AIBU to give neighbours a taste of what they expect me to tolerate?

[Pricklemyfancy]

DH and I work full time and are up at 6am Mon-Fri.
My DH and our 2 DDs (4 and 7) live in a semi-detached house which has been built without our stairs forming the 'barrier', iyswim. Our bedroom is next to their bathroom; my DDs' room is next to their younger child's (18) room.
Neighbours have 2 adult (18 and 20-something) children living with them.
Their "children" bang doors into the early hours, play Youtube stuff at a volume that can be heard clearly in our rooms, play some sort of Call of Duty style war game so we can hear the bangs and groans and explosions... this frequently goes on until 2am. We can fall asleep, but then are woken up repeatedly throughout the night.
I approached the neighbours some months ago and explained that we could hear their noises and were being woken up, and to ask if they could be quieter past around 10pm. They were lovely, but nothing changed.
I went around again last week to ask again if they could be quieter. This time I was received a bit differently, with the father saying he couldn't "tell people what to do". One night last week, the noises were so loud that I went around at 1am to ask them to be quiet. The 20-something adult child answered the door, said they had all been asleep (!) and told me to get away from the doorway or they would call the police.
Only one of them works; the others seem to mope around in dressing gowns all day when they eventually do get up. Would IBU to leave for work on Monday having turned my sound system on loud and directed at their walls from 6am?

Make sure it is heavy rock. Don't set it too loud so they would have cause for complaint from the council, and set the same track on all day repeat.

Definitely do your idea.

But also get a white noise machine. Have had one for the baby but as he co sleeps we've been reaping the benefits. It's drowns out 99.9% of all noises.

If you resort to tit for tat you are the same as them.

You are presently not unreasonable in your expectations and approach.

Keep a record and complain about the times of noise outside your councils guidelines

The lemonade song may seem ok once or twice... but a few hours on repeat would send anyone over the edge, you can’t get the tune out of your head 🤣

In my experience calling council/police did nothing.
I'd move, especially as you're considering it anyway. - we had to move once for this reason.
We now have a quiet considerate neighbour, it's one of the reasons we stay even though our house is a bit small.

Peppa Pig or opera would be hellish.

Or at 4.40am you could play football in the back garden, with the security light on.

Your problem in this case isn't so much with the actual noise makers but with the parents that are enabling it with their inability to parent effectively.
If it wakes you up, then it'll almost certainly be waking them up or stopping them from getting to sleep and the wishy washy response from the father that he "can't tell people what to do" is the very route of the problem.
Of course he can tell people what to do that are living under his roof, the problem is he doesn't because if he had any control over his household then it wouldn't be happening at any time of day, never mind into the early hours.

I have an 18 year old Dd who is into gaming, including online and she also spends time watching YouTube videos, often into the early hours if she has no early commitments the next day.
She doesn't disturb anyone because she uses headphones and plays downstairs when the rest of the house are sleeping, keeping her voice at normal levels. Door slamming is also not an issue because it has never been part of our family life, you walk through a door and close it quietly behind you. It isn't hard.

Nope, the problem is with the homeowners and their lack of ability to set ground rules for their offspring.

Disturbed sleep is the worst thing and you have my total sympathy as I've been through similar with an alcoholic drug user that slept when she passed out and carried on when she woke up with music blasting out on repeat day and night, hammering on my bedroom wall and yelling "you awake bitch?" night after night.
She had the police and ambulance service out time and time again but they never did anything. Fortunately for us the landlord evicted her but I pity the neighbours wherever she went.
It's been more than 10 years but I still can't hear Whitney Houston, Amy Winehouse or Bob Marley without being right back there.

do it. Pigs like this don't listen to reason and council involvement will take years if they even do anything. Believe me, I know!

Right - I need to preface this by the admission that I've had a few drinks - but the support and advice from you all has been unbelievable. Can't believe that I've never posted before. Such bloody good advice, from every single one of you. DH and I will be in touch with our local estate agents tomorrow (he's been reading the thread and has had a few drinks too) and meanwhile we're making our imaginary playlist. xxx

I don't know your plans about moving or not. However once you report this to the Council, Police or other, it becomes an official complaint that you are legally required to reveal to the buyers solicitor and this may or may not be a deal breaker to them. Always consider the long game and how it may come back to bite you in the rear.

Remember You're A Womble, on a loop. They will be climbing the walls with that.

Id move, we had something similar, we lived in a 1930 semi that had single brick party wall, we had a soundproof guy come out and quoted £1000 for 2 walls but we had floorboards and he said the noise could still come through the floor (or something like that, it was a while ago!).

Now live in a detached house, would never ever live in a joined house again.

Well done OP. Just go grey rock with the neighbours. Nod and smile (and don't tell other neighbours why you're moving). Good luck.

@cabbageking A big thank you to you for the wake-up call about having to reveal complaints to buyers x

I had this op and I know how shit it is. When I retaliated with early morning music the payback was horrific - arseholes who aren't considerate in the first place will not respond reasonably to retaliation. We moved to a house we really, really couldn't afford (pre- affordability checks!) It doubled our commute, and was not as nice an area. No holidays, treats or luxuries for years but it had been so awful the only thing I cared about was DETACHED.

Get a really loud alarm clock put it near party wall and don’t switch it off straight away when it goes off at 6am!

Sorry neighbour I’ve been struggling to get up for work due to being woken so often during the night!

Go down the council route. They can issue a formal letter asking to desist, if that doesn’t work they can put in recording devices. Make a diary noting times, dates etc as part of the evidence. Just because they live there they have NO right to make disturbing noise pollution. Neighbour over road did this recently to adult idiot who lives with his Dad, who we could hear through double glazing over the road!!

Play something like this against the wall while you are out

I wouldn’t do it. Retaliating in kind with people like that is like wrestling with a pig; you’ll get covered in shit and the pig will enjoy it.

As the owner of similar aged kids, I would say retaliating won't do much as they tend to sleep through absolutely anything at that age. The adults will no doubt be up anyway, or out at work.

Tit-for-tat is pretty childish and it will merely cause you additional angst and further sour the relationship with your neighbours.

You either continue to appeal to their better natures, report it formally and put potential buyers off in the future as it will be on record, or move.

I wouldn't leave the music or whatever on all day, but as you are up at 6am, I think a very loud blast of music whilst you are all getting ready would be completely in order.

Hopefully they will complain, and you can say that in light of their lack of consideration for you, you have stopped having consideration for them.

I find Iggy and The Stooges 'Wanna Be Your Dog' is really good as an early morning wake-up tune.

”Tit-for-tat is pretty childish and it will merely cause you additional angst and further sour the relationship with your neighbours.”

Indeed. But in that case, there’s no dilemma. Semi-detached neighbours can make each other’s lives a misery to their heart’s content, and the innocent person who might have been tricked into buying the OP’s house, will be spared. Everybody’s happy!

As it’s teens I would try and find the most cringe-inducingly uncool, yet catchy, tune in existence. Something like ‘If I had a hammer’. On a loop. Bonus points for accompanying it with a whistle.

Move. Sorry, but it's the only remedy. Your neighbours are arseholes who have no consideration for anyone else, they know perfectly well they are making too much noise but they don't care. If you retaliate it will consume your life and eventually you will come to dread coming home.

When the For Sale sign goes up and your neighbour chats to you about it - mention how it's a lovely family home and maybe some noisier people will move in with screaming babies who won't mind them and their noise and who will be less tolerant than you have been. And then say, unless you'd like to be a bit more considerate of us and then we'd stay..