ᐅ Neighbors startled by the building structure. Has anyone experienced this before?

Have you ever experienced this? A long-standing empty lot gets developed, and suddenly the neighbors are upset because the new building blocks their sunlight, obstructs their view, or causes other disturbances. It’s quite common to get used to an empty space over many years. But who has gone through this, and how did you handle it?

Are you the builder or the affected neighbor?

Well, something is being built where nothing existed before... some neighbors would like to have a say. But usually, they cannot.

The important thing is to comply with the applicable laws and provide little to no grounds for complaints. Always be kind and friendly.

Hello,

we were really worried. In front of us was an extra-extra-extra-large property, truly. A large family, money was no issue. They had a valid building permit / planning permission for the children and wanted to develop a part of the land to rent it out until the children reached adulthood. That plan fell through, as they didn’t want strangers on their property (and financially, it wasn’t necessary).

I’m curious, if a building permit / planning permission expires, is it possible to submit it again at a later date, and what happens then?

We still have daylight for now^^

However, they have now planted a few individual trees. Are they allowed to cut them down just like that?

In Bavaria, the immediate neighbors must sign the building permit / planning permission application. Therefore, no one should be surprised by this. The only inconvenient part is when there is a small street or pathway in between. In such cases, it’s advisable to simply talk to the neighbors before starting the construction, although unfortunately, this is no longer common practice nowadays...

MIA_SAN_MIA__ schrieb:
In Bavaria, direct neighbors must sign the building application.

Just to avoid confusion: In Bavaria, for projects requiring approval, the site plan and construction drawings must be presented to the owners of neighboring properties for their signature. However, if they do not sign, this does not affect the issuance of the building permit. So, neighbors in Bavaria are not required to sign.

For projects exempt from approval, the neighbors only need to be notified about the construction.

I don’t mean to be pedantic, but there is a small difference [emoji6] ...and even when documents must be submitted, I’m not sure what happens if the documents were not shown to a neighbor. How could this be proven if the neighbor is not obligated to sign? In other words, how is the building authority supposed to know whether a neighbor actually received the application or not when no signature is required[emoji848]

Thank you @ruppsn!

It wasn’t clear to me in the same way. Our architect explained it like that, and we had everyone sign as instructed.