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Confrontation with Upstairs Neighbor SOLVED! (LOCK PLEASE)
THEPAIN73
Shiny.Real shiny.Registered User regular
Shiny.Real shiny.Registered User regular
I live in a two floor apartment place with my girlfriend. A few nights ago (Thursday) around 9:50, our upstairs neighbor was being very loud. It sounded like there were many people and we could hear people yelling and slamming doors. At around 11:10 I was sick of it and decided to call our apartment's noise police.
Our apartment place has an on call noise officer to help keep people from being too loud. I called them left them a message and they took care of it.
Fast forward to today:
I just got back from shopping with my girlfriend and this guy gets out of his car and comes up to us saying he is my upstairs neighbor. He stops me and starts talking to me about the noise complaint I called on him. Saying how if he gets too loud then tap the roof with a broom or something and don't call the noise police on him.
I tried walking away and telling him I was "just going to go inside" and he stopped me again repeating what he had said before and explaining that it was just his cousin and him that night and he had just gotten back from Chicago so he wasn't in the wrong. I unwillingly heard him out and walked inside and right now I feel like he was confronting me and it could have gone a lot worse.
My question is: Who should I contact about this because I feel like he was telling me "don't call the police OR ELSE". I dunno, does anyone have any experience with weird/confrontational neighbors?
Should I tell the apartment? Or the police? I just don't know what to do. I mean the guy knows where we live and knows what car we own now. I just feel threatened.
Our apartment place has an on call noise officer to help keep people from being too loud. I called them left them a message and they took care of it.
Fast forward to today:
I just got back from shopping with my girlfriend and this guy gets out of his car and comes up to us saying he is my upstairs neighbor. He stops me and starts talking to me about the noise complaint I called on him. Saying how if he gets too loud then tap the roof with a broom or something and don't call the noise police on him.
I tried walking away and telling him I was "just going to go inside" and he stopped me again repeating what he had said before and explaining that it was just his cousin and him that night and he had just gotten back from Chicago so he wasn't in the wrong. I unwillingly heard him out and walked inside and right now I feel like he was confronting me and it could have gone a lot worse.
My question is: Who should I contact about this because I feel like he was telling me "don't call the police OR ELSE". I dunno, does anyone have any experience with weird/confrontational neighbors?
Should I tell the apartment? Or the police? I just don't know what to do. I mean the guy knows where we live and knows what car we own now. I just feel threatened.
THEPAIN73 on
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He is trying to circumvent that resource because he plans to do this again in the future. I would contact your apartment manager and tell them what happened. "This guy confronted me saying that next time I should talk to him instead of using the pre-planned channels that I agreed to when I signed my lease." Then the next time hes loud? Just call the police on him. If he then comes to talk to you and says you shouldn't call the police..
Call the police again and report him for that
Good luck!
The noise complaint service is there for this reason. I shouldn't be the one to tell him to shut up. Our office wants us to use the noise police service.
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But it sounds like he may have been vaguely threatening to it's probably best in this instance to contact the apartment management people.
Next time you have noisy neighbors consider asking them face-to-face to quiet down first.
As is your right to do whatever feels right to you. To be honest I get the sense you took his words out of context, I don't think there was an "or else" in there because if there was you probably wouldn't be in any doubt about it.
There is no right way to handle this, personally I think your actions should depend on his next move. Next time this happens throw him a bone and ask him to be quiet. If he is polite about it and lowers the noise then fine, no harm no foul and he doesn't get another black mark on his record. If he abuses this privilage then screw him and call the noise police, he signed a lease agreeing to the terms and you aren't in the wrong for doing what you did.
In a perfect world you could just rely on the noise police to solve this problem but in reality it's better to get on with the people who live around you if at all possible, because like you said, he knows where you live and there are a lot of crazies out there.
This.
I would've refused to bang on my ceiling, and that I'll knock on his door if he's making to much noise, and if you continue after that I'll call the police. He's not the one running things, the apartment place is.
People get loud on occasion. Whether it's music, chatting with friends, talking on the phone, or whatever, and it's always mind-boggling to me that people go through third parties to tattle on neighbors instead of just manning up, acting like an adult, and requesting a little peace and quiet.
He was in the wrong for being loud, sure, but you're in the wrong here for acting like he's harassing you for introducing himself to you and simply asking you just ask him to turn it down on the volume the next time he's making too much noise for your comfort.
This is pretty much what happened when I had a similar problem - the first time, I talked to him and all was well. The second time, I talked to him and he grudgingly stopped while giving me a death glare as the door closed. The third time, he ran outside and started screaming as soon as he heard me slam the door (3 AM on a Sunday, WTF) and walk upstairs. Every other time...screw that, we called the cops the instant he was breaking the town noise laws.
Eventually the manager got sick of hearing from the cops (among other things) and had him evicted - the final time was so bad the police dispatch could hear it over the phone, loud music and what sounded like a drunken wrestling match with people being slammed on the floor.
You say this like it always works to just "man up" and talk to the person. Maybe you've been lucky, of which i'm envious, but it's not always smiles and understanding - maybe it will be just an isolated thing, but if not, there's no reason to let it continue when his complex has a set procedure for dealing with such things.
Say what you will, but the OP is not even remotely in the wrong here - these kind of things are written into leases and local laws for a reason, and stuff like "Me and my cousin just got back from Chicago" is probably not in there as an exception. If the neighbor can't handle what's written in the lease he agreed to, that's his problem. Give him one more chance if you're feeling really generous, but after that, screw him.
The idea is that by going over the first time you may have more luck talking to the person than calling management without giving them a chance to quiet down. It is passive aggressive to skip talking to your neighbor before going to management the first time you have a problem. It's too late for the OP now but unless you're hearing something that makes you fear for your safety, and especially if it's just some loud noises and you ignore it for over an hour before doing anything, then you should just talk to your neighbor (and do it when the noise begins).
I apologize if I gave an impression otherwise, but I don't think he should have skipped talking to the person the first time either
As you say though, it's too late now anyway, and it sounds like the neighbor hasn't exactly handled things in a very encouraging way so far - the guy should have apologized for what happened, and not made his demand for the OP to ignore his complex's rules.
I could inform my upstairs neighbors that banging a broom on the floor will be the "new way we do things" if i'm blasting music late at night, and they might even agree if they think i'm threatening, but that still doesn't mean they might not get fed up and call the police anyway - upon which i'd be up a creek since there are multiple warnings about excessive noise written into our lease and the condo bylaws.
In a perfect world, going to talk to someone would be the best course, but unfortunately some people were raised without social skills or worse. So instead of respecting the OP, they continue to make noise, attack him/his GF, etc. While unlikely, that's why the apt. building put a buffer in place - to create an authority figure for the noise maker to direct their (possible) hostility towards.
In this case since he knows it was you already, I would give him one chance and stop up there if it happens again.
Yes. If the complex has a service in place, then any tenant is fully within their rights to go straight to the complaint department every single time. No exceptions. But it's much easier to foster good neighbourly relationships if you give them the courtesy of a face-to-face the first time around. If the very first contact a neighbour has from you is through a third party who is there to filed a complaint, there's a very high chance you're not going to get along.
And about the passive aggressive thing, totally true. It's like leaving a note for your roommate instead of just telling them they need to wash their own dishes. And it's unavoidable because even if you don't mean to be passive aggressive (perhaps you just like working through official channels), it comes off as such. Always much better to try and work things out the first time and then fall back on complaints if they prove they just don't give a shit about you.
I've done the same thing, PAIN. Called the non-emergency police line on my neighbor, and that solved the problem.
People often don't realize how loud they're being.
There have been several "my neighbor is making noise" threads recently and advice in all of them have gone the route VoC was getting at. In every thread, the guy who runs directly to the landlord instead of first talking to the neighbor was deemed an asshole. Only when it became an issue with any sort of frequency did people suggest going to the various levels of authorities.
You should have cowboyed up and talked to him first. Calling in a noise complaint without talking to the people first is a pretty dick thing to do.
Next time you see him apologize for overreacting and get his number so you can just call him if shit's getting too loud. Noise is something that comes with living in an apartment and so is actually dealing with other people.
If you call the cops about a neighbor using non-threatening language and a forceful tone, it's just going to make your living situation more hostile.
In our old place we kept hearing this loud thumping and after 30 minutes we were going nuts. So we knocked on their door. Turns out they were playing rock band and had no idea we heard the thumping. They stuck some towels underneath and it was fine. And it was fine right then, we didn't have to wait for management to tell them to stop whenever they got around to it.
And these aren't the only times I've done this. I've lived in apartments for 6 years and have always been on good terms with my neighbors. Have I had neighbors who apologized and didn't mean it and kept being little shits? Sure, and after giving them a couple chances we went to management. But I'll still always go to the neighbor first because it's usually faster and easier to solve a problem that way. And I hope it means that if I'm ever too loud they'll give me the same consideration.
Secondly, a good neighbor would have simply suggested that if you would like him to keep it down, another solution would be to contact him directly...but would have left it up to you to make the decision.
If he was being more direct and said, "Use a broom. Don't contact the police." I would assume that he's trying to intimidate you.
Next time, knock on his door and say he's being too loud. If he's an asshole at the door and the noise continues, call in and complain. But if you "hide" in your room and try to anonymously call in, and your neighbour finds out, he's going to be pissed. Anyone would be, and so would you.
Act like an adult next time. People get noisy sometimes.
Exactly!
Not three hours ago, our next door neighbor had the bass on her TV turned up to 11 - or at least that's what it sounded like to us. Dru walked over, knocked on the door and she apologized profusely because she didn't realize how well the bass carried through thin apartment walls and resonating wood floors.
Now if she hadn't answered the door, or if it had been a multi-day problem where she didn't do anything to fix the noise or had just blown us off when we asked her to turn the bass down a bit, then would be an appropriate time to escalate to the landlord, or to non-emergency police.
Part of being an adult and sharing housing spaces with other people is having the nuts to go upstairs and talk to them first, giving them the chance to apologize and you the opportunity to feel better about your neighbors. Taking it to the landlord, or the police, first thing just kind of makes you a jerk.
If they're having a get together once in a blue moon, and things get a little noisy, just let it slide. When it becomes a regular occurrence late a night on a weeknight, go knock on the door and ask them to keep it down. When it becomes a regular occurrence, and they won't listen to your requests, that's when you involve the "noise police."
If your first reaction to anything involving another human being is "call the authorities" when talking to them instead wouldn't put you in any real danger, that's just childish. Don't be surprised if your neighbours are hostile/cold to you when you act like that.
And Pain, how "threatened" do you actually feel? Be honest, here. The guy was clearly annoyed that you called in a complaint, so his tone was probably less than friendly. Did he actually say anything threatening? You can't "imply" threat. You were either threatened, or you weren't. It sounds like he came up to you and told you to just let him know next time instead of calling in a complaint, and he'd be quiet. Your response was to say, "I'm going inside" and walking away? Yeah, I'd be a bit taken aback by that response as well and would want to re-iterate my request.
You said "he was confronting me" like that's a bad thing? Yes, he was confronting you. You should have confronted him on Thursday night, and this whole unpleasant business of talking face-to-face with your upstairs neighbour would have been avoided.
The cops will probably not issue a ticket or anything even if they're called. Three years at this job, and I've only seen a cop get close to issuing a noise ordinance ticket once, and that's because the occupant of the noisy unit was being incredibly rude to the cop. And he didn't issue one even then! You're probably not fucking over your neighbors by calling in a complaint on them.
If, for some reason, you don't want to confront your neighbors directly, calling security or the cops doesn't make you an asshole. The proper channels are called such for a reason.
That being said, I go over and talk to my neighbors if they're being too loud. No sense bothering the cops if I can get them to be quiet myself.
PS4:MrZoompants
To the OP: without going into the sordid business of sorting out who's being a dick for doing what, which is pointless anyway, I'll agree with those that suggested trying to handle this in person initially. You have more to gain by doing so than you have to lose. It's not exactly impossible for your neighbour to be incredibly irritating while still technically being within the rules of the building, or at least without you being able to do a whole lot about it. If it doesn't work out, the appropriate channels still exist - for what they're worth: you're better off avoiding having to rely on them. OTOH, like Improvolone says, there's always the possibility you'll be in the wrong at some point - probably inadvertently, but that doesn't matter. I don't think you'd appreciate a neighbour calling the cops or some other authority on you the first time that happens either.
I've lived in apartments for almost 10 years. I live in a house now, but I have adjoining neighbours on two sides and a third across a fairly small patio. Trust me when I tell you it's not worth it not to try and solve things amicably and courteously first.
Why don't you talk to him? if necessary, apologize and let him know you will follow some etiquette next time. It is better to get alone and avoid having enemies where you live.
It might have been nice if you'd asked him to turn down the volume if it was a first offense, but you aren't obligated to. The service is presumably something you pay for, and using it does not make you passive-aggressive. It's not like you left a sarcastic note on the door for him to find. If the guy had been a little nicer about it when he talked to you, perhaps actually apologetic for causing a problem, I would be much more likely to try to talk to him first in the future. If he's going to chase you down in the parking lot instead of knocking on your door like a civilized human being, I would probably go out of my way not to interact with him in the future.
This is the right post, right here. The OP did nothing wrong. You're not a dick and it wasn't a dick move, OP. If dude has a problem with being told he's being too loud by the apartment management, then he should go out of his way to be as respectful as possible to his neighbors from now on.
In addition, I would never approach a neighbor I didn't already know pretty well late at night when it sounds like they might be drunk. If I already had a good relationship with that neighbor, that is one thing, but it doesn't sound like the OP did.
however
while i wasn't there, it doesn't sound like he did anything threatening when approaching you. i mean, "i sought a third party to mediate something and i was then approached afterwards" isn't exactly... menacing. he 'insisted' on continuing the conversation sounds a lot like he walked backwards and went 'hey, man, please let's finish talking about this'
i mean
he should respect your boundaries and you're not beholden to talk with anyone you don't want to, so he was wrong for pressing the conversation
but 'threatened' sounds like a big, big leap
so i'd advise you to relax
I have lived in places with problematic and loud neighbors, it really depends on how much you know about them whether I'd go talk to them. If it's accidental, and it's not often, just go knock on the door.
If it's all the time, or if they have a lot of people coming and going from their place at odd hours or look shady? Call the noise patrol.
Sure you could use the service to get him to be quiet.
But that takes time.
All you need to do is tap on the ceiling and the sound will stop.
I have no idea why this is even a thing.
Satans..... hints.....
Jesus where the hell do you live that this is a concern, Bridgeport?
There was no chasing down or big lead up. They were both either coming or going. The guy happens to see the OP in the parkinglot and instead of making a big deal by going to his door specifically later, decides to quickly handle it there, which any reasonable person would have done. I'm not surprised at all that he may have had some frustration in his tone, especially after OP tries to just walk away without even acknowledging what was said.
"Hey, whatsup man. I have work in the morning, is it cool if you guys keep it down?"
Most people are pretty reasonable. I wouldn't have threatened you, but I was in the same situation as this guy a few times. We never even had a party in our apartment, but people were always calling the cops on us for noise complaints instead of walking ten feet and talking to us about it like we were reasonable people.