How can I wreak revenge on a noisy downstairs neighbor?

Do you have wood floors? If so put on high heels, walk around and bounce a tennis ball. Bonus point if you can get a large dog who likes to run from room to room, chasing the tennis ball.

Vacuum at 2am or roll a bowling ball around.

One time my neighbors above did some sort of video game that involved running, possibly the Dance Dance Whatever game, and it was like a 7.0 earthquake while elephants were rampaging was happening, They did it during the daytime, so no complaints can be had.

OP, take up Schuhplattlering.

What makes you think annoying him back will make him more considerate?

Take up jogging in your apartment. You get the benefits of exercise while getting back at your neighbor.

OP, do you own a cowl neck sweater?

To be serious, do you think he knows how loud he is? The best outcome is to just tell him, “hey, I think you might want to know that I can hear you talking.” (Which means fucking, fighting, crying, whatever, he’ll get it.

If it’s revenge you want, I think Ethyl Merman has many uses.

First, thank you for saying wreak and not wreck.

Second, use this stupid Geico family.

Do not vacuum at 2am or anything else that will violate the terms of decency and your lease. Has to be terribly legal like R3 describes.

I have a smoker downstairs from me in this non smoking building. After months of me carefully vacuuming every day starting at 7:30am and then intermittently throughout the day, as well as lovingly tapping my foot while singing off tune whenever I"m on the computer...he snapped and starting throwing furniture around and smoking so much that he received an Eviction Notice this week.

A loop of Ethel Nerman is a GREAT idea. I'm going to incorporate that into the daily routine as a good bye present.

I have the opposite problem.... a woman of short stature who is apparently at Level 5 at Jumanji, replete with stampeding hearts of animals and move bough furniture they must be pretending they are running a showroom.

Any suggestions for someone who wants revenge when you’re on the floor below?

* enough furniture

(They live directly above me and are driving me crazy... the landlord is only dealing with “urgent” issues at the moment) I’m wondering if not paying my rent would get his attention...)

Sad R12. What time does she move the furniture? Get one of those video games that has sound effects like an airplane far away slowly coming into focus and slowly going away again. Not real loud, but enough to drive a person mad.

You should move. Never chance living below someone.

Vacuum in your high heels.

The now defunct webstore Think Geek used to sell a little electronic gizmo called the Annoy-A-Tron. It was about the size of two CR2032 batteries (those small round flat ones), and emitted beeping sounds at random intervals and frequencies. For some acoustic reason it was almost impossible to pinpoint its location.

I just searched and found a knockoff on Amazon. You'd have to figure out a way to place it so that your neighbor could hear it but you couldn't - maybe on an external window?

I had a malignant neighbor. At some point, I tried to record some bothersome noises they made, but, even though I could hear it, it couldn’t get the sound to be picked-up on my iPhone. That experience taught me that he likewise couldn’t record any noise that I was making, and that was good to know.

Get a basketball and practice dribbling.

Get and use a ceiling vibrator; just use it on the floor. High end models have WiFi and Bluetooth controls.

Walk on your heels, especially when you get up to get a drink or pee in the middle of the night.

Vaseline their doorknob. Be aware of CCTV though.

Get a bottle of Liquid Ass and spray it their way, from your balcony.

I used to have an upstairs neighbor who blasted Neil Diamond. One more than one occasion, he turned that shit on and left.

Invite your husband's rumba band over to play their rendition of 'El Breako the Leaso'

Get an animal or two- I swear to the gods above they sound like horses when they run around.

[quote]I just want to find a way to annoy him as much as he annoys me so that he will be more considerate.

That’s not how any of this works

Yes, R19. OP should adopt multiple rambunctious animals in his home. That’ll really stick it to the neighbor!!!

Girls! Girls! You’re both petty little cunts!

This is reason number 413 why I will only live in a house.

Put your alarm clock on the floor next to your bed

Take up skipping and practise your jump rope.

Kill them.

Tie cowbells to your jump rope so they will get the THUMP! CLANG! BOOM!

Be nice to them. Call and ask to be helpful. It will drive them crazy. I am quite serious. People just hate that.

“I’m going to CVS later, can I pick you up something? I heard you coughing earlier.”

“I noticed when you were on the phone earlier that your voice sounded scratchy. Do you need some cough syrup?”

“Oh, I have a realtor I could recommend! I couldn’t help but overhear you talking on the phone about it, earlier.”

I had a neighbor once who was similarly inconsiderate. He basically told me to fuck myself when I tried to talk to him about his Eurotrash music. So I duct taped my speakers to the adjoining wall, put in a Maria Callas CD, turned the volume up all the way, set it on replay, and left for the night. When I came back the next day, he heard the elevator and came to the door and said "You win" and that was the last I heard him.

My neighbor sued me and only won because I was inattentive. He expected for me to pay his legal fees, but the judge limited them. So, he has to pay a portion of his own fees. - He is the sorest winner I have ever met. Sore-losers aren’t half as as bad as sore-winners. They’re the worst.

Now I’m going to sue him, because he’s not letting this thing go, and I’m tired of just taking it. I want to shut him the fuck up, once and for all. And of course, I wouldn’t be doing anything, but I see that he’s been stealing from the association and I can prove it.

Pierre, you make me laugh.

Have you tried knocking on his door and having a polite, adult conversation with him? Normal people feel bad if they've made their neighbors feel uncomfortable.

Or you can shoot him in the face.

i highly recommend sound transducers. Attach them to the ceiling and blast some retro punk through them.

How about an inexpensive gadget you affix to the ceiling. There are a couple levels of VIBRATION that could be very annoying.

r33, not OP here, but I tried that. Didn't get me anywhere. (the having an adult conversation part, not the shooting in the face part, though I'm leaning strongly towards the latter)

The risk is speaking to a neighbor, frankly and adultly, about a barking dog, for example, is that they can say “fuck you”, and do nothing, and now you’ve given your hand away. Now, if you do something sneaky, like call the police, he knows who is complaining. And dogs can be hard to control. People, particularly deplorable people, sometimes will leave the bored dog in the yard all day with nothing to do but bark.

In my neighborhood, if I wanted to motivate a neighbor to do something, I do it anonymously. It just seems safer. I sent one owner a letter where I said, basically, “I love the color you’ve chosen for your window frames that you started painting a few years ago, Its beautiful. It will look so nice when you finish.” Surprisingly, he resumed painting after a two year hiatus and finished that next Spring. it was a bit of an effort to find the owner’s name and all, as it was before the internet.

Other common complaints are about thoughtless street parking. Parking spots sell for up to $200,000 in my neighborhood, so it is annoying when people “store” an unused car on the street. Street spots are not owned by a person but are first come, first served. But there is a general understanding that you can use them, but you don’t own them. One time, there was a car with two flats, and every panel was dented, that hadn’t moved for a year. I started leaving flyers on it. When I saw that the owner was immediately removing the flyers, I started using Elmers glue. Fuck them! I needed a spot for my car, too. They finally sold the damn car.

Sometimes, an owner will park in a way that blocks the use of a second spot, but just isn’t thinking. That’s no big deal, but if they leave their car there for a long time, someone will leave a note. It’s just understood that you can hog a single street spot with a car that you use, but you cannot be thoughtless about it, and you have to occasionally move the car.

If you shovel out the snow from a street spot in some neighborhoods of Boston, you can take ownership of the spot by leaning a piece of furniture in the empty spot, when you are using the car. If you didn’t know the custom and took a spot, you were inviting vandalism of your car, if the shoveler returned and found your car in his spot, The last Mayor finally declared that there was a two-day limit on it, and the garbage men were instructed to take the furniture with the trash after two days. (Some shovelers had basically taking ownership of spots for the entire Winter.) I, personally, generally just stop using my car until the snow melts. But it is my preference to garage my car if I know a storm is coming, and then move it back to a street spot after it’s started melting. There’s a whole culture to how you share the common spots around you.

When I worked in Cambridge, MA I noticed during snow storms the cars just wouldn't move. They'd be buried under a few feet of snow but they'd stay there until spring melted most of the snow. I would imagine it wasn't just Cambridge where this happened.

[quote]R8 If it’s revenge you want, I think Ethel Merman has many uses.

Yoko works better than Ms. Merman.

I'm surprised no one has asked the OP what the person below is doing that is so annoying. OP?

Woodchipper. My neighbour has made my lockdown life hell for the past 2 weeks.

My upstairs neighbor has an alarm clock with (I think) Wendy Williams screaming, "WAKE UP, IT'S TIME FOR YOU TO BLAH BLAH BLAH DE BLAH DE BLAD DE BLAH (can't decipher the rest)". It's super obnoxious. I was gone the whole summer with my cat sitter staying over, and Upstairs Neighbor went away for the weekend, forgetting to turn off the alarm clock. Poor cat sitter had to sleep in the living room because of that.

The guy downstairs has a woodchipper? Why in the world is he running a woodchipper? Is this an apartment? A duplex out in the country or .........what? You can't be the only one being disturbed by that noise. I once stayed in the condo of a friend whose neighbor was shaping surfboards on the lawn downstairs. The noise and foam shavings plus stink from chemicals was disgusting so I get that you're pissed. I can't believe the other neighbors put up with this shit. Can you get your neighbors to form an alliance to end this bullshit?

Make sure you have a thin carpet down to prevent damage to your floors, but drop a toolbox on it. Bounce a tennis ball if you have hardwood floors. Amp up your base and play music with a strong rhythm, but not long enough to have the cops or landlord called on you. Do it at 2 am if you really want to be obnoxious.

Take up the saxophone, and practice only while drinking.

r48- i think violin would be worse. OR BAGPIPES!!!!

If the neighbor is old, drums or bongos might get the old ticker out of rhythm and end this problem quickly.

You can bring your orchestra from the club to practice in your apartment.

Get noise cancelling earphones for you, and play horror movies at full volume all day, they would think you are some kind of psychopath and leave you alone. You can also say hello to them in the hallway "hellooo Clarisssse"

The woodchipper was at the place next door to my house. They picked the worst 2 weeks because we were all working from home (or at least trying to) due to the NZ lockdown. It has stopped now and the house is for sale and in the pictures there is a full bath in the main bedroom, so apparently trees were the last of their problems..

I'm thinking shitty wallpaper choices are near the top of the list for problems.

This an easy one. Expand your social circle or if you don't have one create one. So now you have friends that enjoy coming over too !This will take your mind off being so lonely and vindictive that you sit around in a jealous snit contemplating punishments for people who are charismatic and well liked.

r51, what would a property like that go for? They have no price listed.

Forget heels- clogs!

Kill him or move. Only options

The online estimate says $565 - $640K NZ, which is about $320k - 381.5k US

pour grease down your sink. It will clog his sink, not yours

Give him CoVid19.