A woman has asked people for advice after revealing how her life has been ‘ruined’ by her neighbour’s ‘disgusting’ balconly habit. She was thinking about writing a note but others had different suggestions
08:00, 05 Jul 2025Updated 10:43, 05 Jul 2025
She called her neighbour’s balcony antics ‘disgusting’ (stock image)(Image: Westend61 via Getty Images)
A woman has shared her distressing experience on Reddit, revealing that life has become “unbearable at the moment” due to a problematic neighbour.
She recounted how her neighbour has taken to “living” on his balcony, which is greatly affecting her own quality of life. In her post, she explained: “I moved to the upper floor of an old two-story apartment building two months ago. At first, everything seemed fine, but then a man in his 50s moved into the unit below me. He lives alone. From the very first day, he started making noise, but I tolerated it, thinking it was just the usual moving-in chaos.”
The situation escalated when he furnished his balcony and began spending most of his time there. “A few days later, he bought new furniture for his balcony and basically started living out there,” she said. “He sits on the balcony in his underwear only, chain smoking, watches reels with the speaker on, and making long video calls. Sometimes these video calls even happen after midnight.”
She suspects that because he speaks a Slavic language, he doesn’t bother to keep his voice down, assuming others won’t understand him. “I think he speaks a Slavic language, so he probably assumes no one around understands him and feels no need to lower his voice,” she wrote.
“But his endless noisy balcony lifestyle is completely disrupting my daily life and causing me stress. Both my living room and bedroom are directly above his balcony, and even with the windows closed, it sounds like he’s literally inside my apartment when he talks. I tried to tolerate it by using headphones or turning on the TV, but recently, things got worse.”
Continuing, she elaborated: “For the past few days around 4am, he has started smoking on the balcony while constantly clearing his throat and spitting loudly non-stop. He does this during the day as well, but at night, the sound is unbearable and wakes me up. He really spits every 5 seconds. It’s disturbing noise wakes me up each time and also it’s also very disgusting.”
The woman confessed that she ‘doesn’t want to confront’ her neighbour as he ‘doesn’t seem like a very considerate person’. She admitted she hasn’t spoken to the apartment manager because she expects they ‘probably won’t care’.
Instead, she’s considering leaving a note on his door. She quipped: “If that doesn’t work I have nothing to do I guess. I am feeling exhausted and have to go to work with only 3 hours sleep due to him. How adults can be that much unconsidered and self centred?!”
The post clearly resonated with users on Reddit, garnering over 1,000 upvotes and hundreds of comments.
Someone chimed in with a suggestion, saying: “Would it disrupt his video calls if you played loud music on your balcony every time he started one?”.
To which another individual added: “It works…I had a neighbour outside my first floor condo that would pace back and forth smoking and chatting on their phone every night, but it was exponentially worse when the weather was nice and of course everyone’s window was open.
“Then I decided to put my 150w tower speaker to the open window and serenade them with ZEPPELIN’S Immigrant Song at full volume until they went back inside their unit across the common green space. They ceased their phone calls for good after the second time I employed this tactic, before Plant finished his opening viking war cries and ‘We come from the land of ice and snow…’.”
Another had a different suggestion, writing: “Even better, record the noise. Then, play it for him on a loop, loudly. Especially the loud phone calls post midnight. And all the spitting. Keep playing it, and play it for the landlord. Ask landlord if he is allowed to smoke on premises.”
An additional recommendation came from someone who said: “Hang some bird feeders outside your windows,” which was seconded by another respondent, who wrote: “I was thinking birds were the solution.”
Contributing to the thread, a third individual remarked: “They have feeders that will clip to balcony railing. And squirrels just love bird food and make quite a mess below!”
The tips follow another incident where a woman recently confessed she was ‘living in fear’ because her neighbour claimed she was ‘too noisy’ – even when she only went to the toilet.
Have you endured a horror neighbour scenario? Tell us in the comments below…