Noisy Neighbour ?

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I don't know if I am being unreasonable to be so pissed off with my new neighbours.
We live in a mid terrace house, myself, my husband, our 8 year old son and a small dog. We've lived here for 10/11 years, the house on the left side has always been rented out to a number of different people. New neighbours moved in to the rented house about ten days ago.
They are a young couple with a toddler and new baby on the way. On Sunday evening the bloke knocked on our door and politely asked if we could stop our son running up and down the stairs as it was so loud it disturbed their daughters nap time.
I said we would try to stop him running on the stairs and I said I thought he was going to complain about the screaming. It was haircut night and my son is autistic and hates haircuts, it can sound terrible. But he said it was just the stairs that bothered them.
We talked to our son and he did try to not run on the stairs.
Today I find a note from next door, complaining about the "stomping up and down the stairs" and "it is disrupting my child's sleep pattern" he then goes on to threaten us with reporting the "noise nuisance"

I'm feeling really pissed off, that they are threatening to report us.
In the 10 years we've lived here, no neighbours have ever complained about us before.
Would I be wrong to point out that their newborn will disturb their toddlers sleep more than our son on the stairs 😁

Thanks for the replies, we won't respond to the letter and we will try to keep the noise on the stairs to a minimum. Hopefully that will be the end of it.

Lily - the OP has quite clearly said her son has autism. Now it doesn't excuse all behaviour, however running up and down the stairs a couple of times in the afternoon is nothing. Stairs can be loud, even just walking up them (I live in a terrace house, both ours and next doors stairs creak and bang when walked on). Next door also have their own child with another on the way - I wouldn't dare complain about noise if I were them, a toddler and a baby will cause noise at all hours from their side. The OP didn't 'start a war' - her child was going upstairs in the middle of the day, it's not worthy of complaint. Totally different from banging on the wall at 5am. If the OP manages to stop the stairs, it will just be something else then - 'he's playing to loud, you bang your doors, we can hear your telly, I heard you sneeze last week'. Sorry, but the world is full of noise, 3.45pm is not the time to expect next door to tip-toe around for their precious toddler.

Lily, I have said my son doesn't play on the stairs, nor does he use the for exercise
What war? Iv already said the I appreciate the fact she is heavily pregnant with a toddler and just moved house. She is more than likely shattered and every bit of sleep for her and the toddler is precious.
We talked to our son about using the stairs "slowly and quietly" and he did. But he obviously forgot when he came home from school yesterday, they wrote that letter within 2 hours of him coming home from school.

But there was no need to write a letter threatening to report us.

They're frankly being utterly ridiculous. We once had a neighbour moan about hearing us turn our light switches on.

They know your son has autism yet still feel the need to moan about him? For being too loud going upstairs, of all things? Some people are just pricks.

Sorry, I thought you said he ran up and down the stairs 3x when he came home from school. I appreciate the odd time can't be helped, but I do think you need to have a bit more empathy for neighbour. The note sounds like they are at the end of their tether. It's possible they are also disturbed by your son's screaming (and rightly they haven't mentioned this since screaming/crying isn't something within your control) but the thumping on the stairs may be the tip of the iceberg.

I imagine there will be plenty of noise from their side too with a newborn and toddler. But IMO some noises are less acceptable eg door slamming/stair stomping/wall banging annoy people more as they are preventable. Whereas screaming and crying are part of family life.

I have a 6-month DS and admit to feeling enraged when I've just got him to sleep and he's woken by neighbour's door slamming. Sometimes it takes an hour to get him to sleep so I can understand why neighbours sent the note. I don't think they have grounds for a complaint though, more likely they are exhausted and not thinking clearly!

By 'why start a war' I meant don't blow this out of proportion. Showing the note to other neighbours seems like you're trying to gang up and prove that you're right. The whole situation can be solved by insisting your son walks up the stairs instead of running up. It's not worth falling out with new neighbour's over it, surely it's better to just apologise to them and live peacefully?

We didn't show the note to lots of neighbours, just the couple who used to live in that house next door to us. We were so surprised by the note we wanted to know if the noise on the stairs was much louder than we realised.
We were told that you can hear people going up and down the stairs but it's "normal" noise, not excessively loud.
I did apologise to him when he first calls round to complain and we did talk to our son about the stairs, but he an 8 year old kid and he forgets things sometimes.
I do just want to live peacefully and don't want to fall out with anyone.

But the old neighbours can't tell you what the new neighbours can hear. Changes of flooring, furniture etc can change how the noise travels.

Also your old neighbours may have been used to him going up and down the stairs - in the same way you don't really notice a kid growing everyday they may not have noticed a big jump in noise.

Your new neighbours also may not realise how much you can hear of them so you need to tell them, so that they know that it's not that your DS is overly noisy (and normal noise is a very personal thing - my arsey neighbour things drilling at 7am on a Sunday is 'normal DIY noise').

You need to speak to the new neighbours, explain how much you can hear them and let them realise that the soundproofing is crap, rather than just that your house is noisy.

You also have to realise that there's a chance your old neighbours were more tolerant than average and your DS might be overly noisy.

Can you ask your new neighbours if you can go to theirs and listen to your lad on the stairs for yourself, then invite one of them to listen to their toddler and an adult on the stairs whilst in your house.

But there was no need to write a letter threatening to report us.

The thing is, they had asked you, you said you would sort it then it happened again the very next day. They will have thought that talking to you about it hadn't solved the matter, so they felt the need to threaten to report.

Op im sorry for being rude to you in my previous post.
I had trouble with a neighbor before and it kind of just hit home got a bit to into your post no excuse for being passive aggressive though.

LifeofI, it's OK, I asked for opinions

missbishi yes, they asked us to try to keep the noise down and we did talk to our son and repeatedly reminded him to go "slowly and quietly" on the stairs.
But he is an energetic 8 year old boy who can easily forget things, how the hell can I "solve the matter" in just 2 days?

Send em here! 4 girls on one side who are my age who giggle like hell on wine nights (I want an invite), as well as the fact that one of them doesn't seem to be a quiet speaker - she's loud when she speaks to me so that's just her, fair cop. On the other side 5 adults and a baby (son, sons gf, baby, son + parents) who's stairs join the same wall ours do. They be LOUD sometimes. Your neighbours will be BEGGING for you ;).

I hate hearing the noise. But unless I buy a detached house it's going to happen. I've never complained. The one time I did, one son was 'creating' music loudly at 2am in the loft when his parents were away. He wouldn't answer the door to me when I nocked. I took my revenge cold a couple of mornings later at 7am mature. don't start a war over it, i don't think YABU. They sound ridiculous. If they reported you, there's unlikely anything anyone would do anything if your noise wasn't a)excessive or b) between the hours of 7am and 11pm. Let em. Have the last laugh.

Life