[CBR]

If two early evenings talking on our balcony in the seven months since I moved in makes me a bad neighbour, well, I think I’m okay with that!

What I’m more worried about is this guy making vexatious and exaggerated complaints about noise (which he is clearly not averse to doing, considering what he said to the cops when he called them on us). Does he need to provide evidence of our supposedly egregious noise or can he just make official complaints which then go through to the BC/OC/agent/landlord?

[CBR]

@PeterC said:

Of course I was not there. I cannot know if these residents were entirely reasonable or louder than they thought. Having said that, I am all too familiar with the letter from an owner who speaks in the plural on behalf of ‘many concerned residents’ while actually only speaking for herself. It is a common affectation to assume the mantle of speaking for all the right-thinking people in the development. I find it quite plausible that CBR has encountered a ‘noise nazi’. While it is true that a tenant is bound by the same Rules (ACT-speak for By-laws) as owners, enforcing those Rules would require an EC to be prepared to take the matter seriously enough to issue a Breach Notice and then be prepared to further act to take the matter to the ACAT (ACT equivalent of CTTT) if they thought you had failed to act on the notice by not ceasing to disturb other residents. Then it would go to a mediated ‘preliminary conference’ before going further. If the police had attended more than once and found a riotous party going on there would be a case to make. If, as CBR says, the police were called several times but found nothing unreasonable there is no case and some evidence that there is no case to be made and the breach notice is unreasonable. I would take note of the days on which the police found nothing going on. 

Thank you for your helpful response. We have not received any OFFICIAL noise complaints beyond the warning from the agent in April, so hopefully this won’t go beyond overly sensitive harassment.

[CBR]

@Urban Spaceman said:

Heavens above, you two, Considerate Band Fair and CBR, you seem so inconsiderate, selfish, self-centred and self-obsessed.

All by-laws, Acts and house rules aside and no matter what the hour, if your disturbs others it’s just not fair.

Can’t you imagine, yourselves, being woken up after being asleep for a couple of hours on an otherwise peaceful night, by the sound of a couple of half-drunk people talking (more loudly than they realize) and the smoke drifting into your bedroom which may only be a few feet from the other home’s balcony?

You don’t think it would worry you? Prepared to consider that your behaviour, whatever it is, may be making others uncomfortable? Upsetting others?

Why not take their complaints on board, say you’re sorry and mean it. And get a grip.

Hey now, had we been having a party or playing loud drinking games or music at 2am on a Tuesday, I’d think the guy would have had a reasonable complaint. We weren’t. We haven’t. At what point do we not, as residents, get to enjoy the amenity of our balcony? And by amenity, I mean talking, not yelling and screaming and shouting. At the incident described below, the two people outside were quietly discussing reasonably discreet work, quiet enough not to wake the people in our apartment (myself included), let alone anyone else’s.

At what point do we lose that amenity? 6pm? 9pm? Are we not to use our balcony after a certain point in the day? Smoke is no issue as the owner above us is a smoker himself, so again, at what point must we curtail absolutely all noise so this guy can have his peaceful night’s sleep? I feel for him, because I wouldn’t personally choose such work hours, but he bought in a not-quiet area, across the road from a noisy pub (noisier than us, certainly), in a block and area full of young professionals, and expects suburban silence?

He called the cops on us saying we were loud and VIOLENT, and you think we should say sorry and mean it?

[CBR]

That’s what gets me though. When he complained last night, the entertaining had finished. It was two people, talking, outside, at a not unreasonable hour. The cops shook their heads when they arrived and saw that there wasn’t a noisy punch-up.

We suspect he hasn’t, in fact, gone to the trouble of contacting the other occupiers surrounding us, as I know for a fact that one of the apartments above us is occupied by reasonably taciturn international students, and the one adjacent is hiding a cat. But if he has, can they indeed turf us out? Two “incidents” in seven months can’t possibly a case make, can it (especially not without substantiated proof that we are and have been unreasonably noisy)?

Can we get the OC or whatever it is to get this guy to stop harassing us because he’s displeased he’s bought in a noisy area?

[Author]

Replies