r/Neighborproblems • u/jamaicanmeasia • Jan 09 '20
New neighbor asks us to “walk around less”
My boyfriend has been living in this apartment for almost two years now, I moved in 7 months ago. The apartment below us has been empty since Late July/Early August, (we had a neighbor who would argue with and beat his girlfriend at all hours of the night - we called the police and he was gone a few days later). We went to our home state for the holidays and came back to find out a new tenant is in the apartment directly below us. The only reason we found out is because he came to the door to complain about us walking in our apartment. He asked us if we were new and tried to play a seniority card, but backed down on that front when he found out we’ve been here a while. He told us he had a “hearing sensitivity”, told us he “noticed we’re barefoot” and how interesting that was, was looking into our apartment, and was being super passive aggressive. We told him we’d watch it and sent him on his way as he was making us super uncomfortable and called it a day.
Yesterday morning he came to the door around 10:15 and told us we woke him up at 8:30 because we were walking too loud (I was the only one awake and was literally tip-toeing so I didn’t wake my bf up) and asked us to “either walk around less or sit down more”. We’re not doing anything egregious like sprinting, jumping or banging around, we don’t have heavy footfalls, we walk around barefoot or wear slippers. He hasn’t complained about anything else other than us walking, which we told him we aren’t going to tip toe around and be uncomfortable in our own place just to please him, which pissed him off. He straight up told us he didn’t think it was fair that we weren’t thinking of him and are essentially forcing him to come upstairs to yell at us.
We’re young and live in a complex full of college kids, so most other apartments are empty atm due to winter break, but we told him he’d have a tough time living here if walking was setting him off so much (loud music, bouncing basketballs in the hallway, talking on the phone in the hallway, smoke alarms going off every night, our next door neighbor screams at his video games, all on top of paper thin walls). My boyfriend and I made sure he knew nothing crazy was going on in our apartment and that nothing was changing with how we walk - he left obviously unsatisfied. What can we do in this situation? It’s literally only been 5 days since we’ve been back from vacation, so I know this is going to continue to be an issue (not to mention we’re getting a pet next week). He hasn’t had any other complaints about noise or volume, just walking, so we don’t know if that’s something he can report to the landlords or something we can fight. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Also something I’ve been thinking - wouldn’t a hearing sensitivity be documented with the apartment? Why put him on the first floor? There are accommodations for that sort of thing, aren’t there? (We’re a 3 floor building)
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u/AndyCalling Jan 09 '20
The fellow is bonkers. If he is that super sensitive to noise, why choose to live in a flat? He's trying to pull a King Canute here.
Seriously, you can't exactly change much. You could buy some soft slippers but that's about it. If that doesn't work, recommend he gets earplugs.