persistent low frequent noise - possible neighbourly dispute

thegreenone

This is a completely random post and maybe not for the OP but for anyone else reading this.

I used to have tinnitus.  When I went for a doctors appointment about something else, a check on my blood pressure was done and it was sky high.  On medication and the tinnitus has gone.  I've since read that high BP can cause tinnitus. 

ExEstateAgent

Chief_of_Staffy said:

Someone downstairs watching TV and upstairs a bloke listening to music. Sounds like a nightmare. The solution is to not live in a flat.

That's helpful isn't it. 

Chief_of_Staffy

ExEstateAgent said:

Chief_of_Staffy said:

Someone downstairs watching TV and upstairs a bloke listening to music. Sounds like a nightmare. The solution is to not live in a flat.

That's helpful isn't it. 

When a person is upset by their downstairs neighbour watching TV, and their upstairs neighbour 'possibly' producing 'low-frequency sound', then it's worth pointing out that the only way to avoid the expected sounds of everyday living is to not live in a flat.

But feel free to link to your helpful input as I may have missed something. I don't seem able to find it...

Titus_Wadd

My local council registered me to us the NoiseApp on my phone.  It's a good idea in theory because you can record the noise sample and it's transmitted straight to the council (either ASB or Environmental Health departments). That said, 3 years on and hundreds of recording they did the square root of naff all, saying they couldn't determine where the noise could be heard from, despite it using our phones' GPS to locate it. So don't get your hopes up that the council will do anything sadly.

RedFraggle

Chief_of_Staffy said:

ExEstateAgent said:

Chief_of_Staffy said:

Someone downstairs watching TV and upstairs a bloke listening to music. Sounds like a nightmare. The solution is to not live in a flat.

That's helpful isn't it. 

When a person is upset by their downstairs neighbour watching TV, and their upstairs neighbour 'possibly' producing 'low-frequency sound', then it's worth pointing out that the only way to avoid the expected sounds of everyday living is to not live in a flat.

But feel free to link to your helpful input as I may have missed something. I don't seem able to find it...

I'd say don't live in a late 50s house. I could here my neighbour make a cup of tea! The flat I am in has less noise transfer than any house I've lived in that wasn't detached

Bigphil1474

OP, the Environmental Health team or ASB team have a legal duty to investigate statutory noise nuisance, so they are your best starting point. They should have calibrated noise monitoring equipment which they can install in your flat for a while to give an opportunity for you to record the noise. They will then listen back to the recordings and determine whether the noise is in fact a statutory nuisance. The normal rule of thumb is whether the man on the Clapham Omnibus would find it a nuisance. It would normally be a repeating problem rather than a one off, and significant enough to affect your day to day enjoyment of your property. As others have mentioned, it's worth getting your ears tested just in case, but also to rule that out. Councils are short of staff and short of money, so will drop investigations for any excuse. No point getting your own NME as the evidence wouldn't be accepted by the council. You can do your own private prosecution but I think they are quite difficult to succeed. 

Chief_of_Staffy

RedFraggle said:

Chief_of_Staffy said:

ExEstateAgent said:

Chief_of_Staffy said:

Someone downstairs watching TV and upstairs a bloke listening to music. Sounds like a nightmare. The solution is to not live in a flat.

That's helpful isn't it. 

When a person is upset by their downstairs neighbour watching TV, and their upstairs neighbour 'possibly' producing 'low-frequency sound', then it's worth pointing out that the only way to avoid the expected sounds of everyday living is to not live in a flat.

But feel free to link to your helpful input as I may have missed something. I don't seem able to find it...

I'd say don't live in a late 50s house. I could here my neighbour make a cup of tea! The flat I am in has less noise transfer than any house I've lived in that wasn't detached

There you go, then, the OP has even more options than I claimed.

EssexHebridean

Not everyone has the financial privilege to be able to not live in certain kinds of accommodation, and sometimes we need to take a step back and remember that. We wouldn't respond to someone living on the streets and concerned about their safety with "Well the solution is not to live in a cardboard box" (or at least, I HOPE we wouldn't!) and in the same way, sometimes a flat is someone's only option. As in life, there is always an option for us to take the view that if we can't say something constructive, we're probably better to say nothing and move onto another thread... 


OP - unless you are concerned that the reaction of the neighbours might leave you in a position where you would be unsafe, then that first conversational approach is probably a good one. You have several anecdotal situations in this thread which you could use as an approach "My friend was saying that they had an issue with noise travelling from X appliance when it was moved, might something along those lines have happened?" and that could keep it very non-confrontational.  I suspect if your use of "low" refers to the volume then recording equipment might not be able to pick up on it, so that might not help as much as ideal. 

Chief_of_Staffy

EssexHebridean said:

Not everyone has the financial privilege to be able to not live in certain kinds of accommodation, and sometimes we need to take a step back and remember that. We wouldn't respond to someone living on the streets and concerned about their safety with "Well the solution is not to live in a cardboard box" (or at least, I HOPE we wouldn't!) 

People watching TV in their own flats, or listening to 'low-frequency' music, is not a safety issue. The best advice is what I gave - do not spend your life fretting about ordinary and expected ways other people live their lives.

But I'll tell you what might well be a safety issue; complaining to your neighbours every time you hear them make a sound. That not only could have safety implications, it will reduce the value of your flat so that when you sell, you'll likely not have the option of buying somewhere with better noise insulation.

Eldi_Dos

Herzlos said:

I'd go and get a hearing test first, because I think it's unlikely to be a bass speaker all the time purely because people aren't running speakers all the time. 

Maybe something like a fridge or an A/C unit? If it's transmitting through the structure then it could be coming from more or less anywhere. 

This is very good advice in my opinion.

 The first indication I had that my hearing was deteriorating was when we would be sitting in the mess room and I would 'hear' the change of load on a transformer as a pump or other piece of equipment kicked in somewhere, the other lads thought I was pulling a fast one, but I later came to the conclusion that as my ability to hear higher frequencies decreased I came to notice lower frequencies more.