Our hoarder neighbour is a nightmare and ruining our lives – I’ve spent £60k on my house and now it’s worthless
LOCALS say their lives are being ruined by a hoarder neighbour and fear their homes are now worthless.
Glynis Sheard, 60, bought her property in Wildmill, Bridgend, four years ago but says she was unaware of just how bad the situation was next door.
Her and her surrounding neighbours say they are in a state of frustration and feel there is nothing they can do about it.
Pictures of the grounds of the property reveal the extent of the problem with mounds of metal and wood piled high and neighbours say the mess has attracted rats to the area.
Glynis told : "We've had pest control out to deal with rats in our garden but they said we're fighting a losing battle because of the hoarding next-door. So we now feel there's nothing we can do about it."
The neighbours are hoping the council will take action and provide support, after claiming their quality of life is being affected.
Read More on Neighbour Disputes
A spokesperson for Bridgend County Borough Council said: “We can confirm that a number of council departments are working together to engage with the resident so improvements can be made to the property concerned.”
While locals say they now want to move they fear they would be unable to sell their homes due to the extent of the mess near them.
Glynis said she had spent £60,000 doing her own house up and it wasn’t even finished but added she didn’t think anyone would want to buy it “because of what it looks like next door”.
She thinks the situation had been slowly getting worse for the last 52 years.
Most read in The Sun
Glynis said: "The house next to us is in a terrible state, and I've contacted everyone I can think of but it now feels like I'm going round in circles.
“There is mess at the front, back and side of the property and it looks horrible - people actually slow down in their cars when passing the area, and we are all really disappointed as a community."
She said she’d even had to make changes to how she lived her life due to the sheer scale of the debris next door.
Glynis said she never lets her grandkids play in the front driveway, only in the back garden because she knows that’s safe.
She feared that the youngsters could get injured if they were climbing on mounds of rubbish and it fell in.
To try and help the situation she said she tried to put a fence up to separate the two gardens but due to the amount of pressure from all the rubbish leaning on it, it fell down.
Glynis also said the rubbish could easily injure a passer-by and said someone walking past was nearly hit by a piece of wood that had been leaning up against a wall.
She added the council were meant to discuss the situation in a meeting last week but she heard this had been pushed back.
Glynis also expressed concern for the neighbour’s wellbeing, saying they had so much junk now they couldn’t keep on top of it and they didn’t want to throw anything away, believing it to be precious and valuable.
She added that when she first moved in she tried to build a friendship with her neighbour but said it “became too hard” and that they now hadn’t spoken properly for around six months.
The woman living on the other side of the house, who did not want to be identified, also said they had problems with rats.
READ MORE SUN STORIES
She said: "We've got rats everywhere. They're in the walls and I've spotted them in the house as well, and I'm worried about Weil's disease.
"I have two children and I'm always worried about them, living here. It is not nice for us to deal with these situations on a daily basis, and I am really disappointed in the way the council has handled the situation."
