I don't think your respective ages have anything to do with it -- I do suspect your neighbors either were lucky enough to have better soil in the beds or did considerably more preparation work.

I will always recommend the lasagna method to make a long-term improvement in the soil, but your plants need help at once. Their problem is likely that clay soil does not drain well, and -other than bog-lovers- most plants want drainage, else their roots don't get enough air and eventually either rot or succumb to a disease.

I hate to say this, but it's better done now than later: dig up the plants, remove most of the good soil from the hole. Next, widen the holes to the expected root-spread of the mature plant (that means that a bush which will be about 3' wide when grown up, will do best if the soil is 'fixed' to a matching width of 3 feet). BTW, this isn't true for every perennial, just the majority of them! You can mix the clay stuff into the good soil as long as you have 3 times as much good as there is clay. Now, put down pea gravel to about 3 inches depth of in the bottom of the 12" deep hole. Amend the removed soil with a heaping shovel-full of perlite added to each wheelbarrow load of soil (that's about a double-handful of perlite to a laundry-basket sized pile of soil) and/or add gypsum (as recommended on the bag). Both perlite and gypsum will aid drainage and help prevent the soil from clumping into clay-ey lumps. Now you can re-plant and replace the soil. You will likely find that the finished bed is higher than the lawn. This is good, because the soil will let excess rain drain onto the lawn -- and if the bed is beside the house, be sure that the surface slopes *away* from the house. I highly recommend using 3" of an organic mulch around the plants: it will prevent weeds, help the soil retain moisture through dry spells, and act somewhat like a sponge in holding water for slow release rather letting downpours wash your good soil into the ditch - and the mulch itself eventually turns into a nutritious soil.

Ah, and be sure your plants are suitable for your climate, soil, and available sunlight! Shade-lovin plants won't do well in full sun, and sun-lovers won't do well in shade, no matter how good the soil.

You can plant bulbs (such as lilies) now and enjoy them for years with little more effort. Choose un-fussy annuals for ease of maintenance, and intersperse with zonal geraniums [pelagoniums] for a great show of bloom by very easy-to-live-with plants. Water the plants any week that there isn't an inch of rain, and smile back at your neighbors.

I'd like to know what color your clay is, and does the area drain reasonably well.

By the way, gypsum will do nothing to improve the consistency of a clay soil, unless that clay also happens to be loaded up with sodium. It's one of the garden myths that I WISH were true, lol. We could use a few magic elixirs.

I'd add that the incorporation of organic matter in the form of compost is pretty much SOP for amending clay soils of any type. And to be perfectly honest, there is really no shortcut to some hard work unless you are willing to build up the height of the beds. The lasagna or layered method that meldy refers to is one of the easiest ways to improve poor soil conditions but it doesn't lend itself well to immediate results - it takes time for the layers to decompose and meld together (no pun intended, meldy) and create an adequate planting medium.

Most professionals no longer recommend amending individual planting holes - this has proven to be detrimental to the long term health of plantings for a variety of reasons. If you are unable to amend over a large area - the entire planting bed - it is preferrable to dig very wide but quite shallow planting holes and place the plants high, above the existing soil level. Backfill with your existing soil and mulch with imported soil or compost to cover any exposed portions of the rootball. This will prevent any soil interface issues (water not percolating properly down and through different soil layers) and eliminate drainage concerns that are common to clay soils. The alternative is to bring in decent soil and mound up the planting beds to provide an adequate planting height. Eventually, through the activity of the plant roots, soil organisms and watering, the good stuff will mix into and break up the hard stuff :-)

Sorry, Al: I should have been more specific as far as the use of gypsum (calcium carbonate) goes, because it does very much depend on the particular soil. In my area, I have found it to be an excellent amendment for most types of the local clay soil, loosening the clay's cohesiveness without clumping. From reading, I understand that certain areas, especially in the PNW and some parts of the South, gypsum is not especially effective.

I based my advice on the fact that I have used gypsum as an amendment in several places with success, and -not being a geologist- I call the clay types by the local names of 'Indian clay' [a grayish white, finely textured material which can be used for making pottery]; yellow clay -which dries to a material similar to adobe; and the Virginian orange/red clay [which may be full of nutrients, but it easily packs into something similar to a non-permeable brick]. Beds in similar clay areas but without the gypsum, have kept a tendency to pack down unless the bed was amended so that at least half of the soil was amended with organic mulch.

VVWA (Victor Valley, CA) has a nifty way of determining whether gypsum will help your soil:
Gypsum (CaSO4) is useful for reclaiming soils with high levels of sodium. It will not correct problems caused by layered soils. A simple test will help determine whether your soil would benefit from gypsum:

Remove the bottom of two coffee cans. Replace the bottoms with window screen, placing a paper towel filter on top of each screen. Fill each can with one pint of soil, and allow it to dry. Add one tablespoon of gypsum to one coffee can, mixing it thoroughly into the soil. Set each coffee can on an empty coffee cup; fill each can with tap water.

Collect drainage water until 1/2 pint or more is collected from the gypsum-treated sample. If more than twice as much water has drained from the amended soil, your soil contains excess sodium. Likely, a chemical amendment such as gypsum will help reclaim the soil.

Gypsum contains calcium which replaces the sodium. A sodium salt is formed in the process which must be leached from the soil. Gypsum should be applied as deep as the ultimate rooting depth of the species to be planted. A soil test will indicate how much gypsum is necessary.

The irrefutable thing about red clay soil is that it has oxygen in it....or it wouldn't be red! I've learned that as long as the site drains relatively well after a heavy rain, red clay is a perfectly fine planting medium. And I am a person who knows the difference between 'just hanging on' and 'thriving'!

A PAIN to work with initially, though, lol! We use a heavy duty auger when planting nearly everything. It enables us to break up the soil in a wide, shallow basin prior to installing a new plant. No amendments are added to the planting hole or the back-fill.

Red clay soil is easy to over water, and I suspect that many plants are lost by doing so. Once you get the hang of it, you'll find it very easy to be successful with.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:1054392}}

Another option is to plant only annuals for the first three years. That means that at least twice a year you can dig over the ground and add more compost.

You need to pick your time to dig, too. Too wet and you'll be 'lifting the world'. Too late and you'll need a pick-axe.

Either a long handled spade or a spading fork can help you as you work. And adding your grass clippings to the surface as mulch can also be useful, provided you stir the surface a little after rain so it doesn't form a thatch.

With the right level of moisture in the soil the worms can work. Having a mulch layer helps retain the moisture. Make it something you can dig in, season by season. Shredded bark - but not bark nuggets. They take years to disintegrate. Fine for under shrubs but not while you're trying to build up a workable soil.

If you can get horse manure it can be useful - but it will vanish pretty quickly (about 3-6 months. Sigh.) Same for autumn leaves.
Dig over your patches and dump piles of leaves over the loosened soil, then leave for the winter. If you want winter colour - go for containers for the next couple of years or so. They have the added bonus of being movable - and you don't have to wait until the leaves die down on the bulbs before getting to work on your gardens.

If you budget to spend more on soil feeding than on plants for the next 2-3 years and add the compost at least twice a year, in bulk, then your clay layer will have become better mixed with compost and a much more plant-friendly environment.

BTW - it's probably better to put the compost on top and dig through the remains at then end of the season than to ever dig a trench and put it at the bottom. In clay it just goes revolting and toxic. Not worth the effort.

Dbla --- what did you plant?