my upstairs neighbour and my music

GoodEnough

Tue, Feb 16 2010, 11:07 am

Do I need to specially keep my music on a low volume so that it shouldn't disturb my upstairs neighbour?

I like my music playing loud enough that I can dance to it if I fancy, not so loud that I would have to yell to be heard, but not so quiet either. I have a single woman that lives above me, she is bedridden, my dh says playing music loudly will give her some simcha in her life lol, but she once called me to complain that she has headaches often and my music sometimes disturbs her.

Do I need to keep her in my mind when deciding at which volume to play my music?

life'sgreat

Tue, Feb 16 2010, 3:22 pm

muminlondon wrote:

I like listening to loud music as well. I think it's only mentchlich to keep the neighbors in mind. I always ask my neighbors when I move into an apartment if they mind the music. If they do, I have no choice but to keep it lower. Could you ask her what hours it would be ok to have the music loud?

GoodEnough

Tue, Feb 16 2010, 3:42 pm

Barbara wrote:

I think that some degree of noise is inevitable if you live in an apartment. OTOH, playing music so loud that it can be heard upstairs is likely out of bounds. Buy yourself an MP3 player with headphones, and blast away to your heart's content.

She claims she hears every word we speak, when we are in the room directly below her bedroom, which happens to be our living room, I really do not think my music levels are out of bounds.

I don't always like headphones, cuz then I don't hear my kids, door or telephone...

GoodEnough

Tue, Feb 16 2010, 3:49 pm

life'sgreat wrote:

muminlondon wrote:

She complains about regular noise too - just my kids running about etc, so I once told her if my noise is really bothering her she should call me. One morning my dh turned the volume up higher than usual, it was about 10.30am, and she called me to camplain, so I turned it down. I don't think she will have hours where it would be ok.

Merrymom

Thu, Feb 18 2010, 7:19 pm

I don't this has anything to do with your neighbor being bedridden, I just don't think anyone should be forced to listen to your music without being able to escape it. There is some music and some singers that I literally hate, it's torture to listen to. If you were my neighbor and happened to like what I hate I would be very upset. It's not like I can lower the volume so do the mentshlich thing and have your neighbors in mind. If you were playing music only at very specific times like when you were exercising it would be different but at all hours of the day is just not fair.

momof2+?

Tue, Nov 15 2016, 8:13 pm

Bumping this up bec I'm in the exact opposite situation as the original OP.

My upstairs neighbours blast their music loud enough that I feel like dancing to it from downstairs. For example, now I hear Avraham Fried's "yerushalayim." It's 8 PM.
So:
1. The mother of the house told me "I don't hear the noise, so call me if it's too loud." (that's comforting, right?) But I don't feel comfortable calling her every couple of days...
2. During the day, the fact that I hear her music doesn't bother me much (I like music!) but when my kids are trying to sleep....another story. and I have 3 ages 3 and under.
So if my kids are in bed at 7 PM, is that the start of the night and my neighbours should start being quiet from then? or it's too much to ask? My neighbour is not very strict about bedtime.
3. we use sound machines. their noise is louder.

so truthfully, this has been going on a while and I don't think it will change. But what bothers me is how my neighbours don't seem to care enough. where is the mentchlichkeit? Common decency?
Will I be this indifferent in 10 years from now? (trying to put myself in her situation...)

LittleDucky

Tue, Nov 15 2016, 10:07 pm

Super uncomfortable situation. Almost lose-lose. I am in a similar situation. Do you want to annoy your neighbors or do you let your family suffer? I have had neighbors who threw parties so loud that I FELT the music. I have neighbors who have music so loud that it wakes my kids up. And one of my kids is a little baby who doesn't sleep through the night so if someone wakes up my baby it is seriously an issue.
But what can I do? We need to be considerate and reasonable. If it is after 10pm I will knock on their door. Technically, every city has a time where noise complaints can be accepted and I think 10pm is standard. You can't expect your neighbors to be super quiet at 7 as much as us parents want. But they shouldn't make so much noise either.

Practically, you said you have a sound machine. Is there any way to insulate your place any more from the noise?

mummiedearest

Tue, Nov 15 2016, 10:14 pm

momof2+? wrote:

if she told you to call, call. and if you call three times in a week, why not let her know what time you'd appreciate some silence? tell her that you feel bad bothering her repeatedly, would it be possible to keep it lower after 7? it's a reasonable request. this gives her the info she needs to decide whether or not to be a good neighbor.

you don't think it will change, but that may be because you're not asking for change. she may very well be open to accommodating you.

rachel6543

Tue, Nov 15 2016, 10:15 pm

I honestly think the right thing to do is be considerate of your upstairs neighbor, esp since she is disabled and bed ridden and can't go somewhere else. Keep the music low. If you want it louder put on head phones, or put headphones in one ear so u can still hear your kids...etc. otherwise blast music when you're driving in the car (that's what I do).

that's my personal opinion for this situation. Apartment living isn't easy, esp when buildings have thin walls, so it's always better to be considerate and kind to your neighbors.

mummiedearest

Tue, Nov 15 2016, 10:16 pm

rachel6543 wrote:

the op wrote this years ago. it was bumped up for a more recent post.

momof2+?

Tue, Nov 15 2016, 10:27 pm

OP here. (2nd OP?)
So like I said, I don't think it's going to change. I have called her in the past (Let's say 5-10 times in the past year,) but I try to only call if my child wakes up multiple times or can't fall back asleep or if a child is sick etc...
when I do speak to her she is nice (quote) "oh I'm so happy you called bec. I don't even hear the noise, I'm going to ask my kids to quiet down." (referring to music, running, furniture dragging, jumping rope etc)

Anybody in my neighbour's situation? I wonder if she was like me when she only had toddlers, but just started not to care? Will I eventually be like her? or is it a middos thing?

amother

Indigo

Tue, Nov 15 2016, 10:38 pm

momof2+? wrote:

In regard to music she should have it shut off at a certain time or lowered. In regards to the kids running and jumping it's hard. I tried when we lived on top off ppl. I told them it's not fair to the downstairs neighbors but there is so much I was able to do. Bh we were lucky one couple that lived there wasn't home much but then we did have a baby live under us and father asked if we can try to keep the kids quiet when she was taking a nap. Considering the paper thin floor/ceiling we knew when she was awake we would hear him sing to her.
We tried very hard.
As my mother would say kids would be kids. It's part of multi families living

MagentaYenta

Tue, Nov 15 2016, 10:45 pm

I live in a single level duplex so there is usually someone on the other side of my wall. I just interviewed new tenants and we agreed to quite hours that worked for all of us. Our walls are standard 4" plus solid wood with drywall over them so it offers a bit of sound dampening. It's got to be a lot harder when there are families living on top of each other.

Mon, Nov 21 2016, 10:35 pm

muminlondon wrote:

You should find a way to make it work for both of you.

myname1

Tue, Nov 22 2016, 4:35 am

It's so so tricky! My upstairs neighbors have a couple of young kids and the downstairs neighbors have a ton but mostly bigger. I have a couple but very young. So before my kids were born, I would ocasionally hear tap, tap, taptaptap, and had no clue what it was. (I didn't really mind though- was not often.) Now I know- when my todler thows these small plastic balls, that's just what it sounds like! So if he is doing that or dragging furniture or something obviously loud/annoying, I'll stop him after a minute or 2 and try to give him something else to do. But it happened a couple of times that I just didn't have koach and waited for him to get tired of it himself.

My husband claims the family downstairs probably doesn't even notice because they probably have tons of noise all day long just from all the people's regular voices. If I know they're probably sitting in their living room having shalosh seudos or their Friday night meal, I try to be a little more aware of what my son is doing right above their heads. I'm hoping the fact that we (Baruch Hashem!) rarely hear our upstairs neighbors means the building is especially good and downstairs don't hear us much either. Once in a while there is loud music when my kids are going to bed, but I hear it from the open windows more than the floor/ceiling, so I just shut the window and accept the stuffiness for that bit of time.

But OP #2- I don't think your neighbor is especially rude or self-centered. I think she has a very active house and has learned to deal with it to a point that she really doesn't hear it. And she also can't tell exactly what you hear. I wonder if it's usually true with big families, and if that makes them mind less when their neighbors are noisy (like my husband thinks).

FranticFrummie

Tue, Nov 22 2016, 5:24 am

I can tell you, from the viewpoint of your neighbor, what it's like.

I am chronically ill, and often bed bound for days at a time. When I get migraines, even the tiniest peep (or a tiny bit of light in my eyes) can be excruciatingly painful. Enough to make me curl up into a ball and whimper, while I reach for my Oxycodone.

One of the biggest problems that chronically disabled people have, especially ones who are bedbound and can't escape, is finding affordable housing that won't make you even more ill. Neighbors smoking outside your bedroom window, kids yelling and jumping, and yes, even pleasant music, can be pure torture. You can't even imagine how helpless you feel when you're trapped in your own home. All you can do is cry.

OP, you're not doing anything technically wrong. I'm not going to tell you what to do in your own home. I'm just asking you to consider your impact on her, and try to find a solution that is fair for everyone. You can choose to listen to music or not. Your neighbor does not have that choice.