Can you hear your neighbours

[AlwaysSomethingThere]

Those of you in semi or terraced. How much activity can you hear through your walls? Screaming kids, barking dogs, slamming doors, music etc. I'm looking for a house (unfortunately my budget doesn't stretch to a detached house on an island with a moat, a 12 foot fence and a drawbridge) and the first thing I do on viewings is pin my ear to the party wall as I'm so terrified I'll end up with a shit neighbour.

I suffer with anxiety and EXTREME misophonia so I find it very hard to judge when it's me being irrational or them being inconsiderate.

Interested to hear the measure of what other people think \ have to cope with?

1940s 3 bed bay fronted semi. Solid walls, which is lucky as next door are noisy fuckers. Sometimes I can hear the noise coming through the window when I am outside, but I can’t hear it indoors.

Better than my last house which was a Victorian terrace. One side was an elderly lady on her own who I only heard when she had her morning wee.
The other side had a couple with a young child move in a few months before we moved out. We could hear both sides of telephone conversations in their house, I know that the baby she was pregnant with wasn’t her husband’s.

Can hear neighbours' daughter scream when she wakes up, and sometimes neighbours having sex - the female is a bit vocal!

I did live in a really solidly built 1930s house and the original neighbours I heard nothing, not a peep. 9 years and all was bliss. New neighbours, heavy drinking, fighting, abusive, scum family. Heard everything. So much shouting, music, slamming doors, fucking karaoke, constant kids rampaging around banging and screaming.

So it’s more the people than the house in some cases.

New house is great (1970s semi) as it’s not mirror imaged- so no living rooms next to each other or main bedrooms through the wall. Our kitchen is next to their dining room and my downstairs bathroom is next to their living room. The only noise I hear is their telly very occasionally when I go pee! They hear my DS playing his cornet. They’re impressed that he can play a tune now.

When looking try to get a house that’s not a mirror image of the neighbours would be my main advice. Makes a lot of difference.

We live in a 70s semi with and the neighbours talk REALLY loudly at each other from about 1am onwards every night. It's terrible, so exhausting.
The previous owners were a family with 2 pre-teen children - we only ever heard them when they played the piano, so the current people must be SO loud!

I live in a 1981 semi. We hear our neighbours arguing, shouting at the kids, slamming the fridge door (it's against our kitchen wall), loud music and snoring.

Late Victorian stone-built mid-terrace, built hall-living room-hall-living room.

Single female occupant with occasional visitors on our living room side - hear feet on stairs occasionally, that's about it. Previously very quiet couple with teenage daughters - both so quiet that when listening to them talk it was a strain to catch their words!

Other side (our hall) young couple with toddler daughter, occasionally hear voices & toddler squeals.
Before them was an odd couple with odder teenage DS but even they weren't too bad.
Before them was a couple with 2 teenage boys, one of whom had a record deck & VERY LARGE SPEAKERS PLACED AGAINST OUR WALL. That was terrible .
Apart from him we've been very lucky

1930s semi, I hear it all, alarm clock, phone ringing, toilet flushing, dog yapping. I want to move to a remote island!

We hear our neighbour when he's on the phone or working in his garden. Otherwise nothing much, but he's a single guy. I think if it was a family it could be really noisy.

I definitely want a detached house next as i get anxious thinking about who our next neighbours may be!

Victorian mid terrace, both my immediate neighbours have 6 children each and the only time I hear noise is when I’m in the bathroom. Reading this thread I realise I’m very lucky

Small Victorian terrace. From indoors I only hear loud arguments, the vacuum hitting the skirting board, or ocassional loud music. Noise from outdoors is more intrusive, such as children screaming and swearing in their gardens.

We live in the lower flat of a Victorian Terrace and can hear our upstairs neighbour in one room (due to layout of conversion). Neighbours one side are students who we only hear if they're being loud. Other side sometimes hear coughing if they have a cold (older couple)and we can hear the creaky front door.

1900 semi dormers.
Our house is opposite in layout to our neighbours; our kitchen is in the back of our house and borders their lounge and their kitchen is in the front of theirs and joins our lounge so our living spaces don’t match. We have original fireplaces and I can occasionally hear one or two sounds coming through there, dog barking or everyone round for a party and singing happy birthday in their kitchen etc but day to day stuff we never hear (hoovering, tv, voices, stairs or appliances etc all can’t be heard)
We are both dormer conversions too so our bedrooms don’t join as there’s spaces between the dormers.
I find our layouts are better for us; and for lack of sound transfer especially upstairs, the dormers are really ideal. I wouldn’t want to live where our living spaces of bedrooms matched the neighbours.

I can hear next door's sodding dogs barking right now. At gone midnight. Neighbours have been out all evening and the dogs haven't had anybody to tell them to shut up, so they bark. And howl. For hours, hysterically. I'm sick of it.

I spent thousands on soundproofing 1930s semi due to parrot (now locked in its cage all the time) and the yapping untrained dog (reason poor parrot in cage 24/7)

We're mid terrace. One side we hear their doorbell if our kids aren't home (so my house is quiet!) occasionally their dog or if they're doing DIY.

Other side I can sometimes hear them going upstairs if it's at the same time as me. We do hear him singing in the shower of we're in the bathroom at the same time but it's muffled and just makes me laugh

We live rurally, half a mile from the nearest house in any direction. It's fantastic. Going to be a shock when we eventually move back into a town.

I'm fairly confident a herd of elephants live next door to me.

We don't hear a single sound from our neighbours. But we do hear their grandkids who seem incapable of not running indoors. They take up permanent residence in school holidays - I look forward to the day they stop coming.

I live in a late 40s/early 50s semi. I have been here a long time as have the neighbours. Didnt used to hear anything from the attached house but in the last few years the noise has built up.

They have built an extension and cracks have appeared. I can hear noises as if it is in the same room as me. Their washing machine vibrates things in my house. The dogs barks a lot. They rarely play loud music but it does happen. I can hear every word they saw even with the tv on. I dont know how she can go out after the way her H speaks to her being public knowledge Maybe she does not know that they can be heard.

I live in a terraced house. Oddly I never hear one side, but with the family on the other side I can even hear them walking on the upstairs landing if it's quiet enough. I hear their loo flush, I hear them turning lights on and off. They are also a musical family. They have a piano, guitars, and some percussion instruments. Occasionally they like to play their piano at 8am on a Sunday morning. That's so much fun for me.

1950's semi - we occasionally hear the dog barking and the kids playing however it's quite muffled, not intrusive and it's been a peaceful 5 years living here. At Xmas they had a new tv and speaker system installed to their living room wall, our adjoining wall, and it's been hell. They quite happily play the music channels up until 5 am despite being told it's not acceptable .

We are semi detached and a single woman lives next door. Occasionally I hear the piano or guitar being played and I hear her go up the stairs to bed each night. But that's all. The poor lady probably hears all sorts from us even though I try to keep the children quiet.

I live in a small terrace and I hear neighbours getting up for work at 5am. Why they go up and downstairs for an hour I have no idea. Also hear sneezing but not much else as luckily both sides are quietish. I am more worried about how we disturb them (child who hates bedtime.)

When I lived in a Victorian terrace the noise was much worse ie clip clip on the wooden floors, loud sex (one side) and loud parties (the other.)

I loved the house but the noise did bother me.

1930s semi and yes my god my neighbours are loud. The woman has a voice like a boom box and her youngest ds who is 8 seems to have inherited the same trait. He cries and shouts and screams.

In summer they have music playing loud (usually some rap crap), in the garden. They seem immune to noise. Then there's the instruments, piano and flute. It was 7.30am this week they were on it.

I no longer tell my 2 dc to quieten down!

Oh then there's the sex. By god I've never heard anything like it. The screaming and howling that goes on forever. God knows how it doesn't wake their dc up.