Help needed with noisy dogs
 

My husband and I purchased a brand new CYV at the end of last year and our goal is to move in end of 2016. The home has been put in the long term rental pool. The house has been shown many times and shows beautifully BUT we have lost out on at least 2 renters because our next door neighbor has at LEAST 2 dogs that bark incessantly. The agent believes they are left out all day. This is a showstopper for our rental opportunity and we have already missed out on Jan/Feb and March rentals!!
We have contracted Code Enforcement and Animal Control - and found out that there have been numerous complaints from other neighbors about these dogs and they will talk to them - but that's it.....
We are at our wits end -- anyone have any suggestions? We are in Massachusetts - so we are doing all of this long distance.....
Help!!!

Wow-sorry you are having difficulties. We have heard this discussion many times with CYV and dogs barking. Maybe it is the echo of the walls? Or the fact that potential renters are viewing the property and the dog hears someone and can't see the person? Not sure--but what a sad situation.

Not sure about Florida Law- in Virginia we would call local City/County Police Dept for "nuisance" noise. They would send an officer or animal control officer out. If the dog is found to be barking constantly they would indeed make contact with the owner- after the 3rd complaint citations for noise control would be issued.

I always rented our property site unseen- by photos online that I would send potential renters. I placed an ad in the Daily Sun- emailed photos of the interior/exterior and never had a problem renting out my home 1/2007-06/2012. I had a patio villa, not a court yard for rental property.

Good luck!

I would stand at his front door all night ringing his doorbell every night until he got the message

That's a little difficult since the OP lives in MA.

Did you notice it says "I" and not they.

Dog Barking Laws in Florida | eHow

You may want to check the County Ordinances for whatever part of the Villages this is in or City laws if it is in Wildwood or Lady Lake.

Which county is your Villages property in?

OP said "My husband and I purchased a brand new CYV at the end of last year". From that information I would say they purchased in Sumter county, being that's the only area new homes were being built last year.

1. Find out as much about the dogs as you can.
2. Offer them up for adoption for free.
3. Wait for the owners to drive off and immediately kidnap them and delver them to the adoptive family.

We rented a CYV for a week and upon arrival were greeted by the neighbor's crazy barking dog - settled down as soon as he realized he wasn't scaring us away. We rented on line so had no idea about this dog so I can certainly understand an issue if someone is previewing the property and are faced with this. The only recourse I see is to somehow speak to your neighbor and come to an agreement Perhaps you could have
whoever is showing your property tape the commotion and you could then confront the neighbor with that evidence.

We are in the Village of Pinellas. Thanks for the replies....I especially liked the door bell response. We are actually coming this weekend...found out there were other complaints about these dogs...so perhaps we can form a mob!!!

I had a similar problem in a house we owned. The dog barked from 6AM onward. I finally called the neighbor. She was so apologetic. I never heard that dog bark again. Give them a call. Tell them just what you said here. You may be surprised. In a positive or negative way. But, either way, you have nothing to lose

Try one of the dog bark control devices that you place in your own yard (most say they work up to 50 feet), or offer to buy the owners a bark control collar.

Dogs
 

Do you know if the problem CYV is owner occupied or rental? If it is a rental I am sure the owner would like to know

we did not buy a cyv for this reason, and i really wanted one..we rented for a week and the noise of a few owners dogs were just too much..the second our dog barked i was out the door to fix it...so many great responsible owners and it just takes one to make your day crazy..Talk to them when you come down or have your rental agent speak to them...thats what you are paying them for

Noisy dogs hurting rental
 

Make your CYV pet friendly, and I will take Jan-March 2015. If the neighbors let their dogs bark continuously, then, I will let mine bark at them continuously. Maybe, they will get the message. I take my Airedale and English Springer Spaniel to the Villages every winter. I don't leave them out back alone. I even cage them inside the CYV for "peace of mine" when we are away. I also bag their waste. I have never not received my entire deposit back from my Villages landlords! Villager references available!

Now this is the perfect solution. Check it out, pet friendly rentals usually charge more.

throw a jar of peanut butter over the fence....ever see a dog try to bark while eating peanut butter??:beer3:

Oy vey! Then the rest of the neighbors will have MORE barking dogs to deal with!!!!!

It's not only in CYV. We walk our dog regularly in our neighborhood, one house leaves their front bedroom window open and their very large dog barks at anyone that walks by, usually catches my wife off guard and makes her jump thinking that a dog is coming at her. I think half the time, they are not even home, as it continues to bark long after we pass. Others leave their dogs on their lanai's unattended, or have the lanai doors open and the dogs come running out barking insanely anytime they see another dog being walked. I'm sure they are good at warding off potential theives, but I would be po'd for sure if they were my neighbors, and had to listen to that all the time. Poor dog ownership gives all of us dog lovers a bad name.

I am a squeaky wheel kind of guy. I would take these two pieces of information from Sumter County's website and work my way up the chain of command until I got a result.

•County Code 4-7 - To allow your dog to bark excessively and continuously is in violation of ordinance

Responsibilities
Animal Services is responsible for enforcement of all County Codes related to the ownership and care of domestic animals. The department operates seven days a week with six full-time officers. Please remember that Animal Services responds to emergencies first.

Continual barking is a violation and has been addressed more than once on this forum. I strongly recommend you contact the district office and explain this situation is interfering with your financial transactions. Perhaps Village Watch can pay them a visit. I would tolerate that sort of thing for more than 10 minutes before I would call in the authorities

You would think these type things would be handled promptly but in reality they will make a visit but beyond that nothing will be done. Been there, done that, with a guy playing a band in his garage rattling windows.

Get a dog whistle start blowing it in middle of the night

Why??? To wake up all the dogs in the neighborhood? ......then they are all barking? :shrug::oops:

Is your home pet friendly??? Friends are looking to rent a 2 bedroom pet friendly home Jan - March, 2015! People who have dogs may be more understanding about dog noise???

From reports I've heard, that's about the only way those things would work!

This is a hard one for me. I love dogs and have a neighbor with a bird dog that barks all the time. It does not bother me, but a few of the other neighbors are distraught over this. I am afraid for the dog and the owner. I have overheard some very disturbing comments about violence to both the owner and the dog. I have talked to the owner about this and they are in fact having a trainer work with the dog. It is a hard case for me to deal with.

We used to have a couple of Labs who were a nuisance to the neighbors so we had to have their vocal cords cut. They acted like it never happened, silently barking their hearts out, and the neighbors were happy. Maybe get a quote from a vet and drop it in their box; maybe they don't know there is a solution.

Bad Santa.

???

Seems very extreme to me. If your house was on fire at night, I'm sure the barking dogs,(you know, the ones with the cut vocal cords), would have alerted you, with their barking. :rolleyes:

A shock collar to stop the barking would have been much more humane.

Help needed with noisy dogs
 

Smoke alarms are cheap, a forced move to the country is not. Bark collars require training to be effective, and these home owners don't seem to be interested or capable of training their dogs. There is nothing inhumane about debarking; spaying/neutering has a bigger effect on the dogs physiology. And like I said earlier, our dogs had no idea their bark was gone (well, dramatically quieter). I'd much rather have the surgery than have to give the dogs away. I love my dogs like children but if barking stood in the way of us moving to the Villages I'd have the surgery done again in a heartbeat.

OMG, I would never mutilate my dogs. I would, however, allow my neighbor to have his own eardrums punctured.

Why does barking bother some and not others? It has no effect on me, but some folks are horrified by it.

I had two Dashunds. Loved them both. One was well behaved and the other a brat...but I still loved her. She was a barker. Barked at birds, at leaves, at the wind. Sometimes she barked just cause she could. We tried EVERYTHING!!!! Discipline, shaking coins in a can (loud noise), citronella spray (supposed to work), even did the shock collar. (Tried one time). My son heard the dog yelp and was upset. He put the collar on himself and he yelped. I took the collar back and sent the company a long letter about the cruelty of that awful collar. We were getting complaints from everyone about the barking. Finally, her vet suggested that we de-bark her. She said it was not cruel. She also told us that she went to a place where a whole room full of beagles had been de-barked. She said it was still quite loud and that it only muffles the bark. I chose to forget the de-barking procedure and just did the best I could to deal with her and her barking. She died at 11 years from someone who poisoned her. She died of kidney failure. Her sister lived to 18. It can be a real problem for anyone to go through. My pup now never barks. She's a sweetheart. But if she did bark I would still love her.

That is one of the cruelest things I have ever heard of doing. You and the vet should have both been fined and jailed. The vet should have had his license revoked forever.

YOU are now on my IGNORE list.