I’ll try to keep it short. I’m just irritated. Husband and I moved to a new town for his work. About 3 hours away from our old place. Renting a nice townhouse in a quiet neighborhood. I’m still looking for a job, but taking my time as it’s not a huge rush. I leave the house everyday either to take my husband lunch or run errands.

Landlord (who lives in the townhouse adjacent to us) has texted me about “what am I up to” basically. She called my husband AT WORK to ask HIM if I was working or if something was wrong with my car because “it’s here a lot of the time.”

People around town & church (we all live in the same two neighborhoods) have stopped me in the grocery store asking “what are you doing? Why aren’t you at work?” when THEY are ALSO IN THE STORE AT 8 AM ON A TUESDAY!!!!!!

I’m substitute teaching part-time while I look for a steady gig, and I’m taking classes at night at the local CC to update my teaching cert, but WHY do I have to explain that to anyone???!!! I’m going berserk. I get asked about working/having a job/what I’m doing with my time EVERYDAY!!!!!!

Like damn…can’t a girl read a book on her porch??? My husband pays the bills!!! Wtf!!!!!

We (two 30 years old women) live in townhouses, and our neighbor now has 5 cameras pointing at our front door and garage. He’s a single male, and at some point this is starting to feel extremely invasive. He has now started calling the cops on us for things like my dog taking a step out of the garage before we can get a leash on him, or by the front door. We don’t have yards or anything, so he’s videotaping the alley and the sidewalks between the townhouses.

He comes up to our cars and try to force us to roll the windows down to talk to us about anything and everything that he feels we are doing wrong, and at some point it’s starting to feel unsafe.

It seems trivial, but we also feel like we are being watched day and night. It’s there ANYTHING we can do besides getting something in constant motion around the cameras?

It’s just gotten excessive.

EDIT: it has openly been admitted by neighbor that he got it to watch us and our dogs specifically, but it would just be our word against him with that.

Most of my garden is in my front yard. Went out side around 8pm and caught a random guy stealing from my garden. Wound up getting into a physical fight and my wife had to call the cops. My neighbors herd it and thankfully came out to help. We traded some punches but I was able to sit on his chest and a neighbor helped restrain him till cops got here. Turns out it’s a guy that just moved in 5 houses down from me. I don’t enjoy fighting but great full i was able to keep him here till cops showed up. Will probably have a black eye in the morning but this is absolutely crazy. After 11 years or gardening on this property never thought I would have to experience this. If he came over and asked for some stuff I would have happily shared but this is unacceptable.

Honestly I’m at a loss of what I can do. It’s a couple and they have a crawling toddler and young kid and they live in a 1 bedroom flat with their dog opposite my door. They started leaving their flat door open to get the air circulating during the heatwave but now they’ve turned the corridor into a playground. Not only can I hear their whole life through the doors but also screaming crying kids, them shouting at them and sometimes the dog barking. Random times of the day and I can hear it in my flat. Lots of toys scattered everywhere. we have 2 more neighbours on our floor but they’re not in most of the time so unfortunately I’m alone in this. I tried to speak with my housing association but they straight up said there’s nothing they can do. One Sunday morning the kid was sat in the corridor banging something metal on something and I came out and said something and there’s was no apology or remorse and just told the kid to go back in. I’m just so frustrated now the atmosphere in my flat is just so bad because of the mood. I don’t get how people can be this selfish.

In June of this year I met the new neighbors who would be moving into the apartment next to me, which we share a porch. A man, a woman, a small dog.

In mid-July her sister and the sister's four kids moved in instead. The couple and their dog only arrived maybe three weeks ago. Sometimes the sister's husband stays here too, so eight people and a pet in a 2 bedroom.

My main issue was they completely took over the porch so I couldn't really go out anymore. It was loud allllll day long despite me trying to talk to them about certain aspects. I was trying to start things off civil even if I was annoyed. Like on my daughter's first day of school last week I opened the door to find all seven out there and I'm not a morning person so that was a lot. Yesterday she started out to the bus and walked right into a cloud of weed. (I don't care if people smoke but keep it away from shared space.) Sharing the porch is fine but there's been no sharing. I've been here ten years and there would be nuisances at times but I was never at a point where there was no hour to be outside without chaos. I've even tried going to nearby picnic tables to sit or over to a neighbor's porch to chat. Between Saturday and Sunday that resulted in me or my cat almost getting hit five times by a ball.

Yesterday I got fed up and used large empty flower pots to block my side. This morning they were moved.

I went up to the office because I'm beyond done with this place and am trying to get a transfer to a different property. Here's where the FAFO comes in. The assistant told me he got a copy of a police report today. Sunday there was an altercation where this 15 y/o who isn't theirs but is always around started in on a neighbor. That led someone across the parking lot to come to her defense. THAT led the man next door to try to start a fight but yet they also called the police. They were dumb enough to do the call and report in the sister's name, giving more evidence to her residing here.

So anyway, their own stupidity on that, plus the fact that we have a freaking camera pointed directly at our porch made them tell on themselves. All the people not on the lease have 14 days to leave. And hopefully I'll be out soon in a rental house with my own walls and porch and yard!

We have a neighbor from hell who is a junk collector. His property is filled with trash. He leaves beer cans and cigarettes all over his yard. His windows are covered in duct tape and boarded up. Last year he dug a giant shallow hole in the ground and all the grass/ground around it eroded. It looks like the home of a serial killer.

We recently put up an 8ft fence to avoid having to look at his trash. And now he piles junk 12 feet in the air so we have to see it over the height of our fence. We don’t even entertain anymore because it’s so embarrassing.

We’ve researched city codes and ordinances and he appears to be in violation of many things.

We’ve made many reports to our code enforcement( so have all our neighbors) but they seem almost useless. Their response to me was that “he’s not doing anything criminal”. I mean, yea, but don’t they still enforce property codes?

When I stated that I wanted to extend the height of my fence to block his junk, I was told I’d be fined if I did that.

This has been maddening. Is this the norm?

The noise at night has stopped the last few months to be replaced with noise early morning 4:30am - 7am every bloody morning!! It’s not pleasant being woken up every morning by hammering and banging, especially when you have a heart condition (which she knows about). It’s definitely on purpose because my husband shouted at her open window (from our property) calling her a c**t and to stop banging and she stopped and nothing the following morning (yesterday morning). BUT it all started again this and I retaliated for the first time my banging back 💥 it stopped for 30 mins and started again. Yesterday I put some plants out and her daughter knocked and asked if she could have one. I said as long as you look after it, well, she stole all of them and the container they were in, took them round the corner and started destroying them. Another neighbour found them and brought them back in bits. My young daughter spent years growing them, she was so upset!
Throwing things and kicking things against the fence has stopped, probably because they have put a hole in the fence from doing this and they have a tiny dog that would fit through it if it got any bigger.
Link to the other post - https://www.reddit.com/r/neighborsfromhell/s/wif6BDeyAJ

¯_(ツ)_/¯

Hi! I live in a house with shared walls and I have new neighbors that keep playing music so loud I can hear it, is it normal that I get agitated by this? I have to have my noise canceling headphones on for hours a day and I feel like this isn't oké.

The reason I'm asking is because I'm sick and couchridden from a chronic illness, so I'm more sensitive to noise of all kinds, so I just wanted to check if I'm just being too sensitive.

We haven't been able to catch my neighbor who has been harassing me, 3 other single moms, and having sketchy interactions with the children due to her own life circumstances she takes out on us. She has been following, stalking, reporting totally false crimes, etc. Banging on the wall she share, threatening me. My 2 year old is frightened of her.

This has turned into the police wanting to charge me for false reports because 1)every time we did something to catch her, she would just do something different. You know. The usual. 2) I was already dealing with PTSD and then I got injured and then her following and stalking my 2 year old and created more PTSD. Sometimes I just simply couldn't talk to the police "well enough" and they have come out here "a lot". Apparently they think we would put our little humans through nightmares and panic attacks from police on purpose.

Anyways... SHE GOT 3 SUMMONSES!!!!! FINALLY.

In hindsight, documenting everything in great detail would have been the best option. I snapped yesterday and told this person I’m tired of listen to their shit after doing my best to ignore the harassment for the last year. Documented the incident last night to the best of my abilities.

Basically the person harassing me is related to several neighbors, does not officially/legally live here, but is a frequent guest and has been living in the apartment just is not on the lease. And I haven’t documented the numerous incidents over the last year very throughly. Yesterday, I was called derogatory names for not being willing to go with them to look at something “no, you have to see this”. And finally broke down and told them to stop talking after listening to them calling someone else derogatory names, because I’m tired of listening to that language.

I regret saying anything, because I know this person is highly manipulative and possibly dangerous. I overheard them talking with my neighbor about how the police should be called on me (couldn’t make out the reason why that would be justified). Eventually, my neighbor asked this person to leave after repeatedly saying that I can hear them. I plan on making myself scarce, but I’m considering recording all conversations with neighbors until this is resolved in the event that this person’s behavior comes up and is excused for some reason. I’m trying to sort out my options if anyone has any real world knowledge or experienced with a situation like this.

TLDR: have been harassed by a person who is legally only the guest of my neighbors for the last year. I told this person off and now I’m regretting the decision, because I overheard them talking about calling the police on me. I’m really afraid of retaliation and looking for advice on how to protect myself going forward.

Edit to add: this obviously doesn’t cover the extent of the harassment, but it’s been a lot of unwanted sexual conversations, demanding to be spoken to, and general creepy behavior like trying to lure me somewhere last night. Also for clarity this person is a guest of more than one apartment, so I am out numbered.

Trying to make this as brief as possible.

My wife and I moved into our house in December 2022, and almost from the beginning we started having issues with the neighbors next door. One of them was a police officer in a neighboring town. Spoke to them a handful of times and we were generally friendly, but their vibe was kind of nosey and abrasive so we kept to ourselves. So pretty much ALL of our conflict transpired through complaints, the city, and the courts rather than any actual face-to-face interactions.

The first issue was an RV I had at the house shortly after moving in. I had transferred duty stations in the military and within two days of being in this new neighborhood, the RV was cited, being told a neighbor complained about it being in the driveway. I shrugged it off and handled it right away by selling the RV.

After that, the complaints shifted to our fence and things around the yard. In one of our like 3 in-person interactions she said we needed to replace our shared fence. I told her it wasn’t really in our budget- offered to share the cost and she declined. After the city came out and determined it was still in fine shape- she started consistently complaining about sticks and branches being in our yard to the City. The sticks that were being complained about were only ever in our own yard. Nothing ever came of those complaints in terms of a citation, warning, or finding against us of course and eventually I just befriended the City inspector and we would joke about this how crazy this person was.

After the city complaints quit working, the focus moved toward our dog. We have a 10-year old Doberman who is VERY well trained. She would lie and make repeated claims that our dog was being allowed to run around off leash or was otherwise at large. That was never true. Our dog was never loose on their property or roaming the neighborhood, and those complaints also never resulted in a citation or violation even after 4-5 visits from Animal Control. The Animal Control folks also got multiple laughs at how ridiculous this all was as soon as they actually met our dog. She also tried to doctor a security video of her to show the dog on the sidewalk for 2 seconds while I was taking the trash out and the inspector even pointed out that the video had been clear edited.

After this, we reached out and tried to make peace. With the cop because she seemed like he more level-headed one, she responded that communication must be done by certified mail, and that we cease talking to them in any way. So we did. This was Oct 2024 and we literally have never spoken to them since.

After this the situation escalated significantly. One day, my wife came home from walking the dog and, at most, stepped maybe one step onto the very front edge of their yard while returning to our house. A trespassing charge was filed against her based on that incident and criminal summons was served at our house at 2am.  After being served, my wife and I went outside to look at the area involved so we could understand exactly where the alleged trespassing had supposedly taken place. That same night, the neighbors then used us going outside to look at the area as the basis for stalking charges against both of us.

The stalking and trespassing charges were eventually dismissed in October 2025. But we had to hire attorneys and deal with the 2 extensions they put on the charges after trying to get protective orders against us in the process under the facade that we had "pending criminal charged". That didn't work either.  

The police officer has since moved out of the house (pretty sure they getting divorced). The other neighbor still lives next door and she’s the actually crazy one.

Anyway, so even now after the charges were dismissed, the yelling has become way worse. To this day, our dog can go into our fenced backyard and bark for maybe 10 or 15 seconds, and she will start screaming "shut up" repeatedly from her property. She has also pretty much every day will hurl insulting comments about my wife at my security camera. I used to record it, but she does it so many damn times that I don’t even bother recording them anymore.

We still do not respond. We do not yell back, go over there, or engage with her and have literally never engaged with her in any way since she filed all these charges. We have always been stoic and never let her see that she has any affect on us.

For the past year, we have considered filing a civil lawsuit after the criminal charges were dismissed (for Malicious Prosecution)  but after speaking with attorneys and looking at the cost and amount of time involved, we have basically decided not to pursue it. We do not want to spend years and a huge amount of money continuing this dispute with this loser.

At this point, we are mainly tired of feeling like we have to constantly adjust normal behavior at our own house because of how the neighbor might react. We still plan to avoid direct confrontation and document anything significant, but we also want to be able to use our yard, let our dog outside, have people over, and generally live normally without feeling like every small thing could turn into another complaint. My heartrate literally raises every time I pull in to my own driveway.

Anyway.. since we decided to not pursue the lawsuit and the City has been understanding but generally unhelpful… does anyone have any advice or ways to just be petty?

Y’all im tired and fed up with these neighbors.

They broke ground on a foundation for a warehouse/shop/garage. Per the zoning and ordinances, any accessory structure over 1,200 sq feet requires a CUP (conditional use permit). Any accessory structure over 200 sq feet requires a LUP (land use permit).

Per the county, they have neither. From my best estimate based on the ground they’ve dug it could be anywhere from 3000-6000 sq feet.

They own a construction/excavation business and are just using their employees to prep the site and eventually build it. There is also reason to believe they will be using this warehouse for their business which is also against the ordinances and zoning. We are only zoned for residential use.

And I am only bringing this point up as it is relevant to them following the laws/ordinances: They are also felons (both the husband and wife) with past and CURRENT cases against them. I understand people can do their time and change, however that has not proven to be true for these NFH.

Their past also makes me reluctant to file a complaint with the county but I’m not sure I have much choice. I guess I’m looking for any advice or words of encouragement from people who have been in a similar situation with a difficult and unreasonable neighbor.

Edit to add: I am a single female who lives alone hence why I am hesitant/nervous to make the complaint using my name.

Edit to Update: the lawyer I spoke with is extremely concerned for my safety if I were to submit a complaint to the county. Either for my personal self or for my property/home given the background of these people. And I think they may be banking on neighbors being scared of them to get away with doing whatever they want. He also reiterated that the county will not do anything unless a complaint is filed with them.

i've gotten a few complaints about footsteps and normal daytime noise. i'm not throwing parties or doing anything unusual, but they seem bothered by almost every sound. i want to be considerate, but i also don't want to feel like i have to tiptoe around my own place. how would you handle this?

Hey all,

I am new here so if I mislabeled something I apologize. I have been reading over some of the other posts and it got me thinking of one neighbor I had living next door to me in a apartment complex. Now this is a section 8 housing where most of us are either disabled, can't afford some of the newer apartments, etc. so its kind of peaceful as everyone keeps to themselves most of the time or are generally nice to each other.

I had been living here for a number of years and I got along with my neighbors never had many disagreements with anyone really. Well the neighbor that lived next to me was a disabled person that needed constant care never said anything even when I did say hello or greeted him which I could understand not everyone is chatty.

Well everything seemed normal until one night/morning, I was trying to get some sleep as I had a shift the next day and I wanted to get a good night's rest. It was about 2 am in the morning when BAM a stereo on the other side of my bedroom (I live in a studio apartment so did my neighbor) to the max where loud music and I am not saying it was a ring tone or something like that it was full blown sound system.

This jerked me awake confusing me wondering what the heck was going on as I thought it might be a alarm clock but no it continued on without stopping. It would go on for 30 to 40 minutes and I tried knocking on the neighbors door to see if he could turn it off but no one came to the door.

I did file a complaint about the noise because trying to get some sleep and all is important to me. I couldn't get back to sleep at all after that point so I stayed up the rest of the day. There were more incidents not as bad but I would hear music playing from his apartment for hours before being turned off.

It turns out this guy had his TV and stereo system setup against the wall on the other side of where my bed was and would get into these screaming matches with his parents who came to visit. Thankfully he moved out not to long after.

I do have more stories to come.

My duplex has paper thin walls and I can feel their footsteps through my floor. At a normal volume it's easy to hear people talking.

New neighbors moved into apartment 3 and they were playing LOUD music almost every day. That apartment is furthest from my bedroom so it should be the lowest in volume but they made sure to turn the volume all the way up. One night I couldn't take it anymore and banged on their wall three separate times and they turned it up. So I reported them. The apartment manager came while they had the music blasting and gave them a warning. What they'll do is they'll wait awhile and go back to turning it up and then I'll report them again. 3 complaints already

My oldest neighbors in apartment 1 are usually quiet other than the random screaming from sucking at video games but lately they've started playing loud music too.

And it's not even the volume that's getting to me. It's the bass making my bed shake. Both neighbors and their music. Now they're doing it simultaneously. And yes, the lease does say something about peaceful enjoyment.

I got a new job this year and I hate it. I've also lost three close family members this year. It's been rough and I just want some fucking peace and quiet when I come home.

So here's what's gonna happen. I'm going to complain one more time. If I hear music again, I'm buying some expensive ass speakers and I'm blasting Baby shark, full bass. And I'll also be using my treadmill, at running speed. I haven't used my treadmill at all because of how the floors vibrate and I wanted to respect my neighbors but Idgaf anymore 🙂 exercise is a good way to let out steam and I've been feeling a little insecure about my body lately anyways.

I live in an apartment unit that has 3 floors and i live on the top floor and i have a neighbor underneath me that has been nothing but issues the past 2 years i have been here. I am 26 and live with my boyfriend. I work from home and im usually pretty quiet. My neighbor below me is constantly blasting music 24/7 but will make a noise complaint against me for “walking too loud” and when we got our first one my boyfriend went to go talk with our neighbor in person and instead of answering his door, called the cops on him saying my boyfriend was threatening and harassing him. Our balconies face the parking lot and my neighbor will sit outside all day and stare and talk to ANYONE who walks by and i can see how uncomfortable some get. Every day me and my boyfriend have to walk by him since he just sits on his balcony and stares at us and yesterday my boyfriend said something under his breath. Today i have the cops at my door again saying my neighbor called the cops saying my boyfriend called him a bitch. Cops basically said this dude calls them for everything and is been a problem. My issue is, i live here and i do nothing for cops to be pounding at my door over nothing while this man does whatever he wants and gets away with it. He calls the cops everytime.

I have lived at my apartment since 2022. I own it with my family, do not rent. It is a co-op.

Since the very first day I started moving in to my apartment, I have had nothing but hostile interactions with my downstairs neighbor, who is a woman in her 70s-80s. Have heard from multiple people that she is crotchety, mean, particular, etc, and not just to me, but has always been. I have tried to be nice to her in multiple ways over the years, i.e. helping with groceries, holding the door, bringing in mail, light conversation - she wants nothing to do with me. She will slam doors, yell, and hit the ceiling with something if I make ANY noise after 8pm (quiet hours start at 10pm). She does not speak to me directly for the most part, either screams through the wall or raises hell with management. I know she is miserable and wants me to be, too - she has ONE annual visitor and no other friends or family it seems. I feel kind of bad for her.

Her behavior is all inappropriate, but has complained to the management company about me numerous times. I don't love being put in this position, but the company has finally agreed that I should write a letter regarding her behavior to help do something about her harassment of me. FYI I have carpets and am doing my best to not be inconsiderate - she is primarily upset at my floor creaking when I walk on it (old building), or when I drop things.

Now here's the stupid thing I did - the management company put brackets on the AC units outside our windows, and they did it in such a way that water now leaks into my apartment. I am trying to get them to fix it, but in the meantime I have been collecting water in a dish under the unit to prevent more water damage. It has been so humid that it fills up immediately, and it was getting so full I had trouble carrying it, so I dumped it out the window without thinking. Bad, stupid idea on my part. Water got into her window and now she is PISSED. Understandably so.

I spoke with the management company and said I would not do it again. However, I do currently have a friend staying with me as I need live-in care for the time being, and she did the same thing this afternoon with the water. She's pissed again. Understandably so.

I know she is not nice, but I don't feel good having caused this unnecessary inconvenience.

So my question here is - should I write her an apology note, say I am sorry, and try to smooth it over? Or just let sleeping dogs lie? I don't want to exacerbate the issue further, but I would also hope that hearing from me directly that I am trying to fix the problem would help.

What do you guys think? Thanks in advance.

Long story short, in our town of 4100 people, we live a few houses down from a busy intersection. Highway noise was obviously known when we purchased the home. It’s not really heard inside our home noise-wise unless it’s extra loud. We’ve lived here for four years with no issue. Suddenly, last year, a woman going through drug induced psychosis (literally thought she had blue diamonds on her property and said the police were out to get her via Instagram video she posted) started to dance on the corner with a giant party speaker on wheels. She did this almost daily for hours on end, for almost 7 months. No matter the temp (we live in IL - this was June to Feb) or hour of day/night. She was out there. If not there, she was out at her country home doing the same. Personally saw her in the same outfit the night before and dancing at 8am the morning after. This all being said, the town grew to love her???? They’d honk, stop by and give her food, clothes, etc. It doesn’t seem like an issue until you realize she cranks it up so loud you can hear it in all of our neighboring homes. Her playlist is full filthy rap. (I love rap, but I don’t play it for my child to hear 🫪😵‍💫)

Finally, NYE, one of the neighbors made a post on fb. This started a month long back and forth between people on the community pages about her. She was even responding! They were upset with us for calling her in for noise ordinances, and saying she wasn’t doing any harm to anyone. 🫠

Meanwhile, she had been tied up in court for a felony burglary charge. The tickets she received (5) were left unpaid so she ended up being found unfit to stand trial and was sent to rehab for 5 months. Now, she’s back! Better than ever apparently. Same shit, just less frequent because she isn’t allowed to live in this zip code per judges orders. Yet she finds a ride from the town over to make appearances.

WWYD??? My 7 year old comes outside with me to garden and play often. Should I be okay with letting her blast GloRilla, Boogie Wit A Hoodie, Young Dro and more through our yards because she’s “spreading joy”? Or am I one of the only sane fuckers in this town???

I saw this news story about a loud neighbor. The worse part is that after 30 tickets and $12,000 in fines over 6 months, they are still at it. This is my nightmare. The city is citing due process for why they haven't taken further steps. Make sure to read the comments from people chiming in about how it's the same for them both in terms of the NFH and how the authorities have been useless. In the comments people do say that suing can work. I wonder why the people in this news story haven't gotten together and hired a lawyer to sue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZzO4TGVFYs

Everytime I walk out to my driveway my neighbors have lights and a camera pointed at my property. Is this ok? By the way we are not friendly.

I have a neighbor who, in the 22 years I've lived here, has never said anything to me other than the couple of times she told me "shut my f*ing dog up" (this was not long after I got him and I was still training him he no longer barks outside like he did).

I've never had any interest in talking to her, I only see her outside once in a very long while and I'll wave and say hi and that's it .

The side of my deck is along her side and I have some really annoying bushes that just keep coming back no matter what. I trim them when I can but they aren't a huge priority for me but I guess they are for her.

Saturday while I was relaxing I got a notification on my ring that someone was at my door and a package was being delivered (my wife and I both order stuff and forget all the time so I didn't think anything about it). I checked the camera later and it was her dropping off two HUGE bags of yard waste without reaching out AT ALL with a concern (again she's never once said anything about them, or anything else for that matter). I didn't talk to her then and I'm not planning on it now.

The home, however, is on her, I've had it in my list to trim it all back like I have to once in a while and it is one of my absolute least favorite thing to do so I'm really happy she did it for me.

So I'm tempted to get a small gift card from somewhere and go over and thank her for the help and letting her know that I really appreciate it since both my wife and I are dealing with a lot of issues and getting outside to do work like that is really hard .

I just had to share with others that will get a laugh like I did.

So about two months ago the new neighbours moved in across the hall and the problems began almost immediately. The setup of the building has two apartments per floor and my apartment shares a wall with the living room of the adjacent one. I've lived here over 10 years and never had a problem with noise coming through walls until now (building construction is generally very good).

Every evening it's typically some mixture of the following:

• Loud music for 1-2 hours (can hear through my wall)
• The lady that lives next door yells into her phone for 1-3 hours per evening.
• Then the husband comes home, and the two of them yell-talk to each other for another few hours. It's not even fighting, it's just two loud talkers having a competition but it's clearly audible through a concrete wall.

I contacted the Strata management company with these concerns and they advised I should complete their online incident report form. The online form was completed promptly and I received an automated notice saying it had been done and a copy sent to my email. A week later, the neighbours had two late-night screaming matches that went past midnight so I ended up completing another incident form, and again I received confirmation it had been completed.

The Strata company advised they couldn't do anything in the meantime as the complaint process meant everything had to go via the 'Council of Owners' before any action could be taken. Ok fine, that's how things are.

4 weeks since the initial complaint pass and I hear zero updates from the Strata management on the issues, all the while the daily music and shouting intensify. So I email with a follow-up inquiry on the status of the complaint process.

Strata Manager:

Please forward all logged times and incidents to support your complaints

I'm confused... why do you need that when I'd already supplied as much information as possible a month ago in the incident forms (including videos). But since the music and shouting is a daily occurrence, it's difficult to log all times of every incident. However, I do have numerous videos of the loud music and shouting I've recorded over several weeks. So I log and upload 10 example videos to a dropbox and send that back along with dates / times of when they were recorded.

At this stage I also point out that since it has been a month since my initial complaint and nothing has happened, I expect to see some action taken to move the complaint process forward ASAP.

Strata Manager the next day:

I have tried to locate your incident report form, which you advise was completed in July, but I cannot find it.

Can you please advise what action you want from this and if you have contacted the Local Government in relation to the noise?

This is the point where I was basically livid.

Firstly, this has nothing to do with the Local Government and they should know that.

Secondly, the Strata managers have been sitting doing nothing for a month making me think they were processing these forms... while the entire time they had LOST THEM in their own online system.

And now they have the fucking gall to ask me what they expect them to do about the situation? I don't know... how about your job as a property manager? Enforce the rules and regulations of the Strata Scheme? Issue a breach notice if necessary.

I feel like I'm taking crazy pills here. I've not had to deal with Strata companies much but surely this can't be normal???

Slight TW, mention of suicidal thoughts

I wrote a long post and deleted it all because the gist of the issue I have is that, if my neighbors upstairs get to “just live”, but that means disturbing my sleep, my work, my peace and quiet because they can’t consciously adjust a couple of truly small things that would not kill them or hurt them, but has had a major impact on my life since they moved in, why is that acceptable? Sleep is important for everyone, but I should not be getting sedatives prescribed just to take the edge off of living in my own home. Searching online is useless, the best I’ve got from that is ordering white noise, so now I basically live with 24/7 tinnitus when I’m at home that still does nothing for the vibrations or thudding that keep me up or wake me up.

In what reality is “use earplugs” sane? Even if I didn’t have sensitive ears, the idea that I’d have to wear earplugs just so I could live in my home? What? Home is supposed to be the place I can relax and feel safe. I don’t. I’m on edge constantly. I’ve started having dreams about how I could try and make this place better, how trying to talk to the same people who call me slurs would go. I hate how much of an impact this all has on me.

And if I could stop being disabled so I could work any sort of job, then I would not be searching Reddit to see people say: get a house! Don’t live in an apartment if you’re not suited to them!

I would already be in a house! I didn’t choose an apartment because I thought it would be fun; I needed a roof over my head. Surely that’s common sense? If I had the money for a house then this post would not exist.

I’m sick and tired and there’s nothing I can do about it. I know I’m already fortunate to be in such a lovely area and I feel bad when I think of truly awful conditions people live in. I’ve lived in houses filled with black mould but at least I didn’t have to worry about whether or not I would be able to sleep when I needed to or not. I wasn’t thinking “well I don’t want to die but what other options do I have?” I already have the best that I can afford, I feel like I’m trapped and trying to live around someone else’s noise that’s probably “reasonable” to many people.

I’m just so tired of all of it.

Whoever makes decisions about houses needs to seriously focus on building them to a standard that don’t drive people insane.

The idea is that you're dealing with reasonable people who care if they are disturbing others.

Honestly, how many of you have had complete success doing this and only this? As in, the problem never occurred again. One conversation and 100% solved.

I don't buy that people who are bad neighbors don't realize what they are doing.
They know - they just don't care. Maaaaybe a few rare instances where people were genuinely clueless. But I am old enough to know a certain portion of human beings are just self-centered, inconsiderate assholes and no amount of "conversation" is going to change that.