What level of noise shall I put up with from neighbours?

giddypenguin

mrxry wrote: »

Seems to have reached a point where people are misunderstanding.

I have lived in flats for 10 years, lived away from home 16 years

In all the noise here is far better than some properties I have had which have had walls so thin you could hear people burping in place above or their tvs on, or everytime they walked about, or ones where the neighbours were on drugs and had parties a few nights a week, or when in student accomodation I put up with 9 months of daily parties by person in next room which ran 24/7 (and landlord kept them on at end of year since they never paid rent late and illegally evicted me as I paid late a few times)

I expect some noise, I handle the walking about as its quite muffled, rarely do I hear a door close loudly from my older neighbour downstairs when hes tired but the noise upstairs feels more like its not intentional but more not making an extra effort to be quiet.

I can handle drilling if I am told about it, I can handle a child crying if I am prepared, I don't want to know their every movement but if I knew they put child in living room during day and bed at say 6pm I could plan around it and then if random things occured out of their control you can handle it.

The crying barely bothers me as its muffled enough the annoyance is they are not taking steps to minimize noise.

Speaking as someone with a 2 year old and newborn - I've discovered any attempt to minimise noise is futile. He has one volume - SHOUT. Sure you tell him to whisper, but within 2 seconds he's forgotten and back to default volume.

Doesn't sound like they are being unreasonable- sounds normal. Either way, you can't do much about it.... Insulate your ceilings?

FBaby

Of course your neighbours upstairs are going to disturb you more than those downstairs, that usually how noise travel. For all your know, you make as much noise (albeit different) but your neighbour downstairs has accepted to live with it.

I HATE noise, so I do sympathise, but we have to be realistic, the type of noise your describes (that annoys me to) is the type you will get in flats, or even houses unless in the middle of nowhere. OH and I are struggling with one of our neighbour whose kids (3 of them) scream and shout non stop in the garden which unfortunately is right by our living room. These kids are the kind who you just hope to never have as neighbour, but ultimately, we know that it is totally unrealistic to expect them to suddenly turn into respectful kids like mine were

There is no miracle solutions. You can try to talk to them, but the chance of anything changing are about nil, so then you either get stressed about it and pray every day that they will go, learn to live with it, or start looking for somewhere else for you to go (and pray that it is quiet!).

fed_up_and_stressed

marksoton wrote: »

Oh do grow up. Their routine can't ( and bloody shouldn't) be dictated by you.. Jesus wept.

No but people should ensure their routines don't affect others rights to quiet enjoyment as far as possible.

Examples being doing diy at what most people would consider a reasonable hours of the day. Not blasting music on full volume next to a party wall all day and night etc.

marksoton

fed_up_and_stressed wrote: »

No but people should ensure their routines don't affect others rights to quiet enjoyment as far as possible.

Examples being doing diy at what most people would consider a reasonable hours of the day. Not blasting music on full volume next to a party wall all day and night etc.

Completely agree.

But the OP is complaining this child makes more noise by dropping things than...

Drunks early in the morning
smashing bottles
Dogs
Hoovers
Nightclubs
Any other thing that prevents a pin drop being heard....

Utterly ridiculous.

sniggings

suki1964 wrote: »

Not being funny or dismissing your.concerns, but you may because you are getting stressed by the noise, tuned yourself into it so to speak. My old neighbour done the same with us ( terrace house) and she even came banging on the door at 3am one winter morning cos our central heating had kicked in

You think it acceptable for a neighbour to hear your heating:eek:

Yep it sounds trivial but I once lived in a flat where I could hear a boiler 2 floors up kick in every 3 minutes during the night.

These types of noises should not be heard, I don't blame the owner, rather the very poor building regs we had and still have.

It is possible to build flats where these types of noises are not heard yet the builders build as cheaply as possible and also as close to each other as possible.

When noise issues come up such as the above, it creates a situation where one side feels blamed for noise that they consider totally reasonable and the complainer feels they shouldn't be hearing "everyday" noises.

What is missing in this is the builders, they should be held reasonable for what they build, and without them in the loop, these types of problems will nearly always go unresolved.

TeaLeaf

mrxry wrote: »

not that great if I have done a night shift at work.

This jumped out at me. OP, do your shifts change regularly? That will really mess with your sleep patterns, and as someone else pointed out, may make you hypersensitive to noise. Your posts read almost like it's the anticipation of the noise, rather than the sounds, which is upsetting you more. Constant noises - like the traffic and busy streets - are easier to tune out, even more so if you're not doing shiftwork.

If they've only been there a short while, give them a pass on the DIY noise. The toddler will reach an age where s/he can be expected to quieten down, but in the meantime you have no grounds for a complaint.

Do they know you work shifts? If not, next time you bump into them apologise profusely if the noise of you getting ready in the middle of the night or coming and going at odd hours disturbs them. You don't even have to do anything especially noisy; they'll understand your meaning.

If it's really intolerable for you now, then consider either raising the level of white noise in your house or investing in soundproofing the ceiling.

suki1964

sniggings wrote: »

You think it acceptable for a neighbour to hear your heating:eek:

Yep it sounds trivial but I once lived in a flat where I could hear a boiler 2 floors up kick in every 3 minutes during the night.

These types of noises should not be heard, I don't blame the owner, rather the very poor building regs we had and still have.

It is possible to build flats where these types of noises are not heard yet the builders build as cheaply as possible and also as close to each other as possible.

When noise issues come up such as the above, it creates a situation where one side feels blamed for noise that they consider totally reasonable and the complainer feels they shouldn't be hearing "everyday" noises.

What is missing in this is the builders, they should be held reasonable for what they build, and without them in the loop, these types of problems will nearly always go unresolved.

No I didn't think it was acceptable

What I did say was this woman had issues about noise and tuned into us where as we bent over backwards to make her life easier ( ok so we didn't, just moved appliances from the party wall and were a bit more mindful )

What I was saying was she was so wound up that the click of the boiler from our house would wind her up

She even knocked on the door to apologize about the grandchild crying where as it didn't cost me a thought, children cry
She was noise sensitive and listened for noise. Simple as that.

Hell in the terrace if you were sat there with no tv or radio on, you could hear next door take a pee. But who really sits there listing in scalene? We all usually have background noise of some sort, tv, music, games, washing machines...

Upsidedown_Bear

Hi OP :hello:

You have my sympathy - I'm hugely sensitive to noise and it can make my life miserable if I'm not careful.
I'm still learning to deal with it but one thing I recommend if you don't use them already is earplugs. I spent a number of months trying out all the earplugs I could find to see which ones worked best. There are lots of different types/sizes etc.
Snorestore sell sample packs of earplugs so you can try out a few different kinds.
I now use these:
Quies Solos
Quies

Other sellers are available :cool:

These are no good for sleeping in but for cutting out daytime noise I also got a pair of these:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/301920964692

They come highly recommended



[IMG]http://m.cdn.!!!!!!!!/ol/oltalom/skyfall_3m_peltor.jpg[/IMG]Earplugs in and ear defenders on and I'm in my own little bubble of peace and quiet
[IMG]http://m.cdn.!!!!!!!!/ol/oltalom/skyfall_3m_peltor.jpg[/IMG]

pathtofreedom

Now you've been disturbed a few times, it does sound like you're listening out for things more are being more hyper aware of them, than just naturally ignoring them. I've worked all sorts of weird shift patterns and lived in flats / shared houses in the past so I can sympathise a bit.

However, it isn't their fault you work nights, they are just living their lives, if situations were reversed and your neighbour asked you to have a time table for what hours you are going to spend in which room, you'd tell them to take a running jump.

You need to somehow break the cycle so you get used to them and it fades into background noise. So as above you could look at noise cancelling headphones, white noise generators, ear plugs even, to wear while you're sleeping in the day. If this doesn't work then look at the sound proofing in your bedroom and if you can improve it in your flat, depending on what your lease allows of course.

Kynthia

I've lived in flats and generally you hear nothing from those living either side of you, a little from those below you, and a lot from those above you. You have to put up with normal living noises, which includes walking, talking, tv and music at appropriate volumes for the time of day, children playing and crying, other noises like appliances and diy in daytime hours, etc. If you cant then yiu need to change and not them. Anti-social noise and excessive voluntary noise you can complain about, and politely in person works best. This includes late night load noises, parties, drilling or hoovering at 6am or very late, lots of loud rows, regularly waking you at 3am with avoidable noise, etc.