Homes are very expensive here in Fairbanks and knowing our current financial position, we wanted to be sure that we shopped within our budget. Unfortunately, that left us with very few homes in town. We came across this one in the paper and it’s appeal was that it had a rental unit downstairs and a tenant that wanted to renew her lease. Her rent would cover over half of our monthly mortgage payment, which was just too hard to pass up.
Unfortunately, once we moved in, we found out that certain noises carry quite a bit between her ceiling and our floor. Brian and I did a test one day when he was doing some work down there to see if our voices carried. Thankfully, he didn’t hear me even when I was yelling his name as loud as I could. However, the boys are terrible about stomping and dropping toys, and all of those noises are heard, so we’ve very aware of when her car is outside and when it is not. It’s challenging to keep a two and three year old from being normal, rowdy boys. Luckily, she is actually not home all that much during the times that they are awake and noisy.
There have been a couple of times though, like today, when she’s home and I’ve had a friend over who has three boys (making five rowdy boys) running around up here. On those occasions I’ve noticed that she will turn on her music and turn it up quite loud. The bass carries severely and I’ve wondered if she is doing it to drown the noise or to make a point. Brian said today, that it might be a little of both. The music continued for about thirty minutes after they left and was turned down suddenly after Jacob dropped a heavy book on the floor. I wondered if she thought I stomped or something like that.
I haven’t called her to complain when it is loud. It’s quite annoying, but then I figure the noise that carries down from the boys stomping and jumping is probably just as annoying and she’s stuck with it for now too. She’s always pleasant when she sees me and will make small talk, but I wonder what she thinks of us and our status as her landlords. I also wonder what the next tenant will be like.
