'Get your facts straight': Home owner furious at 'dobber' who called police about granny flat
A landlord has taken aim at “nosey” neighbours who made an anonymous complaint to police about leasing her NSW Central Coast holiday home to an essential worker amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Tanya Watson has rented her Woy Woy granny flat out to holiday makers since March 2018 but when coronavirus restrictions came into place she pulled her accommodation off the short-stay market to reserve it for essential stays only.
“I had very strict criteria about who I would accept,” Ms Watson told Yahoo News Australia.
“Essential workers, essential family trips... they had to have a really good reason for coming and be able to provide me with ID and proof of that reason”.
When a woman who was relocating to the central coast for work asked to stay for three months, Ms Watson checked the details with her new employer and rented the granny flat to her on a three-month lease.
On Good Friday, just two days after the new tenant had moved in, police knocked on the front door.
“They had received an anonymous complaint that I was operating as holiday accommodation during the COVID-19 lockdown on holiday properties,” Ms Watson said.
The landlord said she was “embarrassed” and her new tenant was left shaken.
“She was shocked, a young girl on her own who has moved from interstate, I had to make sure she was ok,” Ms Watson explained.
After showing local police documentation to prove the new tenant wasn’t a holiday maker, they left and Ms Watson followed up the next day to confirm she “wasn’t on the naughty list anymore”.
“My local station said they had received around 200 complaints about non-essential travel over the Easter long weekend,” Ms Watson said.
While police were satisfied that Ms Watson and her tenant weren’t breaking any restrictions, the landlord said she was furious at whoever “dobbed” her in and suspects it was an unhappy neighbour who spotted the new tenant’s out of state licence plate parked near the property.
In NSW the maximum penalty for breaching coronavirus restrictions is $11,000.
‘You reported us to police with false facts’
To make sure no further accusations are made Mr Watson posted a sign out the front of her property which she said will remain there for as long as she needs it.
“For your information - Get your facts straight first,” the sign says.
“Thanks to the dobber of our rental property. Yes - you are nosey. Yes - you reported us to the police with false facts. Yes - the police verified that I am a responsible owner who has a tenant in my granny flat on a lease.
“Mind your own business and stop wasting police time.
“This is a rental, not holiday accommodation, so keep walking,” the sign reads.
Ms Watson said she wished the person who reported her anonymously would have reached out to her first.
“It’s such a waste of police time, this false dobbing of others has to stop,” she said.
Neighbours dob in new resident to police
The incident follows an incident in Byron Bay where a woman says her neighbours reported her for moving into a new property.
The woman took aim at her neighbour on a local community Facebook group, saying she was sick of people’s bad behaviour.
“I am entitled to move house without the new neighbours calling the police,” she wrote in a heated post.
“What has happened to the locals of Byron ... so sad and disappointing.
“I’m pretty sure that if given the chance the locals would install a public hanging area.”
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