Is there nothing I can do about upstairs neighbours and noise from their wooden floors?

[putcarpetdown]

Upstairs neighbours have two small children and wooden floors. We have good relations with them but noise is a killer and after a year of lockdown I can't take any more. The children run, jump, play, drop things, spill their lego bricks, trip around in plastic 'dress up' shoes and it is so amplified in our flat. We have tried to talk to the parents but I don't think they get it.
The lease is no help.
We expect a certain level of noise, of course but it is so loud, sometimes when they jump off steps between various levels in their flat or from the bunkbed ladder (i'm guessing what's happening) it's so loud I start.

I've bought noise cancelling headphones, earplugs etc. They wake us up every morning, running and jumping and dragging chairs in kitchen and the noise continues until bedtime. I've tried to look into what our grounds would be to ask them to put carpet and decent underlay down but it seems it's normal domestic use so there is nothing we can do.
I am not saying the activities are unreasonable but the wooden floors in a un-soundproofed, badly converted old building coupled with the children's activity are! It's so loud but part of the problem is you have to have experienced it to understand how bad it is. It's got to the stage where my heart sinks when they've been out and they come home (which doesn't happen very often in the winter months). Their flat has no outsides space at all and of course young children (around 4 and 6) need to run around.
Anyone had similar and go any advice?! I don't want to fall out with them but I can't take much more. What are our options?

Are you sure there is nothing in their lease? It is normally a standard covenant in a lease so unless yours is an unusual set up?

If you need to check their lease you can download it from the Land Registry.

How many flats in the building? Is there a flat above them?

I think if you are on decent terms, ask about splitting cost of carpet

(Even if you pay entirely it could be done for a few 100, much cheaper than moving. I’d go down the ‘Not well converted’ route vs them being too noisy

One issue though is that some people just don’t like carpet, especially with kids dropping food/drink. This has been a problem on my street, up its cheaper to carpet than sound proof yours

Would even a rug down help? You could offer eg £100 to that (or order one of their choice)

@Cheeks4970

Are you sure there is nothing in their lease? It is normally a standard covenant in a lease so unless yours is an unusual set up?

If you need to check their lease you can download it from the Land Registry.

How many flats in the building? Is there a flat above them?

It’s also standard in my lease. I am upstairs and this is in lease & was queried in my recent sale. So it may say nothing in your lease but not theirs. So you know any of the other upstairs flat owners to ask?

And I can empathise with you. We lived in a flat and above our bedroom was a bare floor where the tenants' child used to bang on the floor at 5am. It nearly drove me insane and caused a lot of anguish. They eventually moved out but it was hellish (and I didn't hold back from telling the leaseholder!).

@putcarpetdown
Has it always been this bad or just become more noticeable since the pandemic?

As for the hallway playing, I think that's quite common when flats have children and no outdoor areas.

@CatherinedeBourgh

I don’t understand why you are dismissing the idea of soundproofing yours out of hand.

Yes, it’s a huge job but it can be done and the effectiveness would probably be no worse than carpets.

This is your problem, not theirs but you want them to make all thechanges.

I agree. Open up the ceilings and insulate between the joists and then clad the underside of your ceiling with a layer of insulating material and new acoustic boards and plaster.

How high are your ceilings and how much money could you throw at the problem? Acoustic insulation and a false ceiling would fix it, and add value to your flat.

I think the problem is that even carpets might not help. A friend had this the other way - i.e. she was the one with the kids, put carpets down, and honestly it didnt really help her downstairs neighbors much. unfortunately, a lot of these conversions just weren't designed to be used as flats and anyone jumping upstairs will sound like walls shaking carpet or no carpet. so be carefully that you don't end up forcing them to put down carpets at great expense and for that to make no difference whatsoever.

personally, i would never live in an upstairs flat for this reason - but it does greatly reduce our options

There is a flat above them but carpeted and with a sound proofing mat under washing machine etc. I half wish top flat would be less considerate so middle flat would experience the issue.

Not ruled out sound proofing in our flat but I’d been advised carpet was most efficient for reduction of noise balancing cost (so less bang for your buck so to speak).

Will check their lease but as far as I am aware all three flats have same lease.

in any flat, but especially a conversion, it is unreasonable and antisocial to have any floor covering but carpet with dense underlay.

Buy a radio alarm and a whistling kettle. Sing.

I am learning the bagpipes but am not very good yet, I need somewhere to practice. Can I call round in the evenings for an hour or so, about 11pm?

Look at music studios & how they soundproof areas

Music studios do this by building a room-within-a-room. For soundproofing you need an air space between two insulated surfaces.
The wall shaking is caused by vibrations, not noise, so the inner room needs to be isolated from the surrounding surfaces.
It's not a simple or cheap job, in other words, and will obviously make the living space much smaller.

And please don't anyone mention eggboxes.

Feel for you OP. I lived below two tiny, quiet professionals with carpet and even then every time they moved around it sounded like a herd of elephants so young kids on wooden floor must be unbearable.

I think offering to carpet is your best bet for a solution that works for you but hard to know how well that will be received as difficult to know how generally reasonable they are from your post.

Could they get into your garden without going through your flat? Offer to let them run around in your garden a few hours during the day to get a break from the noise. They’ll be back at school in a few days anyway

Hello - sadly they can't access garden without coming through here although we have/do offer when we are away etc. Even if they could do that half the problem is we are all working/schooling at home during the day so having them in the garden wouldn't be ideal, although definitely better than on the wooden floors upstairs!

I'm tempted by the kind bagpipe offer PigletJohn but what if they then bought a drum kit? Where would it all end (a marching band? Fine as long as they march away from here, lol)

I completely sympathise with you, years ago we lived in a flat which was a converted house. The upstairs also had two children of similar age and the noise was insane. I would dread being at home as the thumping would sometimes be louder than the TV. Their washing machine also used to vibrate our light fixture in the kitchen it was that bad. They too also had stripped wooden floors throughout.
We both owned the flat and we offered to pay to get their whole flat carpeted but they refused. We ended up paying 4k to get the ceilings in our flat sound proofed and it was money down the drain as it had very little impact on the noise from upstairs. We also looked into the lease and it was no help/as were the council who said there was nothing they could do as it was reasonable noise. We were woken every morning at 5am by the children jumping up and down above and in the end I ended up becoming quite depressed with it.
Im sorry to say that they only thing that helped me was moving, I remember showing the new people round and having to talk to them loudly over the banging! God knows why they put an offer in but luckily they did! The day we moved was like a huge weight off my shoulders.
I hope it gets better for you soon

Thanks Crabby12345 it does help to know I'm not over-reacting and that others have been in the same situation and know the noise really is that bad.
Maybe we should look into moving but apart from the noise, we are happy here and it every other way, this place suits us. Plus, I'd be worried we might jump out of the frying pan into the fire - there are plenty of threads on mumsnet about noise from next door in terraced houses (which is where we'd end up, realistically, we'd have to go further out for a semi and lol at cost of detached, any house we'd want to live in is probably out of our budget and a flat might have same issue - think this feeling of being a bit trapped is part of the frustration).

Tricky.

If the family don’t agree to your offer on carpets, I would be tempted to rent your place out temporarily and rent somewhere else nearby - having carefully checked who lives above the place you rent! Then you can move back once this family moves on. It’s not ideal but the only thing I can think of.

Yes noise through party walls in a terrace can be annoying but having had both, it’s nothing like as bad as the noise from running around on wooden floors above (and if it is that bad through a party wall, it’s generally caused by something the council could stop eg very loud music or tv).

I feel your pain. I'm having similar issues, but my neighbours are mid-50s with a child in their 20s. They put karndeann flooring down and laminate on their stairs, and they don't give a damn. They enjoy clumping about in heels or boots and spent a lot of time getting drunk and screaming abuse at each other. They're so awful to each other you can imagine what it's like talking to them.

Fortunately they all work very long hours, so we avoid the noise most of the time, but weekends and holidays are a nightmare. The problem I find is that once it starts to annoy you, that's it, you can't unhear it, and you start to anticipate it. Id move if I were you.

That's a really useful perspective minipie - thank you.

So sorry to hear you have to live with similar Amortentia tbf at least our neighbours do wear slippers round the house and i think they think they do make an effort - they just have no clue how bad it is. I've got noise cancelling headphones in and white (well, pink actually) rain playing at the moment but I can still hear the thuds and of course the wall mounted shelves shudder from time to time as they slam the front door/crash about. Who'd have thought such small people could be so noisy? Not their parents, clearly . . .
And they don't get drunk, in fact they have a pretty early bedtime - I should count my blessings!

This is the reason I'll only live in houses or top floor flats. Noise from side or below is nowhere near as intrusive as noise from above.

If you're not willing to move then you'll have to put up with it but try to change your own lives to work around the noise. Eg find a job where you don't work from home. Accept that your sleeping routine is going to need to coincide with theirs. Figure out what is the worst time of day for noise creation and take your daily walk at that time. If they start making a racket and you're not working then go out (easier when lockdown is over), I usually go to the park or the library in this situation depending on weather. Get a hobby that isn't done at home. Play your own music loud enough to be heard over the noise, I know you want quiet but noise of your choice is better than someone else's noise. Basically start thinking of your home as somewhere to get clean, sleep and store stuff, instead of it being the focal point of your life. Before you say but why should I, it's because you're not happy, that's why.

Ask the top floor neighbors if they're thinking of moving, consider buying their flat and selling yours so the noise is below you.

I'd consider moving somewhere else though. If it's getting to you then it's getting to you and you're not going to start feeling better about it. You say you like this place and it suits you, except it doesn't. It's noisy and you're stressed. It's no good saying it'd be perfect if...when you can't have the 'if'.

OP, I recently moved out of a flat with neighbours like this. One pre-teen child, but the noise of the running, jumping, dancing, moving furniture etc. all day really carried, and there would be a few loud bangs per day that would make me jump out of my skin! I spoke to their landlord about it and I think they put some thicker rugs and underlay down, but it made no difference.

Eventually I just moved out as I felt on edge and irritable all day. Similar feelings to you around feeling dread when I saw them returning to the flat. I know it is a pain to move, but honestly the difference living somewhere quieter has made to my life and mood is astounding.

I'm pleased you get on well with them, that will help.
There may be a few "quick win" things that would help slightly. For example, if you could persuade them to put sticky pads on their chair legs that will help with the dragging sound, and then offer to pay for carpet in the worst room (presumably the kids bedroom?).
I do think things will be easier when the DC go back to school and also as they get older. Also I think this has to be compared with what could be worse eg parties into the night etc. (our neighbours were singing and arguing until past 0230 on Saturday so I would be very happy with daytime only noise!!- you might be right about out of the frying pan etc if you move- sorry).

We had the same as @Crabby12345. Upstairs didn't want carpet, and the lease didn't mandate it. We put it to the committee that it should be a rule, but it was rejected as the other flat abstained from voting.

The council did come out a few times and agreed that it was very loud, but overall they weren't doing anything antisocial and as it was normal living, there was nothing the council could do. They wrote a few letters asking them to be mindful of other people and consider carpet, but they didn't want carpet with kids, and I don't think they were trying to be loud - it was just life with three small kids.

We investigated soundproofing but a few firms told us that soundproofing around our existing ceiling wouldn't do much, and we'd need a false ceiling, which my husband was pretty against, so we moved. We let the new buyer know about the noise from upstairs but they were buying to let it out and didn't really care, to be honest. They also intended to try and buy the other flat, and they'd then have had a majority to force a carpet term in the lease, but I'm not sure if they were successful.

It might be worth seeing if things are better next week, if you really love your home? The kids may be tired out more once they're back at school, and generally, everyone is likely to be at home less as society opens up. But I think it's unusual to be able to force the flat above to deal with noise problems if it's from normal behaviour and nobody is being unreasonable, so to speak.