Then there are the complaints about too much light, noise or odors drifting from one property to another. Mediators helped the apartment dwellers agree that three times a month, the Vietnamese family would hold their gatherings at another family member's apartment. Once a month, when the family would gather at its own apartment, the older couple upstairs would leave the building. Wait a day or two until the new homeowners are settled in, and don't be intrusive, Johnson added. Let them know that you're a neighbor, offer a card with a name and telephone number on it, and tell them to feel free to call with any questions about the neighborhood.
Some neighborhoods formalize the effort.
The welcome committee in Silver Spring's Woodside Park, for instance, is now Andrea Littell, with the help of her husband and maybe a child or two in tow. They deliver a basket that includes the neighborhood phone directory and other local information including, if the newcomers have children, a list of nearby children. Littell, an at-home mother who is working toward a master's degree in elementary education, says she remembers appreciating a similar visit from another neighborhood woman two years ago. So she made a peach pie and carried it over to the couple who had moved in behind her. The recipient, Susan Davis, a freelance writer and poet, was home with a newborn baby.