Can I audio record my upstairs neighbor being loud af?

[Iron Woode]

I have followed the best advice when it comes to this issue:

call the police. Where I am the noise bylaws are in effect 24/7. The only exceptions come from a city manager's office and that is very rare.

The police here don't fool around, either. When they show up you are going to have a problem. They can also use the noise complaint as a reason to enter your unit. Most of those noisy tenants don't want the police in their unit.

I called one night due to excessively loud partying at midnight and the police showed up 30 minutes later. After some loud banging on their door, the party was over in minutes.

 

[nakedfrog]

I remember when I was 19 and living in an apartment, and I had a boombox. Not a massive 80s boombox, a mid-90s boombox with a CD player and single cassette deck. One night I was listening to a CD, and later on the cops knocked on my door and said they had a complaint about a noisy party. And there's just me, in a sparsely furnished apartment, with my little Sony boombox... it had been sitting on the floor, so maybe the spot it was sitting in made it transmit really well to the apartment below, I don't know.

 

[pmv]

I have followed the best advice when it comes to this issue:

call the police. Where I am the noise bylaws are in effect 24/7. The only exceptions come from a city manager's office and that is very rare.

The police here don't fool around, either. When they show up you are going to have a problem. They can also use the noise complaint as a reason to enter your unit. Most of those noisy tenants don't want the police in their unit.

I called one night due to excessively loud partying at midnight and the police showed up 30 minutes later. After some loud banging on their door, the party was over in minutes.

Given the apparent nature of US cops, I'd personally be hesitant to do that, especially if the neighbour happened to be black. Glad I'm not in the US so don't have that particular dilemma. Is there no non-cop-local-government 'noise patrol' type-of-thing over there?

 

[nakedfrog]

Is there no non-cop-local-government 'noise patrol' type-of-thing over there?

Not in the US. Dunno about Canada.

 

[pmv]

Not in the US. Dunno about Canada.

Seems like an example of the logic behind 'defund the police'. Though I suppose it's also another downside of the ubiquitousness of firearms, that maybe is why you couldn't have an unarmed, non-police, service for such things?

 

[nakedfrog]

Seems like an example of the logic behind 'defund the police'. Though I suppose it's also another downside of the ubiquitousness of firearms, that maybe is why you couldn't have an unarmed, non-police, service for such things?

Yes, I think it would make sense to have different groups tailored to the situation. Having cops show up is probably going to increase the odds of gunplay from either side, versus people whose primary training is in conflict resolution.

 

[Iron Woode]

Given the apparent nature of US cops, I'd personally be hesitant to do that, especially if the neighbour happened to be black. Glad I'm not in the US so don't have that particular dilemma. Is there no non-cop-local-government 'noise patrol' type-of-thing over there?

I am not in the US, either.

We have Bylaw officers that enforce bylaws and they are basically police.

 

[woolfe9998]

No need for consent. Not when someone is making noise which travels through their floor into someone else's unit. That is not a private conservation. There is no expectation of privacy. No consent of any kind is necessary. This would be legal even in a 2 party consent state.

 

[z1ggy]

That's because you are a reasonable type. I'm just saying people underestimate just how many unreasonable people there are out there. In any case, I doubt you, being reasonable, would listen to music on the loud side in the middle of a weekday night. When people make unreasonable levels of noise at unreasonable times, that's probably a sign that they are not reasonable people.

The ironic thing is, I once had a TV that had a broken volume control (that meant you couldn't turn the volume down below a certain, loud, level). I used to try and watch it while pressing a telephone directory over the speaker, to muffle it. When that directory fell off, as it sometimes did, the volume became excessive. My neighbour at the time didn't ask me to turn it down, they just took to posting anonymous obscenity-laden death-threats through my door, leaving me to figure out what the issue was (I'm still not entirely sure, though my best guess is it was that over-loud TV they were upset about - I got rid of it, and in fact haven't had a TV at all since).

I used to be of the opinion that it's a function of how wealthy you are, as housing is heavily segregated on the basis of house-prices and hence wealth. The less well off end up having to live next door to the seriously-troubled/mentally-unwell or criminal classes (not to mention going to the same schools as them) while the affluent get to live in the 'nice' areas where people behave well (or at least save their anti-social behaviour for their professional life, as bankers and politicians and the like).

But then one day I ran into a guy who, though working as a gardener, had inherited a big house in a posh area, and had startlingly similar problems to me. His neighbour was a senior member of the judiciary, who, notwithstanding his very-high-social-status, was prone to having incredibly noisy parties at all hours of the day and night, with open drug use and sexual activity.

It actually seems as if you get very similar anti-social behaviour at the top and bottom end of the social-scale. And while the rich can afford larger homes with more sound-proof walls, their anti-social neighbours compensate by buying louder sound systems and having bigger parties.

I live in an interesting neighborhood. I live in a pocket of an extremely wealthy township. I can drive in basically any direction a few minutes and find multiple $1.5MM+ homes.

There's a spot where it's "affordable" which is where I am. It's not because we are poor but because my wife is nuts deep in student loan debt still, although we plan to pay that off shortly. While we save up for a $600k+ house.... we endure this tiny 700sqft condo. It's certainly an interesting thought as it seems natural this neighborhood could attract some of the "lesser" folk that happen to be from the area since these condo's only sell for $225-250k.

With that said, we have great relationships with everyone here. Yes, there are a few obvious "poor" people that live here, but they are good people. I think it's just statistics, just like no matter what job you have, there always seems to be a "rotten egg" at work, whether its a 15,000 person company or a 150 person one.

Funny as I type this I can hear her music bumping up there through the ceiling. lol. Imagine, some 50 year old (I presume) woman listening to what sounds like up beat hip hop/pop music. Everyday.

 

[Muse]

Yeah the property manager just informed us this morning to contact a lawyer. Landlord is aware now and contacted his lawyer, too. Essentially 2, if not 3 different attorney might get involved.

Not sure exactly what this process will be, but I am still nervous about having to serve this person who lives ya know... like at certain points just a few dozen feet from us with legal papers. Especially somebody who is clearly irrational.

You don't know what people are dealing with and what their mental state is. I don't want to live in fear but I think I'm extra concerned because we have a child. Hopefully if some kind of official notice is served to her, this just goes away and we can get on with our lives.

I understand your trepidation and I think I'd feel the same. I think it's good that you're getting support here, i.e. the landlord and property manager. The lawyers hopefully will help too. I just suggest that you try to be patient, observant, and realize that this will likely resolve somehow, hopefully soon.

 

[z1ggy]

I'll be sure to update this once the letters are sent (by the HOA lawyer and my landlords) and that hopefully things stop. Might also post back that I got shanked or my car ended up catching fire one night.

 

[Brainonska511]

I'll be sure to update this once the letters are sent (by the HOA lawyer and my landlords) and that hopefully things stop. Might also post back that I got shanked or my car ended up catching fire one night.

Hope you have comprehensive coverage for auto insurance.

 

[Muse]

I'll be sure to update this once the letters are sent (by the HOA lawyer and my landlords) and that hopefully things stop. Might also post back that I got shanked or my car ended up catching fire one night.

I don't know the specifics, but seems it would be wise to try to keep a low profile, as they say, while this plays out.