Neighbour noise in a flat vs a Victorian terrace

[Sandrine1982]

Hi.

Having read another post asking whether one would ever go back to living in a terrace, I'm slightly depressed and need reassurance!

We're currently living in a flat on an ex-council estate in London and we're moving out - for several reasons - but mainly due to an annoying neighbour who shouts all the time.

We've offered on a lovely, large Victorian terrace in another area nearby, 3 bedrooms, high ceilings, large garden.

We haven't been able to speak to the neighbours yet but apparently it's an old gentleman on one side and a young family with a 3year old on the other.

However I'm so traumatised from my experience of living near people that I'm really worried about how noisy this future house is going to be. I don't think I'll be able to survive the disappointment after having splashed all our life savings on this move.

Can people reassure me that living in terraced houses is better than living in flats, noise wise?

Can people share their positive experiences?

Thanks x

I've lived in lots of terraces including Victorian ones and never heard any noise. But after my last experience in a 1930s build I will never share walls again. Although it is the people not the walls that are the problem.

What sort of Victorians was it built for? I'm not being facetious - in my experience, having lived in both, the ones aimed at the middle classes are pretty solid whereas in the ones built for the workers you can hear your neighbours sneeze through the one miserable layer of bricks.

We live in a Victorian terrace and don’t hear a thing unless it’s from the gardens when the windows are open. Maybe it’s the build quality, it was one built for the middle classes! What also likely helps is that we’re on a hill so every house is at a different level, the house on the left (family with 3 kids) is a mirror image of ours so we adjoin corridors not rooms and on the right where we do adjoin walls we have 2 professionals sharers who aren’t home much. We love ours! I’d go for it OP, unless you can comfortably afford a detached? The neighbours sound ok- an older guy might have the TV volume up and the 3YO might tantrum but I can’t imagine either is much of a risk for late night partying.

We moved from a ground floor flat to a Victorian terrace and it’s definitely better in our house. One side we barely hear at all, probably helped that our houses are mirror images so the halls are next to each other, not rooms. The other side we do hear a bit more but only in one room. Ours is not grand, would have been a workers cottage originally.

I live in a mill cottage terrace in a northern village and can hear everything. However my neighbours are all lovely and I find the general household burble reassuring.

I live in a small terrace and yes, I can hear my neighbours. But I still prefer it to being in a flat. But would love to live in a detached house. That’s not going to happen while we are in London...

I live in a flat but would choose a house every time.

(I lived in a house until last year, because of my circumstances a flat was my only option in my area).

I live in a victorian not built for the middle classes. We're mid terrace but these were built in batches of 3's. So on the one side, we don't hear them at all because our house was built after there's was so there is at least a two brick distance between us, the other side we here pretty much everything.
We lived in a flat before living here.
I much prefer living here!
I would say, ime, the noise was relatively equal but hard to compare when at the moment we have a family living next door but in the flat we only ever had couples or single people.

We’re mid-(shitty)-terrace with noisy twats on both sides but still preferable to a flat imo, as the noise isn’t on top of our heads. Plus if they’re twatting about upstairs, we can go downstairs. Plus our flat was mid-terrace too so got it from all sides!

Agree it depends what sort of terrace. We used to live in a very small 2 bed, long line of Victorian terraces and I could literally hear my neighbours' telephone conversations word for word. We now live in a larger, 3 bed end terrace which is far grander than our previous one and we don't hear anything at all.

That's very reassuring thank you :)

I'm in a Victorian terraced worker's 2-up 2-down.
One side has young children. Hardly ever hear them unless they are being very loud.

The house across the street has very loud inhabitants and they bother me more. If I have windows open I can hear them shouting inside their house.

FWIW, I don't like noise at all and hated living in a flat.