Condominium Kids Noise Complaint

atom2020 wrote: ↑ Do you have any padding and rugs on your floor? If you don't I suggest you get some it makes a difference. You need to understand that kids jumping up and down can cause disruptions for others below you. I understand it is just kids running around but you need to also understand people are wfh and spending more time at home than ever so people have extra tension and are upset. Quite frankly it is not worth teaching anyone a lesson. Anger tends to cause more harm within oneself esp in such a time of uncertainty and tension. It is better to let go and look forward to a brighter future in a townhouse.I would definitely get the padding and rug - or if you have rugs put some padding underneath it can help with the noise transfer.

moeymoeymoeymoe wrote: ↑What legal action can they take?, bylaw enforcement? Condo rules?

I don’t get people who live in condos. What’s the appeal? This shit?

mmagda wrote: ↑I used to be a board member at my old condo & ran into the identical situation - both parties were crying to me...
This is not something the prop. mgr. can enforce. And to be honest, they've done as much as they could...

If you want to beat them at their own game, call the prop. mgr. over;
- invite them in, show them your home is as "noise proof" as reasonably possible.
- clearly state, that harassing someone over their children would be an absolutely wonderful case in a human rights tribunal
The latter will obviously shut all aprties up.

In the situation at my old place. The downstairs (elderly) sent a letter from their lawyer, as they felt the prop. mgr. was "useless", despite citing the above (she did inspect, they had rugs down & the family said they're doing their best)

Nothing came of it, the upstairs people weren't even aware as the elderly people never approached them to ask them to keep it down...

RaC1550 wrote: ↑ Don't live in a condo/apartment if you are noise sensitive; and if you must, try to be on the top floor. You can't control who your neighbors are and some noise should be tolerated as part of the compromise.

Abhish3k wrote: ↑ All the bedrooms are carpeted and the living area has a couple of plush carpets. I've lived in the building for 5 years in 2 different apartments and never heard a noise from upstairs or had a complaint before. I thought the condo was built pretty well in terms of sound transmission. I only have one kid of jumping age, whom I've got down to >5 jumps on the carpet per day, which I'm not very proud of. The other one doesn't even walk yet. I would normally agree with you but this looks like pure vendetta on the manager's part. There was no assessment by the manager to ascertain if the noise was loud enough to even be classified as noise. He's just taking their word for it because it suits him. I'm not someone who'd get angered very easily but imagine your heart racing whenever your kid runs around from in the house? I'm at a point where I don't mind spending 10K on lawyer fees just to get even, though that's like what I make in 2 months. The only thing stopping me is the fact I'm hoping to move out anyway and I don't want the owners to get caught up in the mess since they have been good through the years and are seniors themselves.

jacey. wrote: ↑ tell them you have covid

Abhish3k wrote: ↑We are a family of 4, two kids 1 and 4. We rent in a condo in GTA. I got a noise complaint letter from the condo manager a month ago saying that the senior residents of the condo below me have complained about noises of kids running and crying. I try to control my kids, but they are.. Kids. So they still jumped once in a while.
A couple of days ago the landlady called and said they've received an ultimatum from the condo manager that if they get one more complaint they'll send a legal notice.
The manager is extremely rude and has a bone to pick up with me due to some history when he tried to pin a broken chute on me as he found a small amazon box with my name on it. He stopped when I threatened to go legal myself then.
But I find his approach tone deaf especially given that we're in a pandemic with kids schooling from home and parents working from home all in a two bedroom apartment.
I obviously don't want to parent based on the whims of a random stranger and it's a constant worry on our mind.
The landlady has been nice but I really want to teach the prick manager a lesson, but I can't be sure if it's worth it. Any ideas on how best to deal with this situation?
I'm also in the market for a townhouse because I just want to be done with this guy, but given the real estate market I might be stuck for a few more months and don't want to live under constant stress.

moeymoeymoeymoe wrote: ↑What legal action can they take?, bylaw enforcement? Condo rules?

I don’t get people who live in condos. What’s the appeal? This shit?

jimbob12341 wrote: ↑ I am in a similar problem but on the other side. I been living many years in my place and gone through the owner living there, to being tenanted to having a new tenant.

The new ones have 2 young kids and they are running around and jumping very loudly throughout the day. We have deiced we can live with that sound as we understand they have young kids (though the adults seem to be almost as loud when they walk around their unit) however we cannot stand for them doing it after 8pm and early in the morning. I have not gotten a good night sleep in months as they keep waking me up at all hour at the night, for instance the kids run around loudly from 5am to 8am none stop.

So it does go both ways, you can't just say you have kids are at the jumping stage and be resolved of all issues. I really think anyone who has young kids or walks heavy (what people above me seem to do both) should really go after ground floors only.

You seem to be a bit more reasonable than my neighbors as they been sent letters from strata, neighbors have left them notes and gone to personally to talk to them and nothing has improved.

Your neighbors really should try to talk to you guys first so maybe you guys can hash out some sort of agreement, like after 7pm we will insure our kids start to quiet down and be totally quiet by 10pm but they will put up with any noise from 9am to 7pm.

When everyone is living together so closely together there really needs to be compromised solutions.

It is kind of crazy difference with your strata manager and I guess your strata council if there is one as I said we been dealing with the people upstairs for months and they still are on warning letters..........



Depending where you live it maybe your only choice. I want to live in a house badly and get away from all this crap. I was willing to buy a house with a family member but now with everyone thinking they can work from home forever, the detached market has gone insane and we are priced out (we can't afford these 200K over asking bidding wars) and my company I work for has already been hinting that they want us back in the office and not much of a remote policy so I am constraint of how far I can move out. There is no point trying to change jobs as I been looking and almost all the companies mark themselves as temp remote, I think I would need to wait to see when Covid blows over and then see what companies come up with (if we still are in this situation of everything shut down still by next year maybe they will be more willing for more remote but if everyone vaccinated by September I can see back into the office for me with very little remote working)

We then wanted to try to go for a bit bigger townhouse (I am in one now but I still have a neighbor above us) with no one else above us, yet we seem to be priced out of that one as well as to get that and 1 extra bedroom (like 200 square feet more bigger than our unit) we are looking at 200K to 300K more mortgage if we want to stay in our area.

atom2020 wrote: ↑ I guess you are in a stacked townhouse - that is one reason I dont like them b/c you can have people above you. I feel the prices for towns have shot up depending on the area. I have seen one go for 150k more than just 1.5 months prior to that. Its really nuts. It can also be hard when you don't know the future of wfh. I don't know what area you are looking in but some areas have the proper condo towns that don't have any stacking those seem to be better I think so you don't get the noise from upper floors.

Abhish3k wrote: ↑ We are a family of 4, two kids 1 and 4. We rent in a condo in GTA. I got a noise complaint letter from the condo manager a month ago saying that the senior residents of the condo below me have complained about noises of kids running and crying. I try to control my kids, but they are.. Kids. So they still jumped once in a while.
A couple of days ago the landlady called and said they've received an ultimatum from the condo manager that if they get one more complaint they'll send a legal notice.
The manager is extremely rude and has a bone to pick up with me due to some history when he tried to pin a broken chute on me as he found a small amazon box with my name on it. He stopped when I threatened to go legal myself then.
But I find his approach tone deaf especially given that we're in a pandemic with kids schooling from home and parents working from home all in a two bedroom apartment.
I obviously don't want to parent based on the whims of a random stranger and it's a constant worry on our mind.
The landlady has been nice but I really want to teach the prick manager a lesson, but I can't be sure if it's worth it. Any ideas on how best to deal with this situation?
I'm also in the market for a townhouse because I just want to be done with this guy, but given the real estate market I might be stuck for a few more months and don't want to live under constant stress.

my_sir wrote: ↑ Having live through horrible upstairs neighbours, I find that your comments really irritating. You don’t understand how annoying it is to have kids stomp and jump all day, every day. You are ok with it because they are your kids. To someone else, they are just idiots. They are not special. If you read your post, you are pointing fingers at everyone else, but maybe you should look at the self absorbed person in the mirror instead of thinking of ways to “teach a lesson”. Maybe learn some parenting skills?? You are clearly in the wrong and if you don’t like the rules, then move. Simple as that. People have a right to quite enjoyment. That right does not get superseded by kids. Rules are there for a purpose, just like masks, speed limits, etc. Seriously, with your attitude, if you were my neighbour and you had that attitude, I would be installing subwoofers on my ceiling. See how you like it.

jimbob12341 wrote: ↑ yeah I guess it is called a stacked townhouse . For many years it was fine but now it became a problem so I probably would stay away from them as well if I have a chance, but like I said many people don't have much choices on what to get and you got to make scarifies.

I am in Metro Vancouver and similar thing is happening in Toronto. I was looking back in pricing history at a complex that is like 5km from my place and we had interest in as they had 2 places for sale. One townhouse in august 2020 which had full renos, sold under asking for like 725K, then fast forward to Dec 2020 and 2 units popped in same complex, pretty much same square feet and pretty much same layouts.

One was had little bit of renos and went over asking for like 780K and the other had full renos and went for like 830K. Now another unit has popped up what seems to pretty much original (complex is like 40 years old) and again same size and stuff and they are starting it at 750K when probably in August it would have gone for like 650K.

Abhish3k wrote: ↑ I find your comment tone deaf. Maybe your situation is different than mine. But If you are so sensitive to a couple of jumps in a carpeted home don't live in a condo which is open to families. Quite enjoyment isn't the same as being spiteful of rest of the world.

but hey, I might have found my neighbour.

atom2020 wrote: ↑ Yes I find some of the prices quite crazy esp since you have to pay the condo fees on top of it and some have high condo fees, then you have to wonder why not buy a condo. Its quite bad b/c even last summer you could get a starter bungalow for close to the prices some of these condo style townhouses are. I find the stacked ones to be so annoying for this very reason b/c of the noise transfer I know they make it this way to save money and get more units in but it is really awful.