Am I being unreasonable or is he?

[float46464]

I rent a flat, and live below a man who plays the guitar a lot. I can hear it through the ceiling and it's really driving me nuts. Every evening he plays a bit but it's even worse on weekends.

Every Saturday and Sunday he starts playing at about 8am for a couple of hours. I usually have lazy mornings reading in bed/relaxing on weekends, but this noise gives me a headache and usually leaves me dizzy all day (not sure why). I usually have to take painkillers or I just feel awfull all day. He will then start again at around 5pm, and keep going on and off until about 11pm.

I have a headache right now after listening to it. I try and go out in the evenings to avoid it but it goes on so late. I don't know what to do? We will probably move this year but not for a few months and I'm sick of having to take aspirin to deal with the headaches.

Is it acoustic or electric? Have you tried talking to him? He might not even know it's bothering you.

Could you ask him to start at 9 instead?

It's acoustic. I haven't spoken to him as I'm a bit worried how it will go.

Pop a note through letterbox?

“Hi

Whilst we agree that you’re really good on the guitar, the noise is very loud. Can we politely ask you to keep it to a post 9 am start one day on a weekend and to stop by 10 at night please?

Many thanks

Neighbour

He doesn't sound unreasonable to me. You might have to invest in earplugs.
Once something starts bothering you it can get magnified in your imagination until it seems like a huge problem. You need to find a way of getting round that so you can find a way to live with it or ignore it. Is there any way you could learn to enjoy the music?
Could you ask him to play more quietly or in a different room maybe?
Last resort - take up the trumpet

Ear plugs? Noise cancelling headphones?

He probably doesn't realise the sound is travelling then. I'd go with Thehop's note.

Tbh unless unusually loud I'm not sure why it is effecting you the way it is. It also doesn't sound like very unreasonable times, but unless you have spoken to him you won't know if he is going to be unreasonable about it.

Trouble is he is keeping the noise to within the times he is allowed.

I agree about the note. It might not help but if he knows he is annoying you, he might change his hours.

Id be more concerned that you were getting such debilitating headaches from it regularly. That's not right.

Would try the note first, but had a problem with ndn gardening late into the night which woke my dc, the nice approach didn’t work but sending my dc to bounce on the trampoline by boundary fence at 6.30 am did (have a detached house in a cul de sac with v few and spaced out houses so didn’t effect anyone else) 😂😂 he now stops at about 8pm and dc don’t bounce until after school and I have moved trampoline from fence 👍.

Don't do a note. I know it's easier, but it's much more likely to get his back up than a friendly face-to-face.

I'd go with the suggested note or go down and say similar to him in a friendly way. It's polite and he may not realise he's bothering you. For what it's worth I would be driven mad by that too.

8am on a weekend is very early in my book to be playing guitar at that time as most people, like yourself like to spend their weekends relaxing in the morning and not listening to some wannabe guitar wizard, you're probably in a daze as it's stressing you out.

But you're kind of BU too, how's he meant to know if you haven't informed him of how it's effecting you, a chap who likes to play his acoustic that much doesn't sound like that intimidating so just have a word with him or even write him a note if you're worried about having to knock on

I would just knock on introduce myself (if you don't know each other) and say you're great at guitar but I'm really sorry is there any chance you could knock it off a bit on the weekends as in start at 10am and on an evening finish at 9pm regardless of what day it is... I think that's pretty reasonable timing...obviously he has a right to practice but you have a right to peace.

I agree with a pp that it's not normal to get such bad headaches and dizziness from someone play in guitar. Have you considered seeing a doctor about it?