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Topic
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Context: Live in St Kilda, Victoria, In a ground floor apartment in a block of 4 (2 up and 2 down), with the other downstairs rented, directly above me rented, and the remaining (directly above next door) owner occupied.
I’m hoping to get some advice about an ongoing noise issue from the upstairs neighbour. When I bought my unit, the upstairs bedroom already had hard flooring (had carpet at one stage based on REA photos). Unfortunately, because the building is old and there’s no meaningful insulation between floors, I can hear almost every impact noise from above like footsteps, heavy drawers opening, wardrobe doors sliding, even a phone cable being dropped on the floor and a bedside light switch turning on/off. The noise transfers directly into my bedroom and has become a significant problem for my sleep and mental health.
I’ve tried to manage this in a reasonable way. I approached the upstairs neighbour politely, offering to pay for a rug (she said no), reached out to the owner offering to pay to install carpet (she said no) and I have paid to install blow-in insulation in my own ceiling to reduce the noise, but it made almost no difference because the issue is impact and vibration, not airborne noise. I use a white noise machine but impact noise cuts straight through it. I also contacted the Owners Corporation for help, but they’ve more or less said it’s a “private issue” because the Model Rules only mention noise related to common property, even though the Owners Corporations Act still requires owners not to cause a nuisance that interferes with another lot owner’s use and enjoyment of their property – debatable how this is interpreted and what is classified as reasonable noise in my instance.
At this stage, I’m unsure what my practical options are. The upstairs owner doesn’t want to install carpet or acoustic underlay, and my body corp is washing their hands of it. I’m worried about escalating things being in a small complex and still ending up with no real resolution. If anyone has dealt with similar impact-noise issues between apartments or knows what options actually work I’d really appreciate any advice or guidance.
inb4 I can’t sell as I’ll lose too much money and never own a home again.
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Okay, let’s start with my opinion that the strata laws in Victoria have giant holes in them and that Victoria politicians don’t care about apartment owners. Prove me wrong if you disagree.
However part of the Owners Corporation Act says this:
46 Owners corporation to repair and maintain common property
An owners corporation must repair and maintain—
(a) the common property; and
(b) the chattels, fixtures, fittings and services related to the common property or its enjoyment.The question is, is the floor of the apartment above common property? It is in NSW and I suspect it may be in Victoria too. Therefore the OC should be pursuing the owner of the apartment upstairs to cover the floor properly and your beef is with the strata committee for not doing so. Take it to Consumer Affairs with a view to taking the case to VCAT. Now, having said that, my knowledge of how strata law plays out in Victoria is a little sketchy so if anyone in Vic has experience of this, please let us know and correct me if I’m wrong.
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I recall friends in the UK who had a noise problem from their upstairs neighbours who basically said “hard cheese – if you aren’t happy, move out.” So they went away for the weekend, having propped stereo speakers up against their bedroom ceiling with the Muppets theme playing on a loop for the 48 hours they were away. Not too loud but loud enough to be heard upstairs and drive the “hard cheese” people insane. “Oh dear, could you hear that?’ they said when they returned to complaints. World War 3 was about to break out but the equivalent of the strata manager stepped in ready to enforce noise complaints from either party. Problem solved.
In this case, just enough irritation to get the person upstairs to agree to putting down carpet at shared cost might work.
One other thought, I wonder if the original DA for the apartment included that the floors would be carpeted. That might be on the title documents for the unit – if so, it would be another avenue to explore.
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