I am a home owner in Stadt Zurich, Switzerland. My apartment has 2 buildings, 6 houses each. The ground floor home owners have right of use to parts of the ground area, and we have common area. All the ground floor home owners have constructed some kind of barricades and fences around their property to secure their privacy and private use area. There is a play area adjoining one of the buildings, which is common area. My friend (who is also a home owner in the building) brought a small inflatable kiddie pool for her 16 month old infant to play in the play area. As it was a sunny day, she placed the small pool towards the edge of the play area for shade. This was outside the fence that the downstairs neighbors have placed here to secure their privacy. In under 5 minutes of my friend being there, the owner of the apartment adjoining approached my friend rudely, told her to move the pool as it was in her private area even though it was outside the fence. To be clear, there is no visual indication here that it is a private space - no marking or boundary. Furthermore, it is landscaped exactly the same as the play area, for which the maintenance costs are shared between all home owners. My friend was upset about this rude interaction and told me about it. At this point, we asked on the apartment group which areas are public and private, and how people can know what is private if it is not explicitly secured and directly adjoins the play area. The ground floor home owners got very agitated, and an argument ensued. The woman demanded that we come downstairs and started yelling at us. She had no handle on her emotions and said her best friend was police - and she would call them. We said that she should feel free. Her husband also got aggressive and started to make threats - calling us impolite for raising this on the group, saying that “this is not good for you, I used to be homeless”. When my partner addressed him as “bro” to try and de-escalate the situation, he said “I am not your bro, call me sir”. The woman tried to de-escalate and apologize for yelling but kept having outburts where she started yelling again. They insinuated that we could be robbers, a threat to their family, or creepily looking through their window. (of course, the grave threat that a 16 month old infant in a kiddie pool poses). Anyway, ultimately, we told them that we will reach out to the building management to clarify what is private and public. Even according to them, the space in question where the pool was placed was partially in their private use space (1 sq ft or less?) and partially in the play area. If the space is considered an invasion of privacy, I think it would be incumbent upon them to secure it - especially as kids play there and will never understand imaginary boundaries. What are our rights here? Are we in the wrong? Thank you for your time if you chose to read or contribute. submitted by /u/meera_jasmine1
Originally posted by u/meera_jasmine1 on r/Switzerland