[oasis69]

That sounds too familiar.

We, too, had a young woman living downstairs from us, having her friends staying frequently for long evenings spent on her balcony, chatting, laughing, drinking, smoking.

We have a noise diary over 5 pages long and it went all the way via verbal complaints to her, her agent, her landlord, strata and finally mediation.

The straw that broke our neck was one of the mediation staff saying that if we couldn’t tolerate her noise then apartment living “probably wasn’t for [us]”.

First thing she did after the mediation was having another hours-long session.

We ended up moving out because we both developed anxiety and stress because we wouldn’t know if we had a quiet evening or not.

Sadly, current Australian law does not support quiet tenants much.

[oasis69]

Just wanted to quickly update on this issue.

 

It went all the way to mediation where we were basically told that this was her “lifestyle” and if we wanted quietness then “renting probably wasn’t for us”.

 

I felt pretty deflated after that, and the lack of support for this case.

 

We have moved on (literally). Burned her notices ritually and moved out, from a bright, spacious, centrally-located unit to a darker, smaller one where I have to take the train to work.

 

Ah, the power of the inconsiderate noisy ones…

[oasis69]

Today I’ve been to the real estate agent. Turns out I was wrong: there are 3 owners for the units in our house, and there is a Strata management.

The agent promised to notify both of the most recent incident which I supplied in writing.

I also popped into the local police station and asked about “talking” noise (as opposed to music). I learned that I can call them about that too, and they would come out and remind the tenant about being considerate and fine them if they didn’t get the lesson.

I feel better now. Hopefully Strata and owners react quickly so we get our peace back.

I’ll keep you posted.

[oasis69]

Thanks for your replies, guys.

To answer your questions: I am in NSW and a tenant. In fact, we have a special situation here: Everyone in our block is a tenant, and the whole house is owned by the same person and managed by the same real estate agent.

If I read you correctly this should be our advantage: I just need to contact that agent and make sure to report early and often.

We are already keeping a noise diary and have started to record five-minute audio files (e.g. the other night when they woke us up at 2am with their chatter).

Yes, we tend to be nice, I don’t believe in the value of getting nasty, although my brain keeps coming up with all sorts of revenge plans… 

I’ll have a read of Whale’s link and will report back as things develop.

Thanks again!

[Author]

Replies