Tenant discovers neighbor has been secretly using their parking stall outlet to power a car block heater, running up their electricity bill: ‘His own outlet is clearly labeled and available right next to it’

Etai Eshet • Editor

Dec 26, 2025 4:00 PM EST

This guy has two options: Start a cat-and-mouse game of plug and unplug, or he can do what we do in my building, and that is a group chat shaming extravaganza.

I know everyone has their own neighborhood drama, but I swear our building group chat is one for the books. Because even though 90% of it is asking for spare parking spaces or a missing ingredient, the other 10 are just pure war. War about anything and everything.To a point, my partner and I have a ready-to-send " Oh $#!^ here we go again" sticker we send each other when the group starts heating up.

It always strikes me as weird when my neighbors start these huge passionate arguments because it's always about things I have pretty much zero taken on. Like, why do all these people have so many emotions about how to phrase a maintenance complaint?

It's apparently just me because things as tiny as who in the building management company we as tenants should text about a gardening problem can become a hundred-text-long thread.

But what my partner loves the most is when a group chat war is just two neighbors fighting each other in public. It always starts with a passive-aggressive text à la: "to the very sophisticated person who thought I wouldn't know they disconnected my parking charger. Remember that we have CCTV in the building. Please do not unplug it again." And things go off the rails from there.

Which brings me to this guy's case. He found out cold weather brings out two types of neighbors, the ones who knock before borrowing and the ones who just plug in. Specifically, he discovers that the shared parking outlet is so shared that every time their breaker flips, the neighbor's car goes dark too. Turns out the neighbor has been quietly juicing his block heater off someone else's electric bill, turning winter survival into a low‑voltage heist.

So my advice would be: tell the other neighbors a text telling them to bring out the popcorn and then, in the group chat, of course, expose and shame the outlet squatter.

You and your neighbors can thank me later.

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Neighbour is using my parking stall outlet, what should i do?

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Hi guys, what would you do in this situation?
I moved into my apartment this fall, and now that it’s getting really cold, block heaters are basically necessary to start the car in the morning. Each parking spot is supposed to have its own power outlet.
My parking spot has two outlets. I didn’t think much of it at first, but I recently found out that when I turn off the breaker in my unit, both outlets lose power. That means my neighbour has been using electricity from my unit to run his block heater for who knows how long.
Block heaters draw a decent amount of power, and his own outlet is clearly labeled and available right next to it.
What would you do here? Would you consider this electricity theft, or is there a more reasonable way to handle it?
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Tenant discovers neighbor has been secretly using their parking stall outlet to power a car block heater, running up their electricity bill: ‘His own outlet is clearly labeled and available right next to it’

This guy has two options: Start a cat-and-mouse game of plug and unplug, or he can do what we do in my building, and that is a group chat shaming extravaganza.

Neighbour is using my parking stall outlet, what should i do?

Hi guys, what would you do in this situation?

I moved into my apartment this fall, and now that it’s getting really cold, block heaters are basically necessary to start the car in the morning. Each parking spot is supposed to have its own power outlet.

My parking spot has two outlets. I didn’t think much of it at first, but I recently found out that when I turn off the breaker in my unit, both outlets lose power. That means my neighbour has been using electricity from my unit to run his block heater for who knows how long.

Block heaters draw a decent amount of power, and his own outlet is clearly labeled and available right next to it.

What would you do here? Would you consider this electricity theft, or is there a more reasonable way to handle it?

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