Loud Drunk Neighbor Suck!

[lavender fairy]

My upstairs neighbor sucks.  He gets drunk regularly, get loud, yells, slams, things, and is a general nuisance.  We have tried calling the cops on him, it only esclates the situation.  Same with calling the landlord.  So, we have done our best to try to make compromises with this guy and talk to him as reasonalby as possible.

 

Also, my dryer sucks.  It was cheap and used when I bought it 2 years ago.  It squeaks.  Upstairs neighbor has asked that we not run it after 11 pm because it keeps him awake.  Fine, no problem. 

 

I did laundry today.  I hadn't done any laundry in over 2 weeks, and spent most of the day doing laundry. 

 

At about 10:50, I hear a loud slam upstairs, then lots of yelling and cussing.  At some point, I can parse out the word "dryer" amongst the cuss words. 

 

I waited a few minutes because I was scared, but went downstairs because I wanted to keep to the 11:00 agreement, and turned off the dryer.  Neighbor met me down there to say, "you really need to fix that dryer."  I told him his behavior was not helping the situation.  He had a few more words to say, (something about how I've been doing laundry every day and keeping him up) and then went upstairs slamming doors on the way. 

 

I'm shaking.  I'm scared.  I'm alone.  I called the wife who is out of town.  She said we will talk to the neighbor when he is sober and she is home about the dryer.  Maybe agree to stop at 10:00.  But we CANNOT afford a new dryer, and do not have much money to fix it.  We were advised by a friend who we asked to come look at it that it problably cannot be fixed.  So, we haven't looked into it any further. 

 

I don't know what to do.  I know I have some responsibility in this situation, but I am also an abuse survivor, and I tend to blame myself for things that other people do.  I don't like haaving to deal with this guy as it is.  He triggers me.  I try to be as nice as possible.  But I don't know how to be nice when he acts like this. 

[Stickler]

I don't know that being nice is of any help, honestly, he's a belligerent drunk.

Is it legal to record him without his knowledge in your jurisdiction? I think having evidence that the guy's like this might be helpful.

If possible, I'd record every interaction you have with him.

Edited August 13, 2014 by Stickler

[Chimako]

Our last dryer was squeaky (this one is too since it's 10 yrs old, we don't buy dryers much), DH found the model number and bought a new belt.  He put it on and the squeak stopped.  

 

Even if you do that tho, it doesn't excuse the asshole upstairs.  

[jt07]

I can relate. Once my ex and I lived in a townhouse apartment where our 65 year-old next-door neighbor would come home from the bar drunk several times a week and play music really, really loudly until the wee hours of the morning. The walls between apartments were little more than two pieces of drywall with air in between so the music came through in all its glory.

 

We complained to the landlord. We even called the cops once after he threatened to kill us. He accused us of not liking his style of music (no, we didn't want to hear any music at that hour). He said he needs to play it loud because he likes to walk around his apartment. We tried to compromise with him. I offered to buy him a set of cordless headphones. All was to no avail. The only thing that saved us was that he retired after a year and moved.