The neighbours are going to hate us

[Potentialneighboursfromhell]

I've just signed for the keys for a flat for me and my DC, it's on the first floor of a small block. There are 8 or 10 flats in total.

I wasn't in a position to hang about hoping something on a ground level came up.

I have 3 DC one of which has autism and adhd.

I came to the new property today to drop off a few bits ahead of the big move next week. The kids were excited, running around.

A downstairs neighbour came up to see if everything was OK and what all the noise was (it was the kids running around - this being the first time they had seen the place and they were excited)

I explained and apologised, the neighbour was fine but I got a sinking feeling as soon as I closed the door. My children are going to drive that poor man and his family mad. DS especially. He shouts, screams, bangs - due to his disability. It can't be controlled not for want of trying. Lord knows it drives me round the bend too.

I've been treading on egg shells the rest of the time we've been here. Telling the kids to "shh" and be quiet, take your shoes off so they don't hear you walking about, lower your voices, don't do this don't do that.

It's going to be hell for everybody. Kids included.

I've made a mistake haven't I? What the hell am I going to do now 😔

Sorry OP sounds rough but did you not think before you moved that a flat with someone below you wouldn’t be suitable given your specific circumstances?

the folk below you must be pretty stressed out too.

what age is your autistic son? Sorry if you’ve stated this and I’ve missed it.

can you approach the council for a house from them?

It's shit for everyone, but there is not much you can do about it. You're just going to have to grow a thick skin and accept that your neighbours will hate you and try to minimise the noise as much as possible. You don't want it to get to the stage that your landlord evicts you due to too many complaints.

To be honest no I didn't. It didn't occur. I came from a ground floor flat and completely overlooked it due to the lack of prev noise complaints - IE none whatsoever.

It didn't dawn on me how much it would be an issue here until the day I brought the kids here for the first time and they knocked on the door almost straight away.

The council couldn't help me. There just isn't the available accommodation. The best they could do is put us in a B&B or hostel if we found ourselves on the streets, then we'd just be annoying those around us there.

DS is 5

@Potentialneighboursfromhell, please don’t justify yourself on here. Whatever logical justification you give, some people are just mean and can’t empathise. I personally have lived in flats a lot and they just noisy. Someone blaring music in the middle of the night is annoying, the upstairs neighbours banging their mat over the side of the balcony to shower me in dirt was rage inducing, but kids making noise is just par for the course.

Also what other use would a three bedroom flat have other than a family? I suppose a flat share but having lived in one of those when I was younger you can be assured is likely to be much louder!

Just enjoy your flat, be considerate and stop worrying about it.

Oh lovely, another ageist post.

You really don’t need to justify yourself on here @Potentialneighboursfromhell 💐

Honestly, OP, some of the utter twats on this thread are quite relentless, and I hope it isn't making things worse for you. Your first responsibility is to put a roof over your children's heads. I'm sure you will be a considerate neighbour once you're all settled in.

Some of the comments here are awful and some people seem quite obsessed with putting the boot in to a disabled family. I'm embarrassed for some of you.

We had furniture delivered the other night, we waited until the next day to set it up. As we didn’t want to disturb neighbors….

Stop apologising to them. Of course you are making noise you are moving into a new fiat.

The OP didn't say she was constructing the furniture, she said they were moving the boxes so they weren't blocking doorways.

Still smells vile though and isn't pleasant for those not wishing to smoke or smell it.
Cigarettes are legal and I wouldn't want too smell those in my home either ideally.

I’ve got an autistic / adhd 9 year old, I would never move into a top floor flat, he drives me mad playing in his bedroom above the living room, sounds like a literal herd of elephants about to fall through the ceiling onto my head. He of course can’t help it, but I wouldn’t subject that to people living below us.

Im with your neighbours on this one.

Cigarette smell is all part and parcel of living so close to neighbours such as flats, can’t stop people living their lives in their homes. Same as noise 😉

often so is weed smell even though it’s illegal technically.

@danni0509 right so if you were in the OP's position, needing somewhere to live but being refused for multiple flats, and then one came up on the first floor, you wouldn't take it? You are saying that you wouldn't subject neighbours to noise and you would rather subject your son to homelessness?

Exactly this.

Its very disingenuous of people to pretend they'd sacrifice a home for their children so as not to annoy anybody with noise.

I know it must be hard but you need to try and stop stressing so much. I sympathise with your neighbours but in reality what do do they expect living below a 3 bed flat. They may not have a choice but by the sounds of things neither do you. You sound like you are doing your best which is all you can do. You have to be able to live without the fear of upsetting your neighbours so maybe it's time to say, I'm sorry that this isn't ideal for you, but it isn't for me either and then just start to live your life as best as you can and stop feeling guilty.

But for everybody saying the circumstances don't matter, the neighbours will have to accept the noise etc and the council will only offer a B&B, what happens to the OP if she ends up getting evicted anyway due to the amount of noise complaints?

Then she's done a full circle. Nothing has been achieved apart from moving into a flat everyone's unhappy and then get turfed out and are actually homeless, compared to waiting a bit longer and finding somewhere more suitable? For say a ground floor flat?
Surely it would have been more beneficial to wait for a more suitable property (sounds like the OP has been waiting for a long time anyway..) that the children can at least be happy in and not walk on egg shells, and the neighbours don't suffer?

The neighbour above us ended up getting evicted about 7 months after we moved out because of unbearable noise her family made. Unless people have been in this situation, do not underestimate how soul destroying it is to have a mental break down in your own home which no longer feels like you're own to the point you have to move because of the fucking awful noice above.
It's more than miserable. (Before people come at me, this isn't about everyday kids noise, above us was a child with SEN who would make our pictures fall down and smash and blow our lights as said earlier) I can't imagine how hard it was for the mum. But her picture frames weren't smashing on the floor.

But it all became a lot harder for her and her family when she was evicted.

It was fucking miserable for us all. Her and her family included.

@Potentialneighboursfromhell
You said on a previous post you hadn’t given it any thought about the noise though. It would be the first thing I thought of. I don’t know particularly how noisy your asd child is. But as I said above my disabled child sounds like he’s going to come through the ceiling every time he’s above the living room in his bedroom, it cannot be helped I know, which is why I wouldn’t expect him to be quiet, but also I wouldn’t subject people living below to that level of noise. You literally started a post to say the neighbours are going to hate us. 🤣 I agreed they probably are. And now you’re justifying what I said in my post. People are allowed to disagree with you. 🙄

@Bimbom you’re correct. I wouldn’t live in a top floor flat with an autistic / adhd child, if he’s anything like my son anyway, the neighbours complaints would be thick and fast and then i would be feeling like OP does now, paranoid and stressed, constantly battling to keep my child quiet, always on edge, which eventually would make me uproot my ds anyway, who needs that stress looking after disabled kids anyway, so I wouldn’t do it in the first place.

As someone who almost had a nervous breakdown and had to move from my house because of noisy neighbours, it is incredibly selfish to say just suck it up. If your children are that noisy I can’t believe your never thought it would be an issue.

if I were your neighbours I’d complain every time the noise was unreasonable and alert the noise complaint department at the council, who will come out and monitor it.

For everyone saying you are entitled to live safely, peacefully etc - so are your neighbours. Building beds (or any DIY) at 8pm is unreasonable, never mind in a flat where you know you are creating high levels of noise.

But if the OP were to be evicted due to excessive noise, then the local council would have to step in, which may be result in more suitable accommodation being offered?

I’m not sure they would, surely a noise eviction would be classed as an intentional thing or anti social behaviour. SS would have a duty to house the children but not the op.

The OP has said the only thing the council can offer here is a hostel / BnB

Should I have just allowed myself to become homeless then? Turn down the only property that was actually happy to rent to me in the time frame I needed it?

In that case the council wouldn't help me, as PP said they'd house the children.. in care. Not me.

I'm done here I have enough stress IRL I don't need people here adding to it. Remember there's an actual person behind the account before you make arsy comments. You don't know what people are going through or what could be the last straw.

Thank you to all of you who have been kind.

Sorry I missed something above, I wasn't assembling furniture. The boxes / planks had to be moved into the bedroom and the dissembled (broken) bed had to be moved out to accommodate it. The boxes couldn't stay in the hallway where they were put upon delivery because they were obstructing access to other rooms Inc the toilet and was hazardous. They simply had to be moved.

Moving is incredibly hectic. It just isn't possible to have everything in place at a time that suits everybody especially when I got no say in the delivery slot.

Update

So I've been here since 17/04 now during which time I've done my best to keep noise at a minimum. I've brought bedtimes forward, kept the tv on low volume after 6pm etc.

There has been meltdowns. I can't help that, but lord knows I've really tried to.

At 7.20 this eve my buzzer rang. It was the man of the couple downstairs. Same neighbours as before. Complaining about the noise (which had long since ceased, the meltdown ended before 7pm - she told me last time I need to be quiet by 8pm as that's when her kid goes to bed and now the goal post has moved)

He was understanding enough, he said its not him who is bothered by the noise it's his partner, she's just going to keep sending him up to complain.

DS has had a bad day. I've got the bite marks to show for it. Yes he has been banging and shouting whilst I've desperately been trying to keep him calm. There was nothing I could have done that I didn't do.

I'm drained and exhausted, feel bad, ashamed but there's also a part of me that thinks they are being petty. We're not talking about 10pm at night. Never music. Just an autistic child.

I hear noise all of the time from my upstairs neighbours, coming in late at night stomping up and down the stairs, slamming the doors shut. Not once have I complained. It's part of communal living.

It has been explained why he's making noise, they've been assured I'm doing all I can.

I don't know what to do now but I'm bloody miserable. I can't live like this.