Afraid I will get evicted because of my 4-year-old's tantrums -- what are my rights?

[Anonymous]

OP here!

We did end up using the idea of taking her out to the car - which we have not actually had to do. The mere threat of it has freaked her out, especially when we start getting the keys. Some of the posts here also made me get real about our own role in this, and we started new "house rules" that made it clear that loudness was unacceptable. After doing that for about a week, I reached out to my neighbor directly and asked her if she noticed any difference. She said it was much better, and we talked about me checking in with her every once in a while to see how the noise is from her perspective.

Also, may I say that I was not fair to describe the noise as "screaming at the top of her lungs." That happened a few times, but it wasn't the norm.

I found many of the comments here judgmental and unhelpful, like the suggestion that we should somehow "move to a house," which we can't afford, or that I should not have another child, which is just cold. But just as many of the comments were useful and compassionate. So thank you.

I still don't know what the law says, but it seems like it's going to be ok, for my neighbor and for us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here!

We did end up using the idea of taking her out to the car - which we have not actually had to do. The mere threat of it has freaked her out, especially when we start getting the keys. Some of the posts here also made me get real about our own role in this, and we started new "house rules" that made it clear that loudness was unacceptable. After doing that for about a week, I reached out to my neighbor directly and asked her if she noticed any difference. She said it was much better, and we talked about me checking in with her every once in a while to see how the noise is from her perspective.

Also, may I say that I was not fair to describe the noise as "screaming at the top of her lungs." That happened a few times, but it wasn't the norm.

I found many of the comments here judgmental and unhelpful, like the suggestion that we should somehow "move to a house," which we can't afford, or that I should not have another child, which is just cold. But just as many of the comments were useful and compassionate. So thank you.

I still don't know what the law says, but it seems like it's going to be ok, for my neighbor and for us.

Great news for all of you-you, your dd, your new baby, your neighbor! I'm glad you were able to find some useful info in this discussion.

[Anonymous]

OP I am sorry some of the posters here were so judgemental but glad things seem to working out.

In DC you can only be evicted for violations of your lease (but not all lease provisions are enforceable) so I think the best place to start would be to see what your lease says about noise.

[Anonymous]

Saw this post on Reddit. Is it possible its from the OTHER side of this story: https://www.reddit.com/r/IllegalLifeProTips/comments/ev8tjo/ilpt_request_what_can_i_do_to_make_my_upstairs/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Saw this post on Reddit. Is it possible its from the OTHER side of this story: https://www.reddit.com/r/IllegalLifeProTips/comments/ev8tjo/ilpt_request_what_can_i_do_to_make_my_upstairs/'

this one is about a baby. OP is an older child.

[Anonymous]

OP - just wanted to come on here and say I have a lot of empathy for you. I am really glad some of this discussion was a wake up call to help get your house under control.

I am an attorney and I really think this would legally be difficult to evict you because family status is a protected class in housing, but it would be a close call because of the noise issue. Either way, you can almost always cure a breach of lease in DC except in very rare circumstances, so if things got really bad you would just have to take her outside every time she started being noisy.

[Anonymous]

Come on folks, suggesting OP move to a single family house means she might have to move to the suburbs. Does anyone in DCUM really want to wish that fate upon ANYONE?

[Anonymous]

OP, I'm glad your situation is getting better.

Anyone who lives in an apartment with young children should take measures to keep the noise level reasonable.

Carpet helps. Not wearing shoes or giving the children toys that will be banged on the floor helps more. Consider putting down very thick, sound-absorbing rugs on top of the carpet, also. (IKEA helpfully has large, cheap rugs with explicit notes about their sound properties.) Keeping the doors closed will help your neighbors to the side of you. Acoustic tile can be installed on the ceiling and floors with no more damage than hanging a painting would cause, and you can get decorative ones as well. They will absorb a lot of sound and are strongly recommended for apartment/condo-dwellers with noisy habits, whether they are children or electric guitars.

Also, highly energetic children should be taken outside or to the park or to an indoor play place where they can run around and exhaust themselves. Running around inside the apartment is really not a good idea for anyone involved. They can be as noisy as they want to be in the park.

A four-year-old should be able to be respectful of noise rules. That does not mean that they won't sometimes forget to use their inside voice. Screaming at the top of their lungs, especially for an extended period of time, should never be okay and at some point in time it will lead to a CPS call, which you really do not want to ever have to deal with.