- Talk to your neighbor calmly about their noise and how it’s affecting you. Ask if they can limit their noise to certain times, or come up with another compromise.
- Ask your landlord or building manager to mediate your conversation if your neighbor doesn’t comply. Or, call your area’s non-emergency police line to make a complaint.
- If none of the solutions work, call the police when the neighbor is being extremely loud and a disturbance.
Resolving Issues with Neighbors Directly
Discuss your noise issue with your neighbour. Approach them calmly and politely with your complaint. Ask that they quiet down and come up with a plan together of how to solve noise problems. Calmly approach your neighbour with your issue. If you have never actually met in person or spoken to one another, make it a point to introduce yourself. Say, “Hi, I’m Mary. I share the wall with you and live next door.” Broach the topic of noise bothering you, but do so as respectfully as possible to be careful not to offend them. Say something like, “I’m not sure if you’re aware, but the walls are really thin here so I can hear a lot. It kind of keeps me up at night.”
Let your neighbour know how you are being affected by their noise. You may be studying. You may have young children or elderly relatives at home who can’t take the excessive noise. Help them understand why need to be quieter. For example, if you are a college student, explain to your neighbour that you need peace and quiet to study late at night. Be honest and say something like, “I’m not trying to ruin your night, but it would be amazing if you could try to keep it down between the hours of 10 and 3. Those are prime study hours for me.” Another way to confront your neighbours about their noise is mentioning the household members they might be interrupting. Be sincere and say something like, “Hey, I have a baby and even though I love rocking out, it’s hard to get my baby to stay asleep with all of the noise. Can you please, please keep it down? My sanity will thank you.”
Refrain from using confrontation as a way to initiate a conversation. Do not blame or accuse, and definitely do not threaten your neighbour. If you are confrontational toward them, they are far more likely to respond by being confrontational toward you. Remember that you're seeking a solution, not a hostile standoff. Stay away from using blaming language such as “you are” or “you need to”, instead focus on how you feel and convey that to your neighbour. Do so after the loud party though, never try to have a rational conversation in the midst of the loud noises happening. Avoid coming to your neighbour with an angered or disgruntled attitude. If you feel like you’re too irritated to have a productive, mature conversation, save the conversation for a later date when you’ve calmed down some.
Suggest coming up with a compromise. Could they keep it down before or after certain times of the day? Could you or your neighbour wear headphones to help minimize the noise? Adhere to noise complaint procedures your building has set in place to help guide you with your compromise. Look into the rules of the apartment complex and/or residential area you reside in. Ask that your neighbours be respectful of any courtesy hours that might be enforced. If you are unsure of how to come to an agreement with your neighbour on your own, use the development’s rules as a guideline for how to resolve the issue.
Write a letter. If the problem continues, try writing your neighbour a letter. While it may seem formal, it may also be a clear and effective way of communicating your complaint in the least confrontational way possible. Take time to compose the letter. As with your initial contact, be polite and factual. State the result you are looking for with your initiation of complaint. Keep a copy of the letter as part of your written record of the actions you have taken to resolve the problem.
Take notes of every interaction. Record the outcome of the conversation with as many facts and details as you can recall, and do so immediately. You will be able to demonstrate that you tried to resolve the problem yourself. Careful notes of your actions can help your case if the problem becomes an ongoing one or you need to make a formal complaint later. Dates and times will be useful to write down as well as copies of any tangible forms of conversation (texts, emails, letters).
Seeking Noise Resolution through the Authorities
Enlist the help of a mediator. If you find that the noise can’t be resolved between just you and the other person, seek out resolution with the help of a third party. Sometimes a board member or apartment manager can help facilitate the conversation and avoid fueling the conflict between you and the neighbour. If your building doesn’t have mediation procedures, talk to your landlord or super about the noise complaints. The super or landlord will act as the middle man and notify the neighbour of the complaints they’ve heard anonymously, sometimes with an official reprimand.
Contact the local authorities if other approaches have failed. Some areas have a non-emergency police option, 311. In areas without a 311 service, you can likely find a local, non-emergency phone number for your local police department (or sheriff’s office) by looking online. When you call 311 or your local non-emergency line, let the dispatcher know where you are exactly. If you are in an apartment complex, give the complete street address including the apartment number. Be prepared to give info about your entry code if your community is gated as well. Give a brief description of what is going on. Tell them what is currently happening. Say something like, “I’m trying to file a noise complaint on one of my neighbours who is having a party that is not in accordance with our community rules.” If you want to remain anonymous to protect yourself against any potential retaliation, tell the operator that you don’t want to be contacted by the officers sent to the scene. The officers will contact your neighbour regarding the complaint, but will leave you out of it and not reveal your identity.
Involve the police in your issues with noisy neighbours. If the issue can be or has been dealt between you, your neighbours, and your landlord, leave the police out if it. However, if you find that you have not had much success with dealing with things internally, call the cops. 911 should be reserved for emergency situations, not a thump or two. Call the cops if there’s a loud party going on or if there is a band playing at all hours of the night. It is integral that the cops be called only in situations where the noise will still be going on at the time of their arrival. If not, contact 311 or your local non-emergency line, for non-emergency noise complaint situations.
Take legal action. Legal action should be your last resort as a result of trying every possible way to reach a solution and not finding one. Use the notes you have taken during past indiscretions with your neighbours as supporting documents to build your civil case for small claims court. Sue your neighbour in court for money damages or as a court order for the neighbour to stop the noise, or “abate the nuisance”, which is what it’s referred to in legal terms. It might be difficult to sue for noise damage because determining damages is pretty subjective. If you still want to give it a try in small claims court, use your log that you should have been keeping from earlier steps. Show that there is excessive and disturbing noise on several occasions caused by the neighbour you’re suing. Show that you have asked that he or she stop being noisy on several occasions and it hasn’t been resolved. Show evidence of police involvement and your interactions with your neighbour that have remained ineffective to resolving the issue of noise.
Avoiding Noisy Neighbors
Live in an apartment that is on the top level of the apartment building. It often comes with a heftier price tag, but it can be the most effective way to avoid noisy neighbours. Sound doesn’t affect apartments on the top level like it does on the ground floor. Consider that when you’re on the hunt for an apartment.
Check out the neighbourhood that you’re trying to rent or buy in. Checking out the neighbourhood you plan to live in before you buy is the best way to get an idea of what the noise level will be like. Take note of your surroundings. On the street you plan to live on, check to see if there are basketball hoops, skateboard ramps, or other equipment that create a lot of noise or cause kids to congregate loudly in one area. Avoid streets with a bus stop, intersection with stop signs, a club, an empty lot, or a halfway house near it. In other words, avoid busy locations with heavy commuter traffic.
Let your landlord know upfront that quietness is important to you. When you’re on the hunt for a place, let your landlord know that living in a relatively quiet building is important to you. Gauge the landlord’s willingness to accommodate your personal preference. If he or she tries hard to place you somewhere quieter, this will be an important indicator of what the landlord is willing to do to make sure you feel comfortable. If you hear buzz phrases like, “This is a young building”, be prepared to be surrounded by a few college parties. If that is a dealbreaker for you and what you’re willing to accommodate in a living space as far as noise levels go, it might be wise to pick somewhere else to live.
Rely on other methods to reduce noise levels. Even in your most concentrated efforts to stay away from loud noise and/or noisy neighbours, noise can still trickle in and get on your nerves at any given time. Construction might be going on randomly or a neighbour might insist on mowing the lawn at 9 am on a Saturday morning. Invest in a pair of noise-canceling headphones or a white noise machine to reduce the volume of noise your place might be absorbing. Another way to absorb sound and reduce its impact is by installing bass traps or other sound-absorbing materials onto your walls.
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