Resident Cheered for Hitting Back at Downstairs Neighbor’s Noise Complaint

A woman who received regular complaints about noise from her neighbor decided to finally push back, and she has been backed for her response.

The woman, who did not give her name, but who posts to Reddit under the username r/Tygmaa, took to Reddit’s r/ApartmentLiving sub, where she pleaded for advice after her neighbor’s constant complaining. She explained she has lived in a co-op apartment building for 10 years, and recently moved to a larger apartment in the co-op, where an older couple live underneath her and her family.

The coupe have been complaining about noise constantly—once even at 1.30 p.m., when the woman was vacuuming her home. She said she had tried to remain friendly with them, even inviting them for a movie night at her home after they complained about the sound of her TV, but nothing changed—and her daughter was now worrying about making any sort of noise in case it caused a complaint.

Things finally came to a head this week, when the woman was putting together a flat-pack desk from Amazon at around 4.30 p.m., and she received the following message: “I’m sorry but I’m dealing with a migraine and all of the pounding is not helping. I’m sorry to complain but there has been a lot of banging and I deal with a lot of headaches and my granddaughter stays here and it wakes her up.”

Adrienne Alexander, owner of public relations firm IPY Agency LLC, said the situation was a “classic case of shared living tensions, where competing needs—reasonable noise versus personal comfort—collide.”

“In co-op living, normal daytime noise like running a vacuum or assembling furniture at 4 p.m is generally acceptable, while excessive complaints can cross into unreasonable territory.”

The woman said the couple used to live in the woman’s now-home before moving downstairs, and she believes they are “just holding a grudge because we are in their old place. They love to tell me how long they lived here with a tone that implies they were the originals so it is their turf.”

And so she took to Reddit with a draft message of what she planned to send to the couple, asking readers if they thought it was the right thing to do.

In that message, she began: “I hear that noise can be frustrating for you, and I’m sorry to hear that you experience migraines. That said, I need to ask that you stop messaging me about noise during reasonable hours.”

She explained that she and her child “spent a few minutes building a bench around 4:30 PM, well within acceptable daytime noise levels, especially considering all we were doing was tapping a piece of wood down with our hands for a minute or two. Not that we owe you an explanation but it’s important for you to understand and accept that sometimes we make noise because we live here.

“We are not stomping around or banging for fun, we’re just spending time in our home doing normal everyday things.”

She suggested the couple research potential soundproofing for their apartment and assured them that if there was any loud, unavoidable noise, such as them getting work done in the home, they would let them know in advance.

“As someone who has worked shift work, experiences debilitating migraines, and has had small children who need to sleep, I have never expected my neighbors to accommodate my needs in a community where we share walls,” she said in the message, adding that in the 10 years she lived there, she had never received or made a noise complaint, “because I understand that noise is inevitable.”

She also pointed out that the downstairs neighbors’ dog barking sometimes wakes her up, but “I simply turn up my sound machine and go back to sleep.”

“I appreciate your understanding and hope we can move forward with mutual respect for the realities of community living.”

Alexander agreed: “If the neighbor’s dog regularly barks, yet they expect total silence from others, that’s an imbalance worth addressing—but not with a retaliatory tone.

“Instead of escalating the conflict, the best response is calm and firm.”

Reddit users backed her completely, with the post racking up more than 19,000 upvotes. Many commenters gave advice on the note and offered tweaks and edits, but another declared: “Perfect Send it over.”

“This is a good response,” another agreed, while one admitted: “I would put my ears to my floor and text her ‘stop, I heard that’ every time I hear ANYTHING.”

“I had a somewhat similar situation last year,” one user shared. “Our downstairs neighbor would slam on the ceiling at the slightest noise. At times it actually woke us up because he would start banging on the ceiling despite us not even being awake.”

The woman later shared the message she did send to the neighbor, and while she removed the part about the dog, she kept much of the draft—and the neighbor had read the message and not replied.

Alexander, however, warned that the woman’s message could be seen as defensive. She said a firm but calm message to the neighbor “asserts boundaries without being combative.

“If the complaints persist, addressing them with building management or a co-op board may be the next step rather than escalating a personal back-and-forth.”

She warned against being defensive in the message, or of being “dismissive of the situation.”

“When I teach conflict classes, I always share the use of ‘I’ Statements. These can help minimize the finger-pointing and actually try to clear through the noise of the conflict,” she said. “Ask questions and leave room for conversation so you can come to a conclusion that works.”

Newsweek has contacted r/Tygmaa on Reddit for comment on this story.

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