Noise Disturbance policy

Noise disturbances may fall outside of the HOA's responsibility. It's more of a "Police" issue than HOA. It's one of those good ideas that practice isn't.

The rules we had were in regards to the pool area and contractors. We had a no noise after 10PM at the pool area. Which basically was the time we closed the pool. The contractors such as lawn care couldn't start work until after 7 am and be done by 5 pm. This was the only real noise control issues we documented. Othewise, individual member noise levels were referred to the police.

Can anyone else provide the benefit of their experience on this? Many thanks!!!

Hi Robert:

Call the police and get this documented. Continue to call the police so you will have support. Provide these police reports along with a digital recording of the noise, the time, and how long it lasted, to the board in a certified letter. Most cities have multi-family noise laws. The cover everything from barking dogs to vibrations (from a old HVAC, dishwasher, etc.). Don't be afraid to keep calling the police. They will get just so tired of coming over they just may take care of the violators for you. Call them as soon as the noise starts because these things are not high on their list and it may take a while.

Good luck!

Thanks Miles for your suggestion. We have 24 hour security at our front lobby, so we would first call them. But, your idea to immediately call the police is a good one too. Do your condo docs have any verbiage on nuisance/disturbances?

Jim,
Thank you very much for providing me with a copy of your CC & R on this topic. We also have common areas such as a pool that is closed after 10pm, so establishing "quiet" times in apartment/condo units, both during the week with perhaps later hours on the weekend for parties, etc. would likely be helpful. But, this is a great start for what I am looking to create. Thanks!!!

1. Call the police

2. Document date, time, etc.

3. If your governing documents support it, file a complaint with your HOA

Here is what works for us:

"Noxious Activities Prohibited. No illegal, noxious or offensive activities shall be carried out or conducted upon any lot, nor shall anything be done within the properties which is or could become an unreasonable annoyance or nuisance to neighboring property owners. C&RS Article VIII, Section 1(c)."

Paul T

Like Tim & PaulT6, we have very similar wording in our CC&Rs. But we also have more detailed rules because of our situation.

We're two 25-story towers with 200+ units in an urban setting in a mild climate. All units have balconies, decks, or patios. We have one security staffer on duty 24/7; a second officer is on duty 18/7. Residents notify them when other residents are noisy on their balconies after 10pm. Our rules prohibits noise nuisances all of the time, but usually no one complains except at night.

When a resident complains, almost always about balcony noise, security goes to the unit in question and asks the residents to quiet down or even move inside. This is effective 95% of the time. The same approach is used if people are loud in our pool/spa area (closes at 10pm weekdays and midnight Fri./Sat. & nights before major holidays).

We have had a few residents over time who kept breaking the rule or refused to comply with the officer's requests. If they refuse to comply when visited, the complainer is advised to call the police. This, again, has rarely been needed. Offenders are sent a "courtesy" letter by our PM following the first "Incident Report" filled out by an officer. If the offense is repeated, the unit's owner is called to hearing and is potentially fined $100. Our fine schedule for various violations is, of course, given to all Owners and is in our Rules & Regs handbook. We can double the fines upon additional violations & have reached $1,600 in two cases over 6 years. In both cases, the offenders, who happened to be tenants, moved away.

There are a few other noise nuisances that we prohibit. And noisy work in units only may occur between 8 & 5 and is prohibited on weekends. The prohibition on weekends not only is to permit peace & quiet, but also to keep our elevators freed up for residents. For that reason, we also don't permit move ins/outs on weekend and only during the 8-5 hours on weekdays. As we're reaching our 12th birthday, a number of owners, especially new ones, are replacing their partially carpeting floors with hard surface flooring and sometimes doing other major work. This all, of course, must be approved by our ARC and we have strict guidelines. When I have time I'll cut and paste the wording of our noise rules, RobertS36.

You've very wise to get this handled ASAP. You also may want to call or visit other nearby high rises to see if they'll give you a copy of their rules.

I'm thinking, Robert, that if you want to give me your email addy, I can send you the web site of our HOA. There may be other helpful tips for you on it.

Say, JohnC46, don't know if your last reply was to me? Anyhoo, the reason the rules here are in three different places is that we have so many rules. So, our very experienced developer placed noise rules in three different sections of our handbook-- "Disturbances/Nuisances," the pool section, and the "recreational areas" section. I imagine the reasoning was that no resident probably will read the whole package at one time.

We as a board reviewed all of our rules a couple of years ago and decided to keep that particular redundancy.

We did have one elderly woman who constantly complained about noise at night. The security staff hardly ever could find the source and she wouldn't permit them to come into her unit to try to figure out the source. One night when an officer went up to her corridor, she was walking in it with a stethoscope against the walls. Her family committed her to an institution recently.

What amazes me are the huge number of views on this topic--over 1,000! Or does the counting thingy (technical phrase) get out of whack sometimes.

I was thinking about the cranks and wackos who would abuse this system and then I read this.

To save yourself some grief, you might also define what is consider a nuisance and this includes excessive dog barking. If a homeowner has a grudge against someone who happens to own a dog, this is a typical complaint. However, if you better define this in terms of time, duration, and occurrence. For example, a dog barking for 2 minutes before 7 a.m. on one particular day is not reason enough to justify a complaint. The same thing goes for a car alarm going off at the same time for the same duration on one particular day. It becomes a nuisance if the noise incidents occur every day. Further, if there is an instance of another dog barking regularly during the quiet times, but the resident doesn't file a complaint against that, this also is problematic.

In my case, there was a complaint although we had the dogs for at least a year the complaint didn't come until there was a new board and this was shown to be part of discriminatory actions against us. We asked who made the complaint and if the complaint could be more specific. We received no response and the board did not pursue this charge. Further, there was another neighbor whose dog barked almost every morning at 3 a.m.

I formerly volunteered for an animal shelter and I know how the in-take staff and the officers are trained to investigate excessive barking complaints. You might consult with your local animal control and police in regards to noise and what is considered a nuisance and the local laws. In California, there are no comprehensive laws about noise, but there is one defining a noise nuisance in vehicles.