Noise Disturbance

It is true it would cost alot of money and probably involve a construction project. It's a construction issue as there was probably not alot of insulation or the person put in wood floors. I don't think any kind of noise ordinance even those outside a HOA can do much about noise inside a residents. The most you can do is call the police or talk to your neighbor about their behavior.

Honestly, this may sound mean but it's not meant to be. It is your problem. You choose a 1st floor place to live. It is well known that means someone is above you. So to complain now doesn't leave you with much to fight against if you did get a lawyer. I used to live in an apartment so I understand. My neighbor downstairs installed a punching bag onto his ceiling. Every day I had to deal with him punching that bag and shaking my entire apartment. Things fell off the wall constantly. So it can go both ways.

My suggesstion is to skip the lawyer and find other ways to deal with the issue. Talk to your neighor and work things out.

RH, read the Restictions in your Covenants (CC&Rs). I would assume there is a Restriction on lights, sounds, and smells which might apply or else a Nuisance clause which might apply. After reviewing the Covenants send your best argument to the Board rather than the MC and ask them to address the claimed violation of restrictions. It can be very subjective and you may not get the support you want.

RH:

Are you certain that the upstairs neighbor is walking around until the early morning hours? The reason I ask is that I have lived in a number of homes where the rafters and trusses creak and groan at night as the temperature drops.

Many years ago I lived in home where someone tried to break in one night. I scared them off and they never actually got into my house but for 15 years afterward I heard every noise that a house can make. I became very sensitive to noises at night and had many sleepless nights.

I am not certain what you could expect a lawyer, your association and/or management company to do, whether it is someone pacing above you or just joists creaking in the night. For whatever reasons, you purchased a living space with someone living above you and the sounds you complain of seem normal.

Have you tried covering the noise up with "white noise?" That is, devices that create background sound. A fan, for example, can do the job as will a stereo or radio at a low volume. If you have cable or satellite TV you may have some music channels that you can leave on at night at a low level.

I appreciate all the input. I have tried several methodologies to block the noise: white noise, ear plugs and to no avail. It's the nature of the walking - which is back k and forth for hours until the wee hours of the morning.

This is not normal, to be unemployed, sleep all day and then start to rouse around 10:30 p.m. and continue one's "day" until 3 in the morning.

Also, this person decided to live ABOVE someone and, as such, is required to follow guidelines for community living - which is quiet time 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. or thereabouts.

this is not a one-way street of community living - why would I be penalized for living under someone. I have no complaint about daytime noise that comes from regular living. But this night-time habit is extreme behavior.

I expect the board and management company to enforce the guidelines in the CCRs and send notice to the person in question. If the letters do not work, then fines are exacted.

As the board and management company declare fines are at their discretion, I would expect this to be a situation that would merit it. And if fines were not paid, appropriate measures taken. However, they are notorious for not doing what they should.

As it impacts my health, is deleterious to job performance and pay (I am not paid for any days off due to illness) further action is necessary if the situation does not improve. I was inquiring if anyone had similar situations and what was the resolution.

I thank you all for your input.

Any other suggestions, I'd be happy to read them.

Glen:

I don't know why you think that walking/pacing in the middle of the night to early morning for HOURS at a time supercedes my helth and well-being issues. Clearly this person is living an alternate lifestyle to normal 9-5 standards.

However, your tone suggests that I am not being fair.

Perhaps it's six years of what I consider abuse that has frayed my nerves and I am hypersensitive to the situation - this is not a debate over who has more rights, although you seem to write that my upstairs neighbor has more rights and therefore I should remain sick and just endure it until I'm dead (moving out is not an option for many reasons I will not discuss here)

It speaks volumes to the self-centeredness of people that you think I am at fault here for wanting the same "quiet enjoyment" my neighbor ALREADY HAS!!!

If he was a fireman or night watchman, I would be careful to be VERY quiet during the day while he slept. Why am I not given the same consideration? Even by those writers who are in no way directly involved?

Again, adjustment is part of community living. Perhaps it has to do with how I was raised. I was raised that one has to make some compromise to ensure the comfort of another in one's community (be it family, friends or neighbors)in order to get along.

I think this discussion string, like society and most people in general, has degenerated into a manner-less mess. I will take responsibility for my part in the degeneration of this discourse, but it is helpful to express my outrage and being treated without the respect, consideration and simplest compassion that I give to others.

It's a one-bedroom unit about 00 square feet.

The previous owner lived in the unit, was fairly friendly and neighborly but when I asked about the late night pacing it got worse. So bad that I heard his girlfriend hiss at him "stop doing that!"

I decided then, talking is useless - authority is the only option.

For a couple of weeks, when this new person-a renter- moved in, he was very quiet at late night. Then it suddenly changed.

I had to call police when, at one point, he had a lady friend over and she ran back and forth - literally- from the living room to the kitchen for approximately 10 minutes at 2:15 in the morning. I called the police.

The mgt. co. informed me that a letter went out to the condo owner. A second will go out if there is no improvement. Fortunately, the last two nights have been much quieter - the constant pacing has let up considerably. I am hoping it will stay that way.

OMG! Clearly, you cannot believe that the place or the person is in error. If I could move,I would have by now! Situations (financial, health and family) obligate me to stay put or be homeless.

For your information, visitors have remarked on the loudness of the footfalls above me. It is a shock to me that people just assume I am in the wrong: hypersensitive, and it's my fault for choosing and living in lower unit. I have lived above before, and I will repeat what I said in previous posts - respect has a lot to do with it.

Respect for another and their needs are part of community living. Would you move if your neighbors dog barked day and night? Or the neighbor played music at excruciating high decibel levels all day and night? Let me answer for you - you would call animal control and the police, respectively.

Your response operates under a double standard. I don't want any more responses to my question or my posts. A few of the responses are accusatory and judgmental. I don't need that from a forum I thought would offer some HELPFUL advice.

With all due respect, dog barking all day or loud music late at night is a much different issue than someone walking around their house late at night.

Obviously I DID think there were other options and, clearly, I am working it out on my own as narrow-minded, compassionless self-involved nits like you keep answering my posts even though my last post requested no more responses.

It speaks volumes to the aforementioned characteric=stics of "nit" dom (of which you may be king) that you wrote, anyway. You respond in the manner you did because you are thinking about YOU (as if you were the upstairs neighbor), not me or anyone else.

So much for being respectful, which is the true underlying issue here (regarding the late night walking back and forth, which is constant aand from 10pm to 3 am - an abnormality which no one should have to put up with, but clearly very few of you reading my post honestly wanted to offer constructive advice).

Just becasue it's not happening to you doesn't mean it isn't serious or life-threatening, even. How dare you write so self-righteously! I have written some of what I have attempted to do in order to "live with it" but clearly, you have a shorter attention span than a tse tse fly (if you read my previous posts).

I already WROTE what happened when I tried to talk to the neighbor! And I have banged a broom. It didn't work. It made the situation worse because the neighbor was/is an ass. Don't compare me to you 80 year old grandmother, I hold two jobs and need to function coherently at work and school.

You and a few others have short, terse, dismissive replies that don't open a dialogue to someone searching for help. By the way, I DO blame anyone who stomps around all night and into the wee hours of the morning - that is NOT normal enjoyment of a home. It might be indication of an abberration either mentally or pharmaceutically. My m.d. suggested that possibility.

I WILL NOT LOOK AT NOR RESPOND TO ANYMORE POSTS.YOU FEW HAVE CONFIRMED THATMOST PEOPLE ARE JUST SELFISH, SELF-INVOLVED NITS THAT DON'T CARE ABOUT ANYONE OTHER THAN THEMSELVES (you only THINK you are able to be "fair" or "equitable" in advice, help or service because you've deluded yourself to think so and others have lowered the bar to keep in tandem with the degrading of social manners and concern for others)

So take your sanctimonious annoyance with my grievance and stuff it!

RH:

You do have problems getting along with people, don't you? I mean people upstairs pacing around, a management company that does nothing for you, a condo board that does nothing for you, police who do nothing for you, and a whole forum of people who keep posting even after you order them to stop!

Your last few posts scream out "paranoid schizophrenic!" If I knew who you are and where you live I would do everything I could to get you a psychiatric evaluation because you are a certifiable whacko.