never said a mean word to her. Might just post my own letter about her cigarette smoke .. and I'm not even that type of person … but COME ON. This is ridiculous.
Image credits: Abbie420newman1
According to Burton, there are four main reasons why today we are less likely to engage in conversation with our neighbors than before:
- We're lonely,
- We're busy,
- We have 'retreat mentality,'
- And we get all the entertainment we need inside our homes.
Whether to maintain a relationship with a neighbor is a personal decision. But by refusing to form a bond with them, we might be risking giving up our social capital and even our physical and mental well-being.
"Be intentional about being outside," Burton offers some advice on how to chat up your neighbors more often. "Watch and speak to neighbors that you see. And take steps to learn and use the names of your neighbors. That is the starting line so get on your mark."
#10 My Neighbor Is Mad That We Have Security Cameras Facing Her Property
We both have 10 acres. Her house is a quite a ways away from ours. She is pissed that we got new cameras because now she will get caught harassing us. She put this up last night right by the fence by my kids trampoline. Traumatized my 4 year old.
Image credits: youneedtocalmdown20
#11 Passive Aggressive Neighbors At Their Finest
Image credits: grey_iguana
#12 There Is A Dumpster That Is Illegally Taking Up A Parking Spot On My Street With A Note Saying Not To Use It. I’d Been Leaving Other Notes Making Fun Of Their Note. Today, Someone Else Joined In
Image credits: thehofstetter
Tight-knit neighborhood communities contribute to safer environments as well. Research shows that neighbor behavior and engaged communities result in collective efficacy: it reduces vandalism and crime. Simply put, if neighbors trust each other and have better relationships, they're more likely to act when crime is happening, resulting in fewer violent incidents.
#13 The Neighbors Need To Stop
Image credits: gdm516
#14 What Is Wrong With People? Open Your Own Mail
Image credits: CashmirFunk
#15 My Family Is Displaced From A Hurricane And A Neighbor Left A Letter
Image credits: clarissaswallowsall
Interestingly, if there are any dog owners in the neighborhood, you should probably be thankful to them that the community can feel safer. And no, the pooch doesn't have to be an aggressive pit bull who barks at every person they see.
A 2022 study found that neighborhoods that have higher concentrations of households with dogs experience fewer robberies, homicides, and cases of aggravated assault. The next time your neighbor complains about your dog, throw that statistic in their face!
#16 So Sorry About Stealing Your Golf Clubs. Here's My Old Sh**ty Set... A Neighbor Of Mine Woke Up To Find This Note On Her Van The Day After It Was Broken Into
Image credits: the_sad_puppet_show
#17 Someone Anonymously Sent This To My Neighbor
Image credits: cnotethegoat123
#18 Angry Note After Removing Clothing From Laundry
Person left their clothes in the dryer for at least 1 hour after finishing. As my clothes were ready for the dryer, I gave 10 minutes of courtesy and then removed their clothes and placed them on top of the dryer, then got to my business. I returned to this beautiful note, plus an extra note on top from a neighbor who witnessed the abandoned clothes and defended me. What are your thoughts on community laundry ethics?
Image credits: Estemar20
There's some truth to the statement that we don't really know how to belong to communities anymore. We joke about it on social media with memes like "People are yearning for the town square," but a sense of community really does help us feel less lonely. According to the American Time Use Survey, only 30% of Americans socialize with a person each day. In 2014, that percentage was 38%.
#19 Crazy Neighbor Gets Mad At Friend For Dropping A Single Strand Of Hair And Tapes Up The Hair As Evidence
My friend moved into a new apartment recently. He shares the laundry room with 3 other units. He is unit #1.
While doing laundry the other day, one of my friend’s hair fell off from his head. Obviously, he didn’t know cause he didn’t check the entire room for hairfall — I mean, who the hell checks if any of their hairs fell off their head wherever they go?
Now apparently, the landlord got mad at the sight of a single hair strand and put up a new sign in the laundry room (the bottom sign is new & the upper sign had been there for a while) taping his hair as evidence that he didn’t thoroughly clean the facility.
My friend doesn’t have any severe hair fall issue. The hair normally fell off his head normally just like hair falls off most people’s heads occasionally. Also for the record, my friend cleans the washing machine & dryer surfaces after he uses them. Just seems like he missed this one hair strand.
Who is the jerk here? Idk this seems super crazy to ask someone to keep track of every hair strand that falls of one’s head and pick them up.
At first I thought the hair must have just landed on the tap by mistake when the landlord put it up the sign. But other units have informed me that this landlord taped up someone else’s hair 6 months ago to a sign asking the unit to clean it up.
IMO, this is next level crazy and it’s unreasonable to expect that level of cleanliness.
Image credits: scorsese_finest
#20 *gasp* Imagine Having The Audacity To Walk Barefoot In Your Own Apartment
Image credits: AddieStark
#21 Note From The Downstairs Neighbors
Image credits: LiI_Swiffer
Living in walkable neighborhoods can help us feel more engaged with our communities. A 2023 study shows that it helps us reach our daily recommended amount of physical activity.
What's more, it makes us more likely to engage in social interactions. Living in walkable neighborhoods also makes people more likely to say they're living in tight-knit communities in which they feel like they can rely on their neighbors.
#22 Someone In My City Got This Put On Their Door
Image credits: SteveCorpGuy4
#23 Letter And Response From Two Of My Neighbours I Happen To Share A Wall With
Image credits: draksid
#24 Note Left On Car Of Disabled Neighbour's Social Worker
Image credits: The_winner_man
We're becoming homebodies, and sometimes, it's not out of choice, but out of necessity. As visiting fellow at the Center for Economy and Society at Johns Hopkins University, Diana Lind writes for The Washington Post, living in communities where we can socialize with neighbors more often is becoming less and less affordable.
#25 Received This Well-Worded Letter In My Mailbox This Morning (Wrong Neighbour - I Don't Even Have A Dog)
Image credits: joshtrytry
#26 Received In The Mail From A Concerned Neighbor
I haven’t been able to care for my yard as much as I would like over the past few months because we had our second child back in February and I’ve been single-handedly caring for the newborn and our 5 year old while my wife has been in the hospital recovering from postpartum complications.
At no point has my yard been out of compliance with city or HOA ordinances, and at no point has anyone bothered to approach me directly about the matter. Instead, we just received this anonymous passive-aggressive letter in the mail. They even postmarked it and sent it through the mail, rather than walking a few doors down and speaking to me like a human being.
Image credits: mahelke
#27 Neighbors Of My Dorm Room Put This Sign Up Yesterday
Image credits: scoutodile
Lind claims that Americans are currently divided into three tiers of dwellers:
- those who are financially well-off enough to afford living in amenity-filled neighborhoods;
- those who alternate between isolating days of digital life and in-person socialization depending on whether they have enough money to go to a restaurant, cinema, etc.;
- and those who don't have stable housing, whether that's due to finances or force majeure.
Lind believes that we should change our perspective on socialization. "We should treat 'getting out' as a necessary health intervention rather than an optional luxury or a work burden."
#28 Somebody Left This Note On My Car… In My Assigned Space
Image credits: kubrickfanclub_
#29 My Neighbor Has Been Giving Me Repeated Note To Cut Down My Trees, These Are My Trees
Image credits: brmamabrma
#30 Not Sure How To Feel About This Or Go About Handling It
I’ve lived in my building (in Iowa) for two years now above a tattoo shop. I see the guys who work there around town frequently and they have never expressed an issue or been anything but pleasant to me. This showed up last night and has been bothering me ever since. Would they have any legal standing to even make someone pay for damages that result from an artist getting startled? I certainly would like to maintain a cordial relationship with them, since this is my home for another two months, but the whole thing has me feeling uneasy.
I learned last night that one of the artists does in fact have a domestic violence charge against him, during which he showed up unannounced and drunk at his girlfriends home and assaulted her, and the street door to my building can be opened by anyone. The hallway door locks, but can be opened with any key. Just feeling uneasy about the whole thing and wondering if anyone has any insight.
Image credits: uncreatibe
What about your relationship with your neighbors, Pandas? Are they as insufferable as some of the folks on this list? Or do these notes sound completely unrelatable to you? Let us know in the comments! And if you'd like to see some more crazy neighbor shenanigans, check out our previous post about the wildest messages on Nextdoor!
#31 Woke Up To This Note This Morning
Sheltered what I assumed was a stray cat for two days, called my apartment complex asking if anyone lost their pet, and on day 2, the owner shows up and I returned her cat.
Image credits: MrKhryspy
#32 Neighbors Don't Like My Parents' Shed
They've done their research, spoken to homeowners directly, and aren't breaking any rules or covenants by having a shed where they do, but the neighborhood hates it. It doesn't look bad, but have been told it's an 'eyesore'. No return address or signature from these cowards.
Image credits: oddphallicreaction
#33 Neighbor Wants Halloween Decorations Down Nov 1st
Image credits: dudermcamerika
#34 One Of My Apartment Neighbors Left This Anonymous Note On My Door Accusing Me Of Noise Complaints After Midnight On Christmas
Image credits: bBirdgirl21
#35 Went To A Friendsgiving
They let their neighbor know ahead of time that they would be having people over, it was 4:45pm on a Saturday and about 6 people were there at that point. He abruptly knocked on the door once, taped this note to the door and ran off.
Image credits: gravityandlove
#36 Because I Work All Day And Can Control Where The Wind Blows. Was Mailed To Me (Probably By My Neighbor’s Wife), Envelope Postmarked The Next Town Over
Image credits: leinad1972
#37 Early Morning Shifts Bugs Neighbors
I live in a semi retirement community with my Dad, this letter was left on the window of my work van. I have to be at work most days at 4:45 am. Kind of creepy they left this on my work van knowing there’s two vans that look identical next to each other.
Image credits: Icy_Deer7055
#38 I Found This Lovely Gem On My Door When I Left For Work
Image credits: Mjstephens19
#39 This Was Taped To My Door, I Do Not Have Children And My Neighbor Is Now Piling Random People’s Garbage On The Lids Of My Trash Cans
I don’t know my neighbors and tried to talk to the ones that do have children, but they’ve been unresponsive. Went outside again to move my bins for trash day and there were random garbage bags piled on top of them. Going to leave a note back because my neighborhood is not notoriously friendly lol.
Image credits: LilOrganicCoconut
#40 Got Pulled Into Our Neighbors Note War
Saw this note this morning and thought it was funny that we were the assumed note-leavers in the building. There's been a constant note war going on for a year now where notes have been put up asking people to stop smoking in their apartments. Of course these don't deter the smokers and the complex doesn't have a no smoking policy. We are the only dog owners and know this is how apartment living is like with the smoking. This is our response to being dragged into this fight.
Image credits: dapper_cam
#41 Our Neighbors Solution To A Newly Poured Driveway On A One-Lane Road
Image credits: UnethicalTesticle
#42 This Poorly Written Letter From My Passive Aggressive Neighbor Telling Me To Remove My 'Legally-Owned' Plants From My Property
Image credits: HedgehogSmoothie
#43 My Neighbor Thinks They Own The Public Street In Front Of Their Apartment
Image credits: estunum
#44 My Girlfriend And I Order Hellofresh Weekly. This Time, We Didn’t Get It — Our Neighbor Stole The Package And Left A Fake Note On Their Door To Cover It Up
Image credits: reddit.com
#45 Well This Is Embarrassing
So I'm going to be sending them some 38db ear plugs, gift wrapped by Amazon, with a note: I'm so sorry! I'm working on it but it will be May or June before I can get a sleep study and then maybe a c-pap machine or something. I hope these will help in the meantime. Here's my phone number to text me if you run out.
Too nice?
When they first moved in, I could hear her screaming, "STOP IT! I HATE YOU! GET AWAY FROM ME! I HATE YOU!" And similar things to... someone? I could only hear one person though. I never heard anything (other than their closet door because it butts up against mine) or had any complaints from the previous neighbors. I came close to having a wellness check done a couple of times but then it would stop. I haven't heard them screaming in a while.
Image credits: writinginmyhead
#46 Curious As To What The “Formal Complaint To The Leasing Office” Would Look Like
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#47 I Moved Into An Apt Complex About A Month Or So Ago And Found This On My Windshield. So Much For Nice Neighbors
Image credits: MickeyChii
#48 Drama In The Building Last Week
Call me crazy, but 8a or 9a is a perfectly reasonable time for people to move about in their living spaces. The first sign went up and I saw it and laughed. The next day, the response came. The third day, the response was taken down. I currently live in small town midwest USA, passive aggression is what this town does best.
Image credits: opesosorry
#49 When My Mom Passed Away A Few Years Back The Next Door Neighbor Wrote This In The Sympathy Card
It says: "Attention: Wally + Sons, According to our tax bill information, garbage totes should not be placed at curbside before seven (7:00) o'clock p.m. on Sunday, the day before our garbage collection day on Monday. Pls. follow this rule. Thanks! -E (?)"
Image credits: harrington3927
#50 Found This Posted To Our Door (In A Townhome Association) Today And We Don’t Even Have A Dog
Image credits: DBLAgent412
