The apartment next to me is apparently under construction, though I can’t see it from the street. They start every morning before 8 and work until about 4pm, even on the weekends. This is a crowded area; apartments are a few meters apart. I’m sure the noise is disturbing dozens of families and personally I can’t sleep, study, or Skype.
Does anyone know if there are laws against noise pollution? Does anyone have experience reporting this kind of thing to a landlord or the police? Do people who use a jackhammer at 8am on a Saturday get the death penalty?
There are laws that are sometimes enforced but I don’t think you’ll have much luck with noise during the daytime. If it happened late at night you may have a case but if it’s stops by 4pm there’s probably not much you can do.
Apparently they’re not allowed to make a racket on Sundays or evenings, and there are prescribed dB limits for noise levels. However, what’s written on paper and what actually gets enforced are two different things, especially where building companies are concerned because “they are important to the economy” (ie., they are run by politically-connected crooks). There are protest banners next to a construction site near my place, where the builders are apparently flouting the law and driving everyone crazy.
OTOH … if it’s just some guy fiddling about moving walls inside his apartment (WTF do people feel the need to do that?) then you can talk to the building supervisor or the area/community manager (you might need to talk to the locals to find out who the community manager is … but there will be one, and they’re usually pretty good). Talking to the police isn’t likely to get you anywhere.
Can anyone tell me where to find those noise regulations online? (Doesn’t have to be in English.)
I’ve just moved to a new apartment that’s adjacent to a hotel with what appears to be a large (and really noisy) central air-condidtioning system on its roof.
I’m on the tenth floor, about 3 or 4 floors above the noisy air-cooling system
There’s constant loud drone day and night - it’s almost as if there were a plane parked outside preparing for take-off.
If the noise levels are illegal, I might as well try to get something done.
I am aware that even in the unlikely event that I am able to get something done about the problem, it is not gonna be soon, and so other courses of action I’m considering in the meantime are:
(1) Moving out. I’m only renting, so I can always move if the problem can’t be solved. As far as I understand, I’d just lose the one month’s rent that I paid in advance if I broke the contract.
(2) Requesting the landlord to replace the windows on the side where the noise is worst (which are pretty old anyway, and not easy to slide).
I don’t expect he’d want to spend the money on double glazing, but 7mm glass with new, well-sealed frames would, I’m sure, make a difference.
(3) Putting some sound-absorbing foam (like this: goods.ruten.com.tw/item/show?11090401333691)up on the walls and ceiling of the rooms where noise is bad.
As I understand, this will reduce the noise in those rooms, since there won’t be any sound bouncing around off the hard surfaces.
Anyone ever tried it?
Noise cancellation headphones. It’s a constant drone - so in theory, they should work well. But WCIF them?
My downstairs neighbor thinks I’m too noisy too, since I’m often up at night (though I do try to be quiet and I’m not having parties or listening to loud music or anything — usually I’m just at my computer working). I previously mentioned him here:
I don’t want to cry xenophobia when it might well not be that, but the guy certainly does seem to like complaining. I think I humored him too much in the past and tried to be accommodating to his complaints and help solve them. That seemed to make things worse rather than better though.
A couple of months ago he sent me a Line message (subsequently recalled) threatening to go to the police then sue me for damages over the apparent noise. I was half-tempted to just tell him to call the police whenever he thinks it’s happening so they can come out with a noise meter or their own ears and see how loud I’m being, because I’m fairly confident I’m not doing anything illegal.
In the end I just forwarded a screenshot to my landlady, who contacted his landlord or the building manager. This happens to be the police or some members of the local police station or something through some arrangement I don’t really understand, so the police called me back.
Fortunately (and surprisingly), both my landlady and the police took “my side”, saying that he has a habit of complaining, I should basically ignore him, and they’ll have a word with him. My landlady also apparently said that if he tried to sue me she’d sue him back, so that was nice.
No idea if he’s also complaining about the bloody jackhammers and drilling often starting at 8 a.m. somewhere close by in the neighborhood.
To be fair, literally every single family and friend I know hat lives in an apartment and nt ground floor has the same issues wih neighbors. Ts just gonna happen when hard ckncrete boxes halouse loads of people together in small areas. It sucks, but it isn’t a foreigner thing. My wife’s mother has a 20 year cold war with 2 of her neighbors over this lol. It’s why I left the connective housing realm haha. I hate bitchy people, nevermjnd ones living about 30cm away from me wih hard concrete being the only barrier.
