Imagine moving into an apartment that you think is going to be really great, but then you meet the neighbors. And you don’t meet the neighbors in a nice, friendly way. You’re introduced to them by their noise and their smells. Yes, awful smells wafting from their apartment.

What would you do in this situation? Would you talk to the neighbors about it, go to the landlord for help, try to ignore the problems, or move?

In this story, one couple is in this situation, and the boyfriend needed to vent. He’s so stressed out by these awful neighbors, and I would be too! They truly sound horrible!

Keep reading for all the details.

Terrible Neighbours in terrible building with terrible landlord

My girlfriend and I (30M and 28F) moved into an apartment in November 2025 and signed a one year lease.

The building is a 3 story (basement, fist floor, and second floor) apartment building, with 6 units on each floor.

At first, things were okay. I made an effort to be friendly and get to know the majority of the tenants in the building, with most being friendly back to me.

But as time passed, more and more stuff came to light. To preface, honestly the apartment itself is nice for what we pay (albeit bad wall insulation, as we started to notice we can hear everything on all sides).

Some neighbors are more considerate than others.

My upstairs neighbours are stompers, at all times. Fortunately, I confronted them when it first became a problem. They were nice and respectful, and we had a good constructive convo.

The noise has gone down, but it still can be a problem sometimes. But this is the least of my problems here.

Now for the big ones…. The neighbours directly beside me, that I share a wall with, are just awful awful people.

It is a man and woman in their late 30s, with the most yappy, untrained small dog and and cat, and various other dogs from time to time as “rescues”.

They’re not good dog owners.

Although I love animals and respect this, these dogs are problematic, loud, and smell so bad.

They are not good owners despite “rescuing” these dogs.

They left their apartment for 7 hours with the dogs home one day and they endlessly barked viciously nonstop for 7 hours.

The whole building came down to our part of the hallway and complained and wanted to call the police as it sounded like the dogs were in distress.

He tried to defend the neighbors.

I advocated on their behalf at the time (I was a month into my lease and wanted to be a good neighbour) as they weren’t home to advocate for themselves.

In hindsight, definitely shoulda let that happen.

I confronted them about it when they got home and informed them of the situation, and they were very apologetic.

I took the apology for what it was and told them I hoped to not have any further problems in the future… boy was I wrong.

One problem is the smell.

Fast forward a couple months to now and it’s been nothing but problems.

The yappy dog barks at all times to any movement outside the door.

On top of that, they always leave their door halfway open and their apartment smells like a barnyard and it leaks into our hallway and it makes the whole hallway smell so bad.

The smell sometimes creeps into my apartment and makes me gag, and I have gotten a diffuser to mitigate the smell, and I constantly odourize our shared hallway.

The noise is a big issue too.

They have people over all the time and yell and party, which I can hear everything because of our shared wall. I have to turn my tv up louder than necessary sometimes just so I don’t have to hear whatever’s going on in their apartment.

Worst of all, from time to time, they have domestic disputes that are loud and vicious and I can hear it all.

I have countless videos of the dogs and their barking, of the smell, of their parties, and their domestic drama.

I ended up confronting them last week about it but they weren’t having it and I was heated so it definitely wasn’t a constructive convo lol (we hate each other).

Then there’s an issue caused by another neighbor.

Lastly, the neighbour below me smokes cigarettes in his unit, and the smell definitely seeps into the pipes of the whole building and floods the whole building, including our apartments.

Everyone has this problem but no one wants to do anything about it – except me.

Fortunately I have a good relationship with this tenant so, this might be able to be fixed.

The landlord isn’t helpful at all.

I have brought these issues up to my landlord, and he genuinely finds any reason to not have to deal with anything. He’s a bare minimum guy.

If only I had done my research before I moved in, I would have known that typing his name on Google would have informed me that he is one of the most notorious slum lords in the city I live in.

I’m losing my mind because I have no real way to deal with these issues until my lease is up and I can move out. I can’t really break my lease cause my lease has specific terms which will hurt me in court.

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Yes, I can go to the LTB, but it will be a long and trivial process to go through just for about 6 more months of living here.

There is some good news.

The one good thing, however, is that my landlord informed me that these terrible neighbours beside me are moving out in June. So I’m hoping that changes things for the rest of my lease.

They are legit 60 percent of my stress living here.

I don’t feel good about living in my apartment, my mental health is down the drain. Really hoping whoever moves in there is a better situation than what I have already.

I just feel terrible and hopeless here.

It sounds like the major source of the problem will be gone soon, so that’s good. Overall, it sounds like an awful place to live though.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a townhome owner who is at his wit’s end with the noise from next door.

Let’s see how Reddit responded to this story.

I completely agree. Nobody should have to live this way.

Another person thinks anyone would feel the way he does in his situation.

This person wouldn’t let the landlord get away with ignoring this situation.

Here’s a vote for filing a complaint.

You can only ignore awful situations for so long. Eventually, the noise, smells and drama will start affecting your mental health. Nobody should have to live next to neighbors like this.

The landlord is awful for letting them continue to live this way, but at least they’re moving soon.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a man who reported some missionaries after frustration over lack of parking boils over.