A bad neighbour is as great a misfortune as a good one is a great blessing.

Proximity magnifies everything. The person you live beside affects your daily life more than most of the people you would list as important, because they are there constantly, and neither their kindness nor their awfulness can be scheduled around. A good one makes a house feel safe. A bad one can make an otherwise fine life narrow and watchful.

Some of this is luck and some is not. Be the good version deliberately, since you are somebody’s neighbour too: know their name, notice when something is wrong, keep small frictions from hardening. When choosing a place to live, weigh who is next door as heavily as the house.