Neighbor teenagers causing trouble- what to do?

I can't think of much other than calling the police.  If the police just show up, the kids won't know YOU called.

2am on the roof throwing fireworks?  I'm calling the cops.

I wonder if this is an option:

http://movingsoundtech.com/

I heard about it in the news.  I'm not sure about the legality or if it the source could be identified back to you.  Would be really cool to see the results.

Call the neighbor first and have them deal with it.  Next call the cops.  YUP, I am that guy.  I have a rental property next to me now after it was sold it was converted to apartments.  I called the neighbor about the trash.  Nothing was done.  Called the police next and they dealt with it.  The trash has been removed as has the old pickup box that they were storing trash in.  I offered to pull the trailer off of the rental property and put it in the front yard of the owner of the property. 

I haven't had any bad vandalism yet, but I am sure it will happen at some point.

This thing does work.  I have a sound clip of it and everytime I play it and crank the volume up on my computer it freaks out the youngins.

I feel your pain.  The first house we owned we had neighbors with a couple teenaged boys who were out of control.  Right about the time we moved in the parents divorced and the Dad kept the house...

Problems started right away because the Dad worked third shift...Things would be mellow until 2:00-3:00am every day of the week when they'd crank the stereo and literally wake my wife and I from a dead sleep...

After the second instance I called the cops and told them specifically I didn't want the cops to say it was me who called.  I have no idea what the cops said but after they left I heard "f - - k you neighbor" clearly audible through the window...

We tried talking to the Dad, I tried talking to the boys in a neutral environment (not the middle of the night when they would be wound up) but got nowhere. 

Eventually we outgrew the house and moving was a logical next step.  I remember the first year being in our new place I would still go to bed with the pit in my stomach that I had from the old place just bracing for the first time the tunes cranked up... For the longest time "enter sandman" by Metallica was their song...over and over... To this day if my wife and I are in some random place and that song comes on and I say: "remember this song" she literally shudders and nods yes....

I was concerned with retaliation and vandalism too however we were fortunate and never had any.  I enlisted other neighbors' involvement however they were afraid of the boys for vandalism and retaliation reasons...

The mosquito thing is fantastic if you can make that work....If the 2:00am fireworks thing was random and not an everyday thing maybe it will just blow over..

Good luck, I know what you're describing..

Sad they ruined a great song for you.  bloody kids.

Based on their ages the trouble makers will be around for a long long time.... From what you described of them, it would be quite a turnaround for them to finish high school and move towards being a productive member of society...

So conservatively, using the 13 y/o as the example, it's reasonable to think they could be around until their early 20's before deciding to move in with the other pizza delivery guys they hang out with....Which means another 10 + years is possible for this...

Deciding to move isn't quitting or being weak, it's determining how badly you want to live in the house you're in with trash next door...

Based on what you've described I don't believe talking to them will help and calling the cops all the time will most likely result in retaliation of some sort...

Sorry you have to go through this, it's a very difficult experience...

ETA:  No disrespect to delivery guys, in my situation years ago, the neighbor trash both delivered pizzas until they lost their licenses...

Based on new information posted today that the kids are drinking, would you offer this same advice?

I'm a scardy cat around crazy teenagers when they're sober; I wouldn't approach 13-year-old drunks (whose parents let them) with a 10-foot stick. 

You know it's really hard for me to gauge what I'd do without being in the situation.  That being said,  I'm not scared of teens--drunk or sober.  If I was going to go talk to a drunk group of 15 young men, I would let my husband know what I was doing, but it wouldn't deter me. 

I work with teenagers all of the time.  I've worked with a lot of "at-risk" kids.  We do leadership camps with local teens and I spend a lot of time listening to them. We bring in NVC trainers, and work a lot with kids talking about unconditional positive regard.  It's very hard to remember this when kids are acting like fachheads, but they're struggling, they're hurting.  It's when they're being the most ridiculous that they need the most kindness--this doesn't mean you're a doormat.

These kids often really respond to someone talking to them and engaging them in a real conversation--not a dogmatic one.  No, it doesn't always work, and while they are in a pack and worked up letting off fireworks, it may not work, but that's why you come back to it the next day or the day after.  What do you have to lose? You can always throw up your hands if the conversation goes south, and say you tried and you'll call the cops next time, but I'd want to make sure I'd tried this first because I think it works better than cops. 

Again, I think the key to this strategy is the follow-up conversation after the fireworks night.  In front of their friends they probably won't back down because they feel they'll lose to much face, though I've certainly had experiences where a couple of kids in the group back right down and are very apologetic and swing the group.  Again, I think a lot of it has to do with how you come at them.  Try to align with them first and then try to appeal to reason "Hey guys, what's up?  This looks pretty fun. I would have probably been doing something like this at your age too-a part of me still wants to, but the reality is I have a long day tomorrow, and so does my husband.  It's 2 am.  I need you to stop."  Don't do it angry.  Don't do it in a threatening way.  And then wait for an answer.  Really try to stay calm and present a reasonable argument.  It makes the follow up go better.

Ok, so instead of calling the cops or going through the expense of moving...

Just buy Switch a plane ticket and she will get it all straightened out for you!

BT to the rescue again!

;P

Part of it working is being the person who lives next door, trying to establish a rapport that then makes the kid feel some responsibility and accountability.  If you're the jerk neighbor who lives next door and calls the cops at the drop of a hat and you've never even tried to talk to me before--yeah, well fach you d-bag (I KNOW the OP isn't one).  If you're the neighbor who's asked me nicely, tried to reason with me, appealed to the human inside me about being tired and needing sleep to work, and has asked me some questions and tried to talk to me, maybe, just maybe I take my party elsewhere.

It doesn't always work.  Sometimes it's meh.  Once in awhile, it's a homerun. 

I just don't agree. 

Why does trying to talk to them automatically make you the neighbor who's calling the cops?  Are we the only two houses on the street? 

Riskier?  Why? Are they going to go from drinking and setting off fireworks late-night to assaulting me or vandalizing my house?  I think there's a bigger area between those two things than you think.

Everybody has to use an approach they feel comfortable with, and I totally understand why some people wouldn't feel comfortable approaching teens in a situation like this.  In a scenario like this, I would always try to have a conversation with people before I went to the cops.  Actually, I don't think I've ever called the cops for anything.  If I have, I'm blanking on it.