Their foot steps sound like they just have 2 pegs for feet… they hit so hard.
And they frequently, almost daily, spend the entire evening stomping around the entire footprint of their apartment.
Are there people who really just get the top floor, and think “I’m so smart, and everyone else can get fucked” then proceed to make all the fucking noise in the world?
I kind of wish that multi-unit housing came with sound isolation ratings. That’d create an incentive to have better isolation and help customers weigh the tradeoffs.
we need to put sound insulation into the building codes. it won’t increase rents much since all the money’s in the land anyways. personally I’ve never had an actual issue with noise form other units but I’ll grant this to the people who do.
I don’t really want to force a specific bottom limit on sound insulation, which is what that would do, though.
Some people won’t care as much as others relative to price and may not want to pay what it’d cost. And some people may want a much-quieter unit than any bottom limit would place.
The problem is that they can’t make an informed decision now because the information isn’t available.
Might be worth just mandating it since you can also fix thermal efficiency issues at the same time. And that affects everyone since poor thermal efficiency = more pressure on the electricity grid and increased risks of extreme cold and heat to individuals.
But transparency would certainly be better than nothing.
So just stick all the poor people with the paper thin walls?
The problem is the information isn’t available. There’s no place to leave reviews of apartments. That seems like a no-brainer to me.
First, IBC has had this as code for at least 15 years.
The International Building Code (IBC) establishes minimum requirements for airborne and impact performance of multifamily buildings. The minimum code requirement is STC 50 and IIC 50. Since many factors can affect the transmission of sound in the field, including non-standardized source and receiver rooms as well as construction tolerances, a field measurement (ASTC or AIIC) of three to five points below the lab measurement is acceptable to meet code requirements.
As the understanding increased of how STC and IIC ratings correlate with occupant comfort, the International Code Council (ICC) issued ICC G2-2010, “Guideline for Acoustics,” which established two additional levels of acoustical performance:
acceptable, defined as STC 55 and IIC 55; and preferred amount of isolation as STC 60 and IIC 60
Second, all the money is most definitely not in the land. As a general ballpark, developers want the land to be under 1/4 of the total cost of the project.
Nice. How effective is that minimum standard? Most currently existing buildings are of course older than 15 years so most people won’t have experienced it. Sadly these days anywhere remotely urban has way more than 1/4 the cost as land, espically for already existing buildings
Pretty sure sound isolation is a factor in LEED rating
It is, but LEED was kind of a flash-in-the-pan fad for tax breaks and hardly any developers strive for a LEED certificate anymore (exception I’ve seen is govt projects). the cost of LEED certification is too much for most developers to stomach.
Nowadays I mostly see LEED as an extra set of letters in a person’s email signature.
Perhaps LEED should be replaced by a bunch of smaller certifications, each covering only a tiny subset.
It is nice to have one logo you can stick on a building, instead of lots of them. But after a little pushing it could be normalized to have a spot for multiple plaques near the entrance of a building, showing which certs it has earned.
Then you have a lower bar for entry and owners can choose a la carte what they want to strive for, and disregard the rest.
Like, a sound isolation rating on an apartment building would be a huge selling point. Have a certifying company that brings in big speakers and microphones and tests room-to-room sound conduction. Then you get a certification for the soundproofing.
I guess the nice thing about private cert authorities is anybody can just do this. It would take a while to get recognized but you could solve the two-sided marketplace problem pretty easily.
LEED kinda works like that with the different levels. LEED Gold checks off requirements a, b, and c; LEED Platinum also includes d and e, etc. I’m not LEED accredited, though, so I can’t speak to the finer differences.
There is a new standard making headway called WELL Certification . I’m not sure the difference between this and LEED but I’d be interested to learn more one day.
There are standards for such ratings, and several countries have mandated minimums, which lead to longer and healthier lives.
This is part of my argument against the recent trend to allow bigger wood framed buildings, so they’re cheaper. There’s only so much you can do to soundproof a multi family house, but a large apartment building needs more. You know here’s higher risk of fires, flooding and damage just by having more people. You know statistically there will be noise issues. You can’t just pass the responsibility on the tenants when you know this will be a problem. Larger buildings should be required to be built in a way to protect tenants from this, ie. Not wood. They deserve at least as much consideration as the builder’s profits
Larger buildings are required to do this under IBC, and have been for many years. You can absolutely make a modern multifamily wood framed building quiet with proper design and construction.
There’s no perfect building material. Wood has issues. But concrete is terrible for the planet from a climate perspective and we’re rapidly running out of quality aggregate (especially sand) in many parts of the world. You can make a list of pros and cons about any other material, too.
I love this game! I used to play it all the time back in the day…
- maybe they’re holding a sumo wrestler training camp?
- or possibly training for the hobbyhorse championships?
- they could be amateur wine makers and they’re stomping grapes?
- they might just be working on their sweet parkour moves?
- it’s possible that they’re working on their MMA game?
- slim odds, but they may be anthropophobic and love a good game of bocce?
- they’re perpetually stuck on the P90X plyometrics workout?
- you live below Kriss Kross and they’re reliving the glory days?
Edit: in all honesty, some people have just never learned the toe->heel method of walking so they clod around like horses
You reminded me that last week I actually could tell they were doing burpees in the Livingroom. Between the cadence of the various noises, and the fact they came in 3 sets of 10, I’m like 99% sure. So that was amusing, counting and identifying that activity.
Many people have terrible gaits and slam their heels down as they walk. I don’t know how someone comes to walk this way, as I’d imagine it is comfortable or great for the joints.
Typically it’s due to shoes
I spent a lot of time barefoot as a kid and now I wear barefoot shoes when not at work, I walk on the balls of my feet
My roommate slams his heels into the ground hard enough I can tell when he gets home as I can hear him walking up the stairs outside the apartment
He wore shoes all the time as a kid and primarily wears boots
What are barefoot shoes?
Shoes that don’t restrict the feet movements. Basically gloves for feet. Only protect superficially to allegedly allow the foot full range of motion and train and stimulate the use of all the muscles when walking and running. They reached peak popularity back in 2010. Recently some studies had questioned this claims as they seem to increase the rate of injuries, for of course, they provide no ankle support or torsion protection.
Basically, moccasins. Very thin, very flexible soles, with a wide toe box, so your feet can fully splay. They offer some protection against sharp rocks and similar hazards, but absolutely no support. Some have individual toes instead of a toe box.
They also make your feet absolutely ripped. I bought a pair from Vivo Barefoot a year and a half ago and they took about a month to not be tiring to walk in. I felt muscles in my feet I didn’t know existed, and now my feet are the most vascular part of my body and look like I do some crazy for specific exercise. I can’t wear normal shoes anymore because my toes feel cramped, not being able to feel the ground feels weird, and I feel like I’m gonna slip way more because I can’t “grip” the ground with my foot.
My back doesn’t hurt from walking anymore. Highly recommend, but you gotta give yourself a month to get used to them. Many barefoot shoe stores do 90 day returns no questions asked to give you time to adjust.
Basically shoes that are super wide for your toes and have no difference in height between your heel and the balls of your feet
They also are typically quite light weight
They take a little getting used to at first but after the little break in period there really nice
The worst offenders are usually obese people with bad gaits where they pound the ground with their heels every step
Ironically, my wife who is half my weight walks louder than I do.
I was going to say this, plus the only person I’ve ever seen walk hard enough to leave marks on a hardwood floor was this tiny woman in very tall heels
The lightest member of our household is the stompiest walker here too. I don’t understand how she can generate that much force.
I had a neighbour I lived next to that no joke the kids used to play basketball inside the apartment. We met the poor person below them once and she asked almost jokingly if they play basketball. Yes, yes they do that is what they’re doing.
Luckily at my new apartment I don’t have to wonder what they’re doing because in addition to the stomping I can also hear their kids fucking screaming the entire day. Do they jump on their bed at 5 am? Why yes. Do they chase the dog around at 2 pm? Why yes, yes they do. Does their dad come home and yell at them at 5 pm? Why yes! Yes he does.
So, people can’t walk around their own apartment? If I pay rent, I expect to be able to walk around my apartment as much as I want, even wearing shoes, this is not unreasonable. This is a building code problem, not your neighbors being assholes.
There’s a huge difference between walking in one’s own apartment and throwing raging parties and stuff like that.
Old European apartments with wooden floors that amplify sound like a fine tuned violin disagree :-)
To OP : talk to your neighbours. We had one old lady who wore her (lady shoes with a little heel) shoes inside and made a racket, she wouldn’t have known if we hadn’t asked. Now the nice lady wears slippers :-)
Asking is of course fine.
My roommate stomps around like he’s a 600lb land whale. He’s like 140lb. I’m a bigger dude and sometimes people don’t even hear me coming. Be considerate and walk like a normal person
Maybe it’s a bigger person thing to be so cognizant of our walking noise. But I deliberately walk a bit different around my apartment to make less noise and be courteous to my neighbors below.
I only step on certain points on my floor because of how creaky the boards are
I always wondered how shit like this worked. My mom’s uostairs neighbors are of normal size, but they stomp around like they each weigh 600 lbs. I don’t get it.
Sounds get amplified, my neighbor joked I was running a factory etc, it was just me, mostly barefoot, sometimes vacuuming.
It really isn’t that hard to be considerate. Just make an effort to not stomp around. Walk on the balls of your feet. It’s actually good for you.
It really isn’t that hard to be tolerant of someone wanting to move about their own home.
It really isn’t hard to be considerate of your neighbors. Sure, you have the right to stomp around your house. There is a lot of asshole behavior that is within your rights.
I was about to link this video, so funny
It’s possible they are either disabled or have a disabled friend / family member visiting. Someone who can walk but not well. In either case hopefully it’s just one off.
Unlikely disabled, because they move quite swiftly. It’s been months, so unfortunately not one off.
Different than other people who lived above you?
It could just be the way the apartment/housing is built making any normal walking loud for you.
Have been living together with my brother with only one wall in between that has nothing in between and let me tell you: two drywalls with air in between resonates just right on a mechanical keyboard at 2am. Now obviously floors have quite different standards even just when it comes to the load they have to carry, but that said, there’s things that make it better and worse. Carpets can be good, dampening in between is good, putting little silicon plates in between stuff that connects to the floor is also good.
And then ofc if they decided to start dropping pianos on the daily, that might make a difference.
Either way, talking to them is probably the best option. There’s not really much you can do about noise from the floor above you.
Did you already tell them there is a problem with the floor dampening and you hear every step very loudly? Surely you would not just expect them to know that they are not supposed to walk around in their own apartment and instead of talking to them tell everyone on the internet how bad they are? Because that would be pathetic.
My confrontation avoidance is pathetic, I’m working on it in therapy along w my generalized anxiety and other things.
But on the other hand, loud neighbors is a common issue in apartments, whether intentional or not… and idk, I just automatically try not to make a shit load of noise out of courtesy. Though, I’ve just recently learned that that behavior may be a byproduct of anxiety.
Also, it’s not as if I named and shamed them. There’s virtually no details about them at all.
Yeah tbh I went full contrarian with that comment don’t take it too seriously 😅 apologies for being so confrontational. Kudos for working on your issues!
It’s astonishing what kind of annoying asocial behavior people sometimes show while being absolutely unaware! We are all caught in our own stories sometimes and don’t always have good awareness of our sourrounding. The way you describe the situation it sounds like yes, they should be aware that they are loud, but it’s still very likely that they just aren’t! We’ve all been there!
You should work on it in this situation too.
ITT: people who spend no time thinking about how their actions might impact others.
Down the road from me is “Top Floor Gymnastics and Dance Center”.
I’m pretty sure the building they operate out of has commercial space on the ground floor and one or two floors of apartments under the gymnastic center.
That sounds wildly unpleasant, unless they had some amazing soundproofing
The building they are in predates WWII, so definitely not.
Does it sound like a giant toddler walking on their heels?
I remember my last apartment. These were my neighbors: https://i.makeagif.com/media/7-02-2015/yTS99e.gif
I thought maybe for a second, but then I remembered the incredible consistency of their gait, their footfalls sound like a very angry metronome when they’re going, though with frequent seconds-long pauses.
Maybe they’re banging
So it’s not just me? I know they’re not just walking around; the insulation is pretty good. But they certainly thump around in random intervals up there, like they’re constantly arranging furniture. I thought maybe they had a dog but they don’t. And they only seem to be active between the hours 3 and 6 am.
Still not as bad as my next door neighbors who come outside their front door at 5am every single day, standing right in front of my bedroom window and yell at each other for an hour. I’m 🤏 this close to opening the window and yelling at them to STFU.
Go outside theirs at 4am and do the same.
Go and have a chat with them. Perhaps as a half joke buy them a really nice pair of slippers for Christmas.
As an aside, I did once share an upstairs flat with a woman who had a prosthetic leg. We had wooden floors. The people downstairs were not amused, though she tried to move around as quietly as possible
I just keep thinking about how I’d do it, I’m so confrontation averse. Bc we’re in a mid rise, I don’t even know who they are or what they look like, which is another variable to add to my anxiety about such an interaction.
Last night I was thinking, what if I left myself a reminder to write them a note when I’m not actively aggravated, and just left it in their mailbox. /shrug
As noted by another comment, it’s kinda pathetic
Sounds like there are actually people living there. Naturally people don’t just sit all day, they also move around their flat. People in the flat below yours hear you too when you walk. Better get used to it …
I’ve lived in 3 other apartments without this particular issue, noise yes, but not like this. Also, it’s not just walking… they literally don’t stop moving for hours straight. It kinda sounds like they are walking laps around the entire perimeter of the apartment, we have the same floorplan and I can clearly hear them moving from room to room to room. I’m honestly curious what they could be doing.
Maybe they are exercising indoors? Or just have some sort of manic energy they are trying to dissipate.
I guess OP will never know. There’s no possible way to know what his neighbors are up to. Too bad it’s hidden knowledge that will never be revealed.
Treadmill?
Only if treadmills move around the apartment, though I’ve never seen that before
