NYC - Landlord, Noise Issues

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nycrenter

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I live in a rent stabilized apartment in New York City. It is poorly maintained and you can hear everything going on in the apartment above you and sometimes to either side of you (depending on how loud the people decide to be/if their windows are open/etc.). I've come to accept this as part of living in the city (thin walls). The ceiling in several rooms of our apartment has caved in due to water damage and I've seen that there are two thin layers of sheet rock and an 8 inch air pocket separating me from my neighbors.

Last year, a woman from overseas moved to NYC, for what we believe to be the first time. She came to us in the afternoon less than a week after she moved in complaining that our TV was too loud and that she couldn't hear anything else in her apartment due to the volume of our TV. We found this odd because we couldn't hear our own TV from any other room of our small 600 sq ft apartment. She couldn't hear it from our front door either, to which she had no response other than that we'd turned it off to deal with her (which we hadn't). She came by again the next day at 5pm and was belligerent claiming she couldn't hear herself think with all of the noise coming from our apartment and again, we asked her what kind of noise, assuming it must be coming from another apartment. Again she claimed it was the TV, again we asked if she could hear it at our door and she said no and we suggested she check with her other neighbors. We haven't heard from her since.

She has continued to complain - not to us, however - but to anyone who will listen to her in both the building, creating a very tense living situation for us with our neighbors, with whom we'd previously enjoyed great relationships and now to building management, who've sent us a threatening letter claiming they have grounds to evict us. She pounds on the ceiling anytime I run the vacuum cleaner - regardless of time of day (2pm on a Saturday? I don't find that unreasonable) and has also done so on other odd and quite random occasions (I've been sitting on the bed reading - no tv, no radio, no other sound than the turning of the page).

We've cut our TV time down so that it's off by 11pm and turn the volume very low after 9pm. Our entire apartment is covered in carpet, with padding, in all of the major walking areas (with the exception of the kitchen). We never have parties, rarely entertain guests (if we do, it's one or two people for couch conversation - we are seriously boring people), we go to bed around 11pm and get up at 7am. We'll occasionally play "loud" (you can't hear it outside of the apt - I've gone downstairs outside of the laundry room to check) music on the weekends when we're cleaning, but it can't be heard over our vacuum.

I apologize if this sounds ridiculous or if I'm giving "silly" details. I'm really having a hard time reconciling the fact that I've lived in this apartment for over 13 years, with not a single complaint before this person, and now I'm receiving eviction threats from the landlord, who, included the complaintant's name on their letter - so I know who it is (even though everyone in the building already told me what she was doing).

The landlord has accused us of throwing wild parties, playing loud music, having rude guests and generally being "loud". I believe that "loud" is subjective and unfortunately don't have any proof that the other complaints are simply untrue and have no idea what to do. The super has told this woman she's out of her mind, but building management seems intent on pursuing this. The worst part about it is that she travels a great deal and is hardly ever in her apartment, but it seems that the minute she steps foot inside, she feels the need to complain.

I'm at a loss and want to know what I should be doing legally to rectify this situation. My upstairs neighbor sounds like they are throwing chairs at 3am and I don't complain because I realize that this is part of NYC apartment living (this neighbor is actually better than the one who actually WAS throwing chairs at 3am). Am I wrong for accepting their behavior? As I type this, I wonder if she's calling to complain that I'm clicking my keyboard too loudly (yes, she's complained about us when we haven't even been here).

Not that this is really relevant to my situation, but the building manager is incredibly unscrupulous and takes cash "bribes" from people in order to get into apartments in this building (amongst other nefarious actions) - so I'm dealing with a super shady character here. So I want to make sure that all I do is squeaky clean with this guy.

Thanks for your time and your help!
 
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Since receiving the letter from our management company, we've spoken to all of our surrounding neighbors (above and below, right and left, across the hall, on all floors) to find out if they can hear any noise from our apartment. As it turns out, they cannot and furthermore, this woman has complained about noise from all of them as well. Unfortunately for us, we are the only ones left in a rent stabilized apartment, as all of the others have already "flipped" (unscrupulously so, but nevertheless, there you have it).
 
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