Living in apartments comes with all sorts of challenges when it comes to dealing with neighbors’ noise, but some apartment dwellers can take their demands way too far.
A person on Reddit found themself in this situation when their neighbor got angry that they vacuumed in the middle of the day.
They weren’t sure about how to handle it, so they went to the AITA (Am I The A**hole) subReddit for input.
The Original Poster (OP), who goes by spatcherlongdog on the site, asked:
“AITA for vacuuming my apartment in the middle of the day during the middle of the week?”
They explained:
“So I have weekdays off from work rather than weekends and I like to clean every Wednesday. My cleaning routine includes, unsurprisingly, vacuuming. We have hard wood floors and two dogs so I bought a vacuum that also wet mops simultaneously.”
“I’m only mentioning this detail because this is the reason I don’t sweep and manually mop. Not to mention it’s a fraction of the work from actual mopping. That aside, I was vacuuming today at around 3:30 PM.”
“I’m only a couple minutes into vacuuming and I hear banging below me but blow it off because people make noise all the time (mind you it’s a multi unit apartment in an older building).”
“Twenty minutes later I finish vacuuming and look down the hall and see a note that was slipped under my door and it says: ‘Please be courteous to your neighbors downstairs. Thanks!’ signed with the most infuriating smile and insufferable heart.”
“That being said, am I the a**hole for vacuuming my apartment during the middle of the day? I am not willing to switch to sweeping/mopping to please these people.”
People on Reddit were then asked to weigh in on who is in the wrong in this scenario based on the following categories:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
- NAH – No A**holes Here
As you might guess, they found this particular dust-up patently absurd.
“Would 3:30AM be more comfortable for them?”
“NTA” —MyCatIsADramaqueen
“NTA”
“I do not think ‘courteous’ means what that person thinks it means.” —StAlvis
“NTA”
“It is the middle of the day, exactly what time would be good? Now it may be that they work nights, and sleep during the day, or they work from home, but their note didn’t really provide any alternatives.”
“Most apartments have noise restrictions, like not before 7AM or after 9PM, so if it bothers the downstairs neighbors they need to give a pretty good reason, cause you are well within your rights to vacuum every day between the hours of 7AM and 9PM if you wish.” —ForwardPlenty
“I bet they work from home and assume that because everybody is working from home now that you’re supposed to be more courteous during ‘work hours.'” —RelaxedErection
“100% this and if they do work nights they can politely explain this and give her an outline of times that would better suit them and could she please accommodate this. Not some passive aggressive stupid note.” —fingerlimepie
“As a night shift worker, I feel like most of us understand that sometimes you spend 3 hours trying to fall asleep while listening to your neighbors pool party and you just have to shrug it off and add an extra dose to the caffeine IV drip.” —korppi_tuoni
“I worked overnights for years. It seemed any time I was on nights was when my neighbors decided to weed whack or mow the lawn. Guess what I did? Learned to sleep through it because my work schedule is not my neighbors’ problem.” —LadyGreyIcedTea
“I have been working from home for a while now, and this summer, all my pensioner neighbours have been busy outside during the day. That being hedge-trimming, chainsawing, mowing the lawn, fixing up the houses.”
“This has been noisy, and it’s been difficult having my window open in the heat. I have never complained to them as the natural time to do this is in daytime, and I cannot expect them to concider my office-hours.”
“NTA, clean when it suits you. The neighbours can invest in noise-cancelling headphones.” —BatMoGirl
“But then couldn’t they have written, ‘Sorry to be a bother, but I work from home during ‘these hours’ (9-5 or whatever) could you possibly vacuum later? Thank you!'”
“Not that OP is under any obligation to change her routine, but still. If you have a valid reason, at least say so. It sounds more like the neighbour was trying to watch TV and got annoyed or something.” —secondmacleod
“I work nights and this comes with the territory. Do I wish my neighbor wasn’t mowing at noon?t Absolutely but it’s unreasonable of me to ask him not too. Would he mow a different time if I asked nicely? Maybe he’s a cool dude but again it’s unreasonable.” —tancur
“NTA!!!!!! 3:30AM I could understand the problem but 3:30PM, no way not the asshole even a little bit! Enjoy your clean floors!!” —ReachLanky3631
“NTA”
“IF they had a specific reason – sleeping baby, Wednesday Zoom Meeting with the boss, etc AND they bothered to talk to you THEN it would be a good thing to see if you could shift the timing around.” —CheekiCheshire
“I was going to say if they had a baby who had a nap schedule of 3-4 pm then they should have let you know and asked for you to vacuum at a different time.”
“But as you said it would be a ASK not a DEMAND.”
“OP you are NTA” —OwnedByACrazyCat
“NTA. this seems like the most reasonable time to vacuum possible. like most people wouldn’t even be able to do that because they work. what fucking time do they want you to clean if not then??? the middle of the night??? i’m sure they’d love that.” —lil_potato_boi
“NTa – you’re allowed to vacuum; part of living in an apartment is occasional noise. While work from home has been an adjustment for everyone, it’s also the middle of the day. If they came up and specifically said they had an important meeting could you wait an hour it would be different, but you can’t just never clean.” —LightningLilac
Hopefully OP can avoid further conflict with their neighbors.