1, 2, 3, 4 - I declare a stereo war

[baratron]

We are currently having a stereo war with our next-door neighbours. It's extremely passive-aggressive on my part, but I'm entirely lacking the energy for confrontation.

The way it's going is that our next-door neighbours keep putting on inappropriately loud music at annoying times of day. Like 4 o'clock in the afternoon or 10 at night. This is particularly selfish, as they have neighbours on both sides. Also, they have (imo) appalling taste in music - most of what they play is the stuff that's currently called "R&B". So I can have coming through my wall just the same 3 or 4 notes repeated over and over as the bass throbs through.

So I put on our stereo instead, usually with something fairly obnoxious. Like Paradise Lost (doom goth metal/synth crossover), Punk covers of Pop songs (Britney Spears & Backstreet Boys done punk-style), or Richard Cheese (lounge & big-band covers of rock, metal and rap songs). Not extremely loud like theirs, just loud enough to say "hey, if you can hear my stereo, then I can hear yours". Generally speaking, within 5 minutes of me doing this, their stereo gets turned down to a sensible volume. Result.

It's obviously not a very good result, though, because I have to keep doing it. Now, I quite like music, especially when I'm doing housework. so it's no skin off my nose. Plus we have no neighbours on the other side, so no one's being inconvenienced except the offenders. But I'm wondering what the best thing to do long-term would be, as they're just Not Getting the hint.

Write a letter to the neighbours? (made awkward by the fact I have no idea what their names are or how long they're going to be living there). Write to the letting agents? Write to the local papers? Or the council noise-prevention people? Or all of the above? Note that I really am not up to going next door and reasoning rationally at the moment - my nerves are all frayed by being ill.

Comments

[ceno.livejournal.com]

Urgh, stereo wars. I've had to play loud doof-doof in order to shut the guy upstairs up many a time.

[ceno.livejournal.com]

Also, if you don't have the punk cover of the Ghostbusters theme you really must hear it :)

[baratron.livejournal.com]

Heh, who's it by?

Do you fancy coming round one of these days? I'm mostly at home, it's not THAT hard to get to. Trains are every 15 min from Waterloo. I could probably manage to walk up to Norbiton station to meet you. You said you could use a chat...

[ceno.livejournal.com]

It might be by NoFX but the mp3 was sent to me tagged as 'punk covers' so I'm not entirely sure. Tainted Love's another good cover, but I don't know who did that.

Yep, I'd like to come over one day... perhaps next week or the week after, depending on when we're both free and how I'm feeling. It'd be really good to see you as it's been aaaaages.

[quiet000001.livejournal.com]

You have punk backstreet boys?

Also, if you contact the council, they'll probably be fairly polite and follow it up as necessary. If you don't feel up to confrontation, that's probably what I would do. (Unless you want to try just popping a note through the letterbox first- "could you try to remember to keep the volume on the stereo down please, particularly at these hours, thanks, number ")

[baratron.livejournal.com]

At least one of the songs is. Um. "I Want It That Way"? Some of the others might be BB too, I didn't recognise that many of the originals. Can fairly easy run off a CD of them, though it'll take a bit of effort.

You need to email me your address, btw, as I can't find the envelope from your Christmas card and I have to go to the Post Office tomorrow in any case.

[johnckirk.livejournal.com]

Yup, the note thing is probably a good idea. That's what I did with my (previous) upstairs neighbour a few months ago, after he played loud music late at night:

"To 10B, Please could you turn off your radio/TV after midnight (or use headphones) - at the moment the noise is keeping me awake, so I didn't get to sleep until 5am last night. Thanks, John (10A)"

This solved the problem; I'm assuming that he just didn't realise that the sound was carrying. In your [baratron's] case, maybe the neighbours think that your house is empty in the afternoon (if most people are out at work)? That could explain why they respond to your music, if it's a case of "Oops, they are in, I'd best turn the volume down a bit".

That said, I'd tried to talk to him before I sent the note, and hadn't been able to. When I had similar problems with flatmates a few years ago, they felt that I hadn't made enough of an effort to talk to them about the problem before I contacted the authorities; fortunately, I was able to move out a few months later. In this case, if the neighbours own their house, you may be stuck next door to them for a long time, in which case it's probably best not to get into a feud now.

[baratron.livejournal.com]

They're tenants, and the landlord doesn't much care about the house. I know this, because of the state of the garden 11 months out of 12, and the fact he comes to see it about once a year - immediately before the tenants move out.

Having a hideous, overgrown garden piled up with litter next to ours bothers me, especially in the summer when the rubbish smells. These tenants are slightly better than the last lot about actually tying up their rubbish bags, however.

[thekumquat.livejournal.com]

Try a nice note first - the council will ask if you have before they do anything.

[esbat.livejournal.com]

Yeah, good idea. Neighbour situations can get ugly very quickly if you try to involve an outside party like the council.

[baratron.livejournal.com]

How about an outside body like the letting agents?

The other thing these tenants are doing that's pissing us off is sitting upstairs and smoking out of the front room window. If we have our windows open, the smoke blows straight in. Now, I know they're not allowed to smoke in the house because the previous tenants always went into the garden to do so. I really don't think it's appropriate for us to talk to the tenants directly about that..?

[lizw.livejournal.com]

Well, the previous tenants might just have gone outside because they didn't like their flat to be smelly and/or because making that rule for themselves helped them to cut down. sgloomi has started doing it for those reasons, for instance. Why wouldn't it be appropriate to talk to them directly, though? I know on the odd occasions when our neighbours have had issues with us, I've always preferred the ones who came to the door and asked politely to the ones who sent notes (especially anonymous ones) or threatened to go to the Council straight away.

[esbat.livejournal.com]

It's a difficult one. I've seen these kinds of things more often than I'd really like and it rarely ends well. The noise issue is usually slightly more fruitful because you have the possibility of agreeing on certain times during which neither of you play loud music.

People tend to get very defensive when you try to modify their behaviour in what they consider to be their personal space. It's an acute problem with living in a flat where your neighbour's behaviour is much more likely to be intrusive. In a house, that's usually less of an issue. IMHO, the only people who should live in flats are hard-of-hearing, easy-going, heavy sleepers who don't like music. ;)

So what I can see happening in your situation is that the tenants downstairs feel under seige from your complaints, things escalate but finally they comply, then they find somewhere else to live and drive you bonkers during their last month by exaggerating everything you complained about in the first place.

Realistically, the best you can achieve here is not for them to stop doing everything that annoys you, but for you to get a dialogue going that sweet talks them into giving some ground. Easier said than done. If you involve an outside body it's likely they'll feel you're attacking them and unless they're very reasonable people, things will get nasty. The letting agent has the power to kick them out, so also the ones most likely to scare them into making your life hell.

I still think your best option is to open a dialogue in a friendly "oh, we'd be ever so grateful, what with ." Milk it basically. If you can't do it face to face, then do it with a letter.

Oh and also, you probably think you're model neighbours towards them and perhaps you are, I have no idea, but be prepared to change something you do even if only as a token because there may be something you do that annoys them. If so, you have a much better bargaining position.

And sorry if any of this is pointing out the obvious or being patronising. :)

[emperor]

IMLE, the Council people will want you to have asked them a couple of times to be more considerate before they'll consider taking action.