To have a little rant about downstairs neighbour?

[freakinthespreadsheets]

This morning at 7am my downstairs neighbour (I'm in a third floor flat) decided to turn his speakers on. They're so loud it makes my floor and bed vibrate, so earplugs don't cut it.

Quiet hours in the building are 11-7 so he's technically not doing anything wrong. The walls and floors are just very thin, I imagine he can hear me getting up to pee in the night 382947 times too!

I'm just pregnant, tired, miserable and hormonal and feel very aggrieved! I've been up all night every night this week with a mix of sickness, headache and insomnia, and was so looking forward to a lie in. The 9-10 week mark has really been brutal!

He does this most weekends, or if he has his kids, they'll be up using the corridor as a race track or jumping the walls at a similar time. I've much more sympathy for this as i know pre schoolers have boundless energy (and they're quieter than this anyhow).

Feel like i can't say much though as we'll soon be keeping him up all night with a crying baby i imagine.
Thank you for listening to my rant x

Have you tried talking to him?

Sympathies, I remember these days well...

Have you got thick rugs down, even if you have carpet it does help a lot.

He may not be aware you can hear him as there is a misconception that sound only travels downwards in flats...

No, I haven't, he's a little scary looking if im honest, I know that's a terrible reason and he's probably lovely! I'm just scared he's going to bite back harder once we have a crying baby keeping him up if I say anything. He's sticking to the building quiet hours so I really don't feel i have a leg to stand on, it's just annoying!

Thank you, we have very thick carpets and underlay, no rugs, maybe I'll see about getting one for under the bed. Thanks for thr tip!
I'm not sure if it's the noise travelling downwards thing as he has a downstairs neighbour too (I'm on the third floor and him on the second).

Crying babies are counted as normal noise

Loud music is not.

Ive heard this before but does that apply if he's not breaching the quiet hours? It isn't my flat (my partner owns it) so I can't speak to the building management company to check x

Is it the actual music of the vibrations? It might be a base on the speaker he could switch off.

You definitely need to speak to him, just go in gently and start with some general chat. Then ask if it's possible to turn them down/switch on later. You can acknowledge he's not doing anything wrong.

Thank you, the music i could handle with some ear plugs no problem, it's the vibrations it definitely sounds bass-y. I didn't realise you could turn that part off without turning the music off, that would feel a lot less unreasonable to ask of him.
I might ask my partner to speak to him when he gets up (the lucky git has slept through it!) as they've spoken before and know each others names etc.

I'm not a tech expert so could be wrong! But I suspect he has some big old speakers either touching the ceiling or walls. He probably doesn't even notice the bass is that high and all the vibrations are coming through to your room. Hopefully he can easily turn the settings down.

At uni my housemate had one and it was the housemate above him that was struggling (I was in his room at the time and it didn't even seem bad).

I also had some neighbours in a block of flats who got a fancy tv and it nearly drove me insane working out where it was coming from. Never heard it again once I knocked on their window at midnight in my pyjamas and told them it was driving me a bit mental 🤣. (I couldn't knock on the door as we shared a wall but they were the next block and I didn't have access or know what number.)

I would not worry about a crying baby. Ear plugs can block that out but they cannot block the base of old fashioned sub woofers. If he put the speakers on special mats or even just a stack of magazines and turned down the base that would help. I had a neighbour like that in a poorly sound insulated flat. Unfortunately it was the thump of the base that he enjoyed. Eventually I had to move.

Surely the quiet hours should be pre 11am and post 7pm!? What a ridiculous rule!

Yes, even if it's outside council quiet hours it can still be classed as anti social noice if it's regularly disturbing you.

Check your council policy.

YANBU. People are obsessed by bass and I don't get it. It's antisocial as too much of it makes music of a certain loudness much more intrusive.

I believe it does.

I once supported a client who'd been issued with a warning about noise nuisance from the council and it was daytime noise, not late at night or early morning,

Sorry I should have been clear 11pm till 7am x

Update - in the end i didn't have to say anything! He'd stopped by the time DP woke up.
Bastard started again at 2am this morning which woke me up and lasted about half an hour before another neighbour told him to turn it off. There was lots of shouting and door slamming so I'm quite glad I didn't approach him myself tbh as DP was asleep and id have felt quite vulnerable on my own. Hopefully that's the end of that!

Oh dear. He sounds like a prick. We had this with a downstairs neighbour who enjoyed pissing off everyone else. His flat was right under our bedroom & the final straw was when I returned at 2am after a night out to find bass thumping through the floor & my poor H trying to sleep on the sofa. I banged on neighbour’s door but he didn’t answer.

Following day, neighbour banged on our door around 5pm. He was clearly drunk & wanted to fight H for banging on his door. When I told him it was me and his music was annoying everyone, it threw him as he didn’t want to fight a woman!

I saw we were never going to win with this arsehole so we moved. Sorry if that’s not the answer you wanted but it was never going to be resolved.

We did end up with lovely, considerate neighbours tho.

sympathies OP - a horrible neighbour is horrendous.

I would still go round OP, he needs to know he's waking up/disturbing the whole building and to turn the bass off.

Oh silly me🫣x

So I have a small speaker in my kitchen, I never play it loudly, but the way the acoustics works in the house for some reason it sounds really loud and heavy bass when I’m in the bathroom. But as soon as I leave the bathroom I can’t hear it again till I go downstairs, but still not as bass-ey. Just something about the way the sound travels. He might not genuinely be playing loud music, and he might genuinely not know how badly you can hear it.

Just because it is “quiet hours” between 11 and 7 does not mean that people can create nuisance to other neighbours outside of those hours!!! (Lawyer here)

I agree.

Having speakers on at 7am is unreasonable and I've got adult children so have been there!
Be might not realise the noise is traveling up to your floor and if so he might be reasonable.

If he's not reasonable - when your baby is born - karma!

😀