Hello! This is probably going to be a bit long and I will try to keep my ranting to a minimum, but I want to make sure I include enough info/backstory to hopefully get some proper advice.
I have been interested in real estate investing for the last 6 years or so, and have been a lurker on the forums here for most of that time. My wife and I decided to hold off on getting started with rental properties until we were able to purchase our first house for ourselves since we live in an expensive market and had to save for a long time to even do that. (Montclair, NJ). We lived in our first house about 3 years, when my mother-in-law unexpectedly passed away, so we thought it would be best to buy a bigger house and move my father-in-law in with us to help care for him. Because we were splitting the cost of the new house, we had didn't need to sell our old house for the down payment and figured renting our old house was the easiest/smartest way to get our feet wet with rental property investing as it was sort of an inadvertent house-hack.
That's the backstory.
For the last month, since our tenants moved in, they and our old neighbor at that house have made my life so incredibly stressful - to the point where I am considering throwing in the towel and selling the house.
The house has a shared driveway with our neighbor, and the back of the driveway where the 1-car garages are for each house is very small and doesn't allow enough room for parking without blocking entry coming or going from the driveway. My tenants have 2 cars, a ford explorer and a suburban (just my luck, right? About the biggest car they could have). The tenants first complained because they were trying to use the 1 car garage as storage and park the Ford explorer in front of the garage. They got in arguments with the neighbors, who they were blocking in, when the neighbors told them they couldn't park there. After telling them they could not in fact park there and that's what the garage was for, they said that had they known they "had" to use the garage for car parking instead of storage, they wouldn't have signed the lease. So, because I didn't specify this in the lease they threatened to sue me unless I reduced the rent. We agreed to lower the rent $250 and moved on. They were fine with parking their other car on the street. Less than 2 days later I received a phone call saying that the police gave them a ticket for parking over night on the street (not allowed in our neighborhood between 3-6am without permission from the police department - which I had told them). The police apparently told them even if they called their car in every night it wouldn't fly long term. They started threatening again and said they needed to be allowed to park in the driveway, to which my neighbor again said absolutely not. After speaking with the lieutenant of the police department he gave me the option of letting them park in a lot down the street to which they refused because again, they felt they should have known that ahead of time. The other solution the lieutenant offered was giving me a temporary pass (about 3.5 weeks) to let them park on the street while I tried to find a contractor to put a double gate in the fence and a gravel parking spot in the backyard (which takes up half of the small backyard).
Realizing that this was going to be an issue whether it was with these tenants or with future tenants, and also that a lot of this WAS my inexperience (we only had one car and parked in the garage so it was NEVER an issue when we lived there) I decided to move forward with the parking spot, which cost me $2300. 2 Days before it was set to be installed, I got a VERY long email from the tenant expressing his frustration and lack of confidence that the parking spot would be installed at all, and requesting that I agree to shorten the lease from 1 year to 6 months with a month-to-month option following. He even added a subtle threat in the email that he felt it would be best for both parties so that down the road I wouldn't "Incur further costs", which I took to mean, agree to this or I will make your life a living hell the entire time we're here. Af
ter speaking with my lawyer and agent I decided to agree to the 6 month term but with no option for month to month following, because honestly I just want to get them out and hope for better tenants next round.
So...The parking spot was finished today and looked great and I was so happy to move forward and put all of this behind us....
And then I got an angry text from the neighbor saying it's not going to work because the only way that the tenant can maneuver into the parking spot is to first turn into "his portion" of the driveway, which is partially in front of his garage and behind his house, in order to then back into spot. (performing a K turn). So he's essentially claiming that they have to drive onto his property to get into the spot. My argument is that it is a SHARED driveway, and they are never leaving the confines of the driveway during the maneuver.
As frustrated as I am because I feel like I am the mediator between 2 groups of ********, I can't help but fault myself for not realizing this would be such a problem beforehand and doing my due-diligence to basically say in the lease "No parking in the driveway or on the street, one car must be in the garage and second car is up to you to figure out." I feel incredibly stupid.
I'll be speaking with my old neighbor further about it tomorrow but I don't really have any other options aside from apologizing to him and claiming ignorance because I honestly never thought pulling a few feet in front of his garage in a shared driveway for a few seconds at a time would EVER be an issue. Especially considering that because of the layout of the space, he crosses in front of mine every time he pulls in or out, has blocked the driveway for months at a time with construction vehicles, and because I split the cost of the repaving of the driveway with him last summer 50/50...but I digress. I'm hoping he backs down but if he doesn't I guess the only thing I can hope for is that he can agree to deal with it another 6 months and then I'll make sure that any future renters know that if they have 2 cars one has to be parked in the garage and the other they have to park in the lot down the street (or manage in whatever way they can but it's up to them), but then that means I'm out $2300 for the parking space I just installed.
Anyway, sorry for the long frustrated and ranting post. I'm nearing the end of my wits and any advice is greatly appreciated! Please, help convince me to stick with it..Below is a photo that should help visualize the situation.
