DIY noise

[HelloJR]

Hi all,

Hoping for some advice. Me and my partner have recently bought a mid terraced house which we are renovating. It is a lot more work than we anticipated (having found some unsafe wiring and small leak under bathroom floor which has caused a joist to rot!).
We both work full time jobs, with me doing shifts and trying to do as much of the work ourselves as possible (that is safe for us to do as DIYers!).

We work on the house on average 2 days of the week, always within the councils advice Re appropriate DIY hours (basically never before 9am, after 5pm, or on a Sunday). Some of the work has been loud as we've been hammering old tiles/plaster etc off of walls.

Neighbours on one side are starting to get a little fed up with us/noise to the point they were rather rude and shouting at us today and threatening to report us for not complaining with building regs (not really sure what we've not complained with as we have had professionals do all big jobs RE rewire, structural etc, so I suspect this is a throw away remark in the moment of them being upset). They are an elderly couple and we previously had a good relationship with them when we first moved in and we always let them know prior to us undertaking any work so they are aware there will be some noise. We completely understand their frustrations, but feel they are being unreasonable and unsure of what else we can do as we cannot stop undertaking the work (for context currently have no kitchen and bathroom and living with family so this work is essential!).

Would appreciate any suggestions RE what we could do to help the situation and if you think we should be worried RE threats of building regs??

Thanks so much in advance!

Exactly how long are you doing noisy work between 9-5? I know you need the work doing but, if they are home all day, and you are working all day they must be driven insane by the noise. You only need to read some of the threads on here to see how noise from neighbours that you can’t control causes anxiety, stress and ill health….OR they could just be really intolerant people and are going to be a nightmare to live next to!

In the interest of neighbourly relations would it be worth popping round and giving them an idea of when noisy work will be completed and an offer of buying them some noise cancelling headphones? I don’t imagine building regs will be a problem if you have been using tradesmen, have they been an issue? Playing loud music along with hammering maybe?

we have on occasion worked 9-5 continuously but we are normally only doing a few hours at a time to limit the noise. For context I was taking tiles off the wall in the kitchen this morning, literally started work at 10:30 and was all done by 13:00 and warned them we would be doing work today 2 days ago and they seemed ok!

As I say, I completely understand their frustrations, obviously no one wants to live next to a building site, but equally we would like to be able to live in our house, have a flushing toilet/bath/shower, electrics that's don't pose a fire risk and a bathroom floor that isn't about to fall through due to rotten joists! - non of which I feel is unreasonable and we always give them notice that we will be doing work so they know when to expect work. The trades people we have used have also been very good, electricians went over and knocked on their door on day 1 of rewire to explain what they were doing etc so the noise was not a suprise to them for example.

It's really tricky to give them an end date as we honestly don't know when we'll be done (inexperienced with this sort of thing as it's our first house and we keep finding more problems!) But what I do know is it's probably going to be a while yet unfortunately :(. Good idea RE earphones!

Thanks for your reply!

How long do you expect them to have to live with the noise ? weeks? months?

That's unreasonable.

You really to get some professionals back in to finish the renovation.

It sound you simply don't have the time to do the work as you both work full time and they are probably fed up because this is just dragging on with no end in sight.

If you are working during the appointed hours it is just a part of having neighbors. The couple is elderly and probably home a lot, plus no one is living in the house so the it is either REALLY quiet or REALLY noisy. You have been considerate and should continue to be, but I would not hire out more work or work less to accommodate. Professionals will make noise too.

Much like you OP we have not been blessed with a money tree and gave some similar to you (builders have done the structural work, we’re doing all painting and decorating).

You are well within your rights to continue to work on your property as you have done. We have had similar issues to you and we have actually found that NOT notifying them in advance has actually caused LESS angst. When we told ours ahead of time they then felt entitled to ask us to change our dates or called up on a weekend to ‘ask when we’d be done’ after we notified them of time critical work.

Refer them to the councils noise complaint service if they continue - it’s unlikely to come to anything.