I moved into my apartment in August. Around early September, my neighbor would start screaming at his girlfriend (wife? baby mama?) to the point where I was upset enough to call the police. The things he said were violent and offensive to the point I was afraid he had a gun and I don't trust those walls to stop a bullet. I've called in noise complaints at least 4 times since. A few weeks ago, he left a note on my door apologizing and saying he was having "relationship problems". I hoped this was a sign he would stop being so loud. Sunday night he starts up again with the same obscenities & noise at 1030. So I called the cops again and emailed the property manager to let her know. Apparently he went into the office and told her he was just watching a football game and got heated. I don't buy it, but that's not the point.

I admit, I'm a little afraid now. I've never actually seen this guy, but based on what I've heard, he doesn't seem like a nice person. I've been driven out of my apartment at least half a dozen times because of him after 10p on weeknights. Am I wrong to keep calling the cops? I mean, there are kids in the complex. They don't need to be hearing the stuff he says through the walls. Heck, I don't need to be hearing it. My lease is up in August & I'm seriously considering moving to another unit. Of course, that's another 7 months away. I don't feel like I, or the other residents, should have to put up with this. It would be one thing if it only happened once or twice. It's entirely another that it happens once a month or so.

Advice? Thoughts?

I think you need evidence which means you need to video/tape it. It won't be the best quality but it will prove you aren't making it up, and document how long it is going for. Maybe tape 3 minutes every 10 minutes. Hopefully you saved the note from your door because it is an admission that he's been loud.

Other than that, I have no other words of advice. It's scary because you don't want him getting so mad at you that he starts unleashing his anger in your direction, but I also don't believe in being a victim and sitting in silence or fear.

^That's exactly what I'm afraid of. I did save the note and I will produce it if necessary. The police report also said they showed up a full 20 minutes before I even called to report it. That confused me a little bit. It also makes me uneasy because I feel like it makes me look like a liar.

Taping is a good idea. You can tape from your own apartment

And yes you should keep calling the cops. I would never be able to live with myself if I stayed silent while listening to domestic abuse.

I called the property manager because I was concerned about the time discrepancy. She said she misread the report and believed that I called when I said I did. Part of the problem is he's lived there for a long time and apparently doesn't feel like he needs to follow the rules any more. He also put a note on the door of the apartment below him, so he doesn't know for sure it was me who called.

She said she was going to talk to her manager about it and he would likely talk to the guy about it. I'm feeling a lot better now that I know more details. She didn't seem to think he was violent or that he would try to retaliate, so that helped too.

Your landlord needs to grow a pair and deal with the problem tenant before she loses her GOOD tenants. I hate situations like this and I cannot comprehend how some people think that their behavior is okay. Check your lease thoroughly. There should be some noise stuff in there as well as habitability, since I want to say you've spent the night away before to avoid being woken up/interrupted. If the landlord cannot provide a dwelling that lives up to what the lease says you may be able to get out of it and just go somewhere else. Is it an individual or a property management company? It's really easy to review a company online to warn others about how they don't take care of their tenants. After dealing with some stupidity at college I'm to the point where I refuse to take crap from landlords, heh. None of my neighbors were as bad as this one sounds, though...geez, what a douche. Apologizing doesn't do any good in these situations and he needs to adjust his behavior or get evicted. If the landlord refuses to take care of it, people will start finding the ways to break leases.

I had exactly this problem when I lived in an apartment years ago. The problem was wild parties, loud music and cavorting naked in the parking lot...nearly every weekend. We gathered up a "posse" of other residents, about ten of us, and marched en masse to the rental office with a "them or us" threat and a strong warning that no lease they had could stand up in court if we left (one of our ten was a law student) if the manager did not provide a suitably quiet residence.

They were evicted, but not before they had a party to end all parties (they had 30 days to vacate.) To call that party an Bacchanalian orgy was understating it.

Jon

She said I'm the first person to complain about him, but that doesn't mean it just started happening. Perhaps the previous residents just didn't say anything?

There's a clause in the lease that says you can't disturb or disrupt other residents. Also, legally, it's not a noise complaint until after 11p. My main concern was that he would retaliate against me somehow. I made a point of telling her that and she understood.

She said she would let me know how the conversation with him went and what they decide to do.

^I was just going to tell you to check your lease. I would have called the cops too, in fact I have done it before in a previous apartment when my neighbors were fighting in the middle of the night constantly and it sounded like there could be some abuse going on. I don't report people for just normal loud behavior, I figure it is the price I pay for having an apartment that I can afford and it doesn't bother me much, so it seems plausible that no one else has complained. Give the apartment manager a little bit of time to find a solution, they probably have some hoops to jump through before they could reasonably evict someone... like a certain amount of complaints or something. I would recommend scheduling a time with the manager to actually go in and talk to her, since it seems this has been bothering you for awhile, and you definitely don't deserve that! In person they may be more inclined to make arrangements. If they don't, find out who their regional manager is, or call the corporate office. If none of that works, send a certified letter asking for a resolution withing 14 days (or whatever time frame you want). That way you are covered if you decide to try to get out of your lease.

^Every time I've called, it has sounded like abuse. I wouldn't call the cops for just a regular noise complaint. Initially, I was afraid for my safety and the safety of the person he was yelling at. What if he had a gun and started shooting? I'm hoping this has gotten the message across and he needs to knock it off.

While it is possible this one time it was about football (the Giants-49ers game was a nail biter), all the screaming, yelling and possible domestic abuse is certainly concerning. As for the police not showing up for 20 minutes, they may not have seen it as a pressing emergency, and I'm sure they would have gotten there faster in other situations. Does the girl live with him? Is all the yelling only while she is there? Have you talked to the landlord about why he hasn't been evicted since he's a known problem? I agree with recording that next time it happens and to continue to report it. It's the only way to put a stop to it and get him out of there. Did you sign anything regarding noise in your lease? If so you could tell the landlord he;s not keeping up his end of the bargain by enforcing the rules and should let you out of the lease. That might get things rolling a bit.

I'd be going over your lease with a fine tooth comb and finding a clause that will get you out of it if nothing changes soon.

I had a terrible situation with my neighbour back in 2009. I was advised to get an AVO out on him so that he couldn't approach me or be near me on the property.
As it turns out, he had serious mental issues and had driven out almost every person who'd ever rented the place I was in. He'd make complaints about me 'jumping up and down and slamming against the common wall at 3am" or "doing aerobics at 2 am" - which never ever happened (LOL, aerobics? Me? Yeah right buddy.) He would come over and pound on my door to complain to me about things that I supposedly did that never happened. He would put his foot in my door when I tried to close it on his crazy ass. It was nuts.

The thing was, he owned his apartment and I was just renting mine - so there was nothing my agent or land lord could do about him. If anyone had to go, it was probably going to be me since they can't force a home owner out of his home.

In the end, I wanted to leave the state anyway, and found the part in my lease that says I was entitled to a peaceful tenancy. Obviously needing an AVO on your neighbour isn't exactly a peaceful tenancy - I didn't have to pay the break lease fees, just waited until they found another suitable tenant and I was out.

Does this guy own his apartment? That could be a real problem in getting him sorted.

I hate living in noisy or conflicted places. Home is really important to me and I'd be going nuts living next door to this guy. If its not too much hassle, try and get out now.

^Apartments aren't owned in the States. You can only rent. I'm not sure how long he's lived there, but it seems like a long time. The clause in the lease that covers noise is not "disrupting" or "disturbing" your neighbors (I think I mentioned that a few replies back).

I honstly have no idea if the woman lives with him or not. The two times things have gotten really heated, it sounded like he was on the phone. The leasing agent is definitely on my side here. But she doesn't make the decisions. It's also not like he does this every night. It's *maybe* once a month.

^Maybe it's different where you live, but you can definitely own an apartment...but then a lot of people call it a condo. I'm guessing you live in an apartment complex where you can only rent though if you are certain that he doesn't own,

You can certainly own an apartment in the states, it's generally just a thing rich peoiple in big cities do, othwise they could just buy a house because it would cost just as much. In DC Pent Hosue Apartments start around $700,000 from some brochures I've gotten in the mail.

^Correct, I own an apartment in a condominium complex. Just one of several legal schemes for ownership. A condominium means that I own a roughly 1/24th share of the entire building (which has, of course, 24 units), but I have the exclusive use of one of these, plus the parking space. The legal documents describe my share of the building down to about five decimal places based upon the square footage of my unit. Technically, I don't "own" my unit, I own the share. According to the condominium documents I don't "own" anything beyond the coat of paint and the flooring of my unit. I have co-dominion (hence the term condominium) with the owners of the other 23 units. I don't live there myself, I bought it when my kids were in college for their use, but I've rented it out ever since they graduated. In many big cities, notably New York, there are also co-op apartments which are owned normally by the tenant, but which have a somewhat different legal basis for unit ownership. Most apartments, however are larger buildings owned by individuals or corporations, divided into two or more units and periodic rents, usually monthly, are charged for occupancy.

Jon

Thanks for the legal clarifications. I always think of apartmenta as renting only and condos as owned. Either way, he doesn't own his unit. You can only rent units in my complex.

I'd love to buy a house, but that's a luxury that's still a few years off. I started a savings account and I'll have my debt paid off by next fall, so maybe come 2014, I can start looking. When my lease comes due, I might start looking for places where I used to live. I love that area, even if it means my commute would get longer.

Update-I haven't had to call the cops on him again. However, he had his TV on at 5am yesterday. What the heck?! It was just loud enough that I could hear it through the wall and I was forced to crawl out of bed and sleep on the couch in my living room.

I'm going to have my dad go over my lease and give his opinion. I think this is stressing me out way more than it should. I'm actively planning to sleep somewhere else next Sunday during the Super Bowl because I know he's going to be a loud, obnoxious douche. I'm not sure if I have enough to break my lease without a penalty, but I'm also not sure how much more of this I can take.

I feel like the tv thing is just part of living in an apartment complex. Can you invest in some sort of white noise machine or fan?

^At 5 in the morning on a Sunday, though? Maybe I'm crazy, but that seems a tad unreasonable.

As for a noise machine or fan, I can't sleep with that kind of noise. It drives me crazy. I'd get earplugs, but I'm afraid I wouldn't hear my alarm in the morning.

My boyfriend turns the news on at 3-4 AM on Sunday mornings because he was work at 5 AM. We take care to keep the volume super low, and none of the neighbors have complained about the noise.

Is there anyway you can change where your bed is in the room? I used to have my headboard against a wall I shared with a neighbor, and the noise was terrible for sleeping. Once I moved the bed to the other side of the room, the noise wouldn't wake me up at all.

^I could try that. My room is kind of small and I have a queen size bed, so things are a bit cramped. Hopefully it'll fit on the other wall and not obstruct the door.