Kids noise vs neighbours: AIBU to think that there is so much you can do when you have young children?

[karpouzi]

We have three kids, all under the age of four, and live in a period maisonette spread over the first and loft floor. Currently, our entire family sleeps in the loft. The eldest two share a bedroom, while the baby is still in our room. On the first floor, we have the kitchen and living area, as well as a double room, which is currently set up as a playroom. We’ve always had a strict rule that our kids are not allowed on the first floor before 8 a.m., unless they’re having breakfast in the kitchen.
However, our downstairs neighbor has been repeatedly complaining about the noise, especially on weekends, saying that it’s disturbing her sleep. She sends us long messages almost every week. We’ve explained that we have a double rug in the playroom, and that the kids are not allowed in that room before 8 a.m., even though they wake up around 6:30 a.m. We also arrange swimming lessons to be at 9am in the weekend so the kids are out of the house. Unfortunately, this is all we can do to minimize the noise. Now, we face a new challenge: the baby will soon need his own room. Our plan is to move him into the boys' room in the loft, which is fairly small. We also plan to get new beds for the eldest two and convert the playroom into a bedroom where the boys will also have space for their toys. The boys typically wake up between 6:30 and 7 a.m., and with this new setup, they will need to stay in their bedroom in the mornings. I’m really concerned that the complaints from our neighbor will escalate. What do other people do in situations like this? I feel I m getting fed and I will start ignoring her messages.

Note: When we renovated our kitchen we did add floor noise insulation but we don’t have the money to do any further renovations at this stage.

are you for real?! Every time there is a complaint they should face consequences for there noise. They are kids ffs!!

@PhoenixResurrected agree with everything you said! If the downstairs neighbour hates it that much then sell up and move!! That's what my sister had to do

@wherearemypastnames is your middle name Oh Holier Than Thou?

If not it should be

I know right. This comment made me howl with laughter

😂😂

I agree she moved into a flat knowing that there was a family with 3 young children, what did she expect. You are doing your best OP, there's not much more you can do apart from putting down carpets when you can afford them, in the meantime ignore her.

Sounds like a nightmare scenario for you with young DC in a small space and for any downstairs neighbour, but you are making some effort to reduce noise. There’s some mitigation as well that she knew you had the DC, yet she may not have understood the reality of that situation, or the poor soundproofing.

DC are not all equal…I had a really noisy family once with only one. He seemed ok, well cared for, interacted well, yet cried and had tantrums every 2 hours. It never got better! I didn’t ever complain, because didn’t think they could do much and it was tough for them, just bloody glad when they moved!

Perhaps she is used to quieter DC, better soundproofing or both?

In this scenario, if possible I would want to meet her over a coffee to find out what the main issues (specific sounds) and times are, as well as explain what adaptations you’ve made so far with your routines etc.

I would ask her gently to please not write any more letters (because that is bloody irksome too), but perhaps arrange another coffee in a couple of weeks to review how it’s been working?

Cash permitting you could lay cork on top of the wooden floors and then heavy underlay with a rug or carpet on top. No one is in the wrong here - it’s old houses and what children do. They have to be able to play at home. My neighbour who’s lovely used to complain to me about the family who lived upstairs from her. The family were also great.

You can't report the noise of children to the police. It's something that naturally happens. I'd consider putting down carpet but other than that I'd tell the neighbour I was building a harassment case against them.

Again, you plan to do nothing about it, so have no more discussions on it. I guess you just wanted a pat on the back here, and to some extent you got one, though lots pointed out that buying a carpet is a priority, which you are not prioritising.

Oh well.

I think you're absolutely awful to refuse to install carpet. You are selfish and inconsiderate and are hiding behind the excuse of money. It's not that expensive to put in carpet, especially if you buy offcuts instead of designer off the roll alpaca wool. If her flat was £700k for a one bed then your 3 bed surely cost a pretty penny too. I very much doubt a few hundred quid would stretch you that much.

The time to do it is now, before the kids move and there's too much stuff to move around to put carpet in later.

You clearly just want her to shut up and have zero empathy for the racket your family is making.

Yes I have also lived in a flat with people like you as neighbours.

The neighbour is being massively unreasonable. If she wants to enjoy a home free of the sounds of others and sleep beyond 8am on weekends, she needs to buy herself a detached house.

Move your bedroom downstairs and keep the kids' bedrooms and playing area in the loft.

Talk to your neighbour - tell her her constant unreasonable complaints and demands are starting to feel like harassment, and her expectation of total silence on weekend mornings even after 8am is beyond ridiculous.

Just saw the playroom will only fit bunks.

That's still OK.

She's still being a c*nt.

What she's doing is harassment. You are not living an abnormal life, creating excessive noise at unreasonable hours. Her expectation of quiet is not reasonable. In particular, her problem with her upstairs neighbours being up and making normal sounds after 8am on a Saturday is batshit.

Do not make your children tiptoe around their own home to placate a person who is not entitled to what she thinks she is.

And room for a pony...

Lol @ "Victim".

The complaint is that she is being kept from sleeping past 8am on weekends, poor diddums.

I would put down some heavy rubber tiles in the playroom as a temporary solution for the sound and carpet downstairs as soon as possible. The neighbour needs to get some ear plugs.

I think this is six of one and half a dozen of the other.
A friend of mine lives in an upstairs flat. It is fully carpeted. The children do not wear shoes in the house and are not allowed to run or stomp around. Yes you CAN enforce this as my friend has managed to. She makes sure she takes the children out to run around.
Your neighbour is at fault for moving her bedroom. I used to live in a flat and changed the bedroom and living room around. I moved it back as I realised, after a noise complaint, that I was often walking across the downstairs neighbours bedroom.

If the kids sound unsupervised for extended periods or you're concerned about thumping, you could also call social services as a neighbour. Or the police if you are concerned the children are alone or being harmed due to the amount of noise or banging going on.

It sounds like she will never be happy and wants to make your lives miserable in the hope you move. Don't buy a flat in an old house if you don't like the consequences. Everyone knows its difficult. You are already doing too much to accommodate her needs IMHO. You have children. It is their home and if it upsets the neighbour she can wear ear plugs, get rid of the housemate or move. What she can't do it expect you to make your children live on eggshells. Housing in London is shocking but she's the one with the problem. Not you. I lived in a flat in London and could hear our neighbours downstairs singing nursery rhymes to their little one, every cry, the toilet flushing, etc. It never occurred to me to complain. I just felt sorry for them having a child in a one bed basement flat. There was a shared garden and they were the only ones who used it - I think everyone else found it too awkward as their flat opened onto it and everyone else would have to use a side gate. I digress. She's unreasonable. You're already doing too much. Your poor kids. She can move if she doesn't like it.

Our immediate neighbours can hear our GC on the stairs and we can hear ourneighbours children there too. We can also hear the tumble dryer on one side. It's inevitable.

However children aren't noisy for ever and the idea of moving them into rooms further from the neighbours sounds good. We did that when our children were small but they do get quieter. My daughter lives in a flat with three immediate neighbours and keeps her children in their own rooms until a reasonable hour, they're not normally noisy when they're on their own,

3 kids in an upstairs flat with no carpets. My sympathy is with the neighbour.

I’m amazed how many people have sympathy with just the OP or just the neighbour and feel need to take sides.

I feel for the OP as 7am-10pm or so is pretty normal for family noise and they are trying to keep kids quiet early in the morning. They are not actively doing anything to cause disturbance it’s just that sound travels a lot in period houses and normal family living noise can be very loud downstairs. I also feel for them as getting lots of complaints from a neighbour can feel overwhelming, particularly if you aren’t able to easily address them.

I feel for the neighbour as their upset is no doubt genuine and it must be very frustrating to want to sleep till 9/10 or to want to focus on some reading on a weekend afternoon while there is a lot of noise coming from upstairs.

Ultimately no one here is awful or being anymore selfish than average. The OP and the neighbour may both have limited options to move if they need to be in that area for work, family links etc so saying either of them should just sell up and go to a quieter area isn’t practical. Suggesting that one or other of them should spend significant amounts of money soundproofing may also be impractical (even carpets will be a lot, particularly if you include carpeting the hall/stairs - it was best part of £3k for us to do ours in a Victorian house even without a super fancy carpet). If you’ve recently bought a new home or you have nursery fees to pay you may struggle to fit home improvements into your budget.

Short term what the OP can do that might help is delay plans to move kids downstairs, wait a little longer (till 8:30 maybe) before heading downstairs at weekends and share with her neighbour when they’ll be away/on day trips so they can take that into consideration when planning their weekends.
Short term what the neighbour can do is try ear plugs for sleep being disturbed and, if they have them, noise cancelling headphones for reading/TV. They are both pretty effective and I say this as someone with older deaf neighbours on one side who watch tv and sing full blast while I’m working at home, a yappy dog on other side and super noisy seagulls very early in the morning.

Longer term there are other things that can be done and I’m sure will be but right now honestly the easiest short term fix is probably with the neighbour rather than the OP.

I've got kids but have also been in the situation of the neighbour prior to having kids, and unless anyone has actually experienced the noise levels that are enhanced by having bare floorboards then you are not well placed to blame the neighbour. As others have suggested, the situation would be greatly eased by installing fitted carpets. Although this property doesn't, many properties of that nature do have clauses in the lease stating the floors must be carpeted. It's impossible to keep kids quiet and you have the right to live your life normally but your neighbour also has the right to live free of excessive noise so if you want a peaceful life free of complaints, it's only common sense to get carpet fitted.

Indeed!

Longer term there are other things that can be done and I’m sure will be but right now honestly the easiest short term fix is probably with the neighbour rather than the OP.

The easiest fix is the OP putting down carpet. She would get a lot more sympathy if she had done that basic step - and indeed the thread was much more on her side until she finally admitted that she had hard flooring.