Neighbour noise: the problem Spain refuses to fix

Neighbour noise: when a new-build flat doesn't guarantee silence

A couple with a baby buys a new-build flat in Vitoria: quiet neighbourhood, upper-middle class, expensive flats. Weeks later, noise from the neighbours below throwing parties, the dog on the second floor that hasn't been washed filling the lift with hair and smell, and barbecues on the ground-floor patios turn their terrace into a smoke chamber. It's not an isolated case. It's the general tone of a country where noise pollution has become normalised.

Construction quality: plasterboard as public enemy

Economic forums have been pointing for months to a key factor: new builds use plasterboard left and right, a material that provides no soundproofing. Shared partitions are no more than 8-10 centimetres thick, compared to the brick walls of 1980s homes. Neighbours who snore like MotoGP bikes, children who stomp like horses, DIY enthusiasts who hammer endlessly. The result is that paying a high price for a flat in a supposedly good neighbourhood doesn't save you from hearing your neighbour's entire life.

A cultural problem that knows no social class

The experience repeats across Spain, from Vitoria to Madrid, including high-income areas. The usual response is "you make noise too" or "if you don't like it, move to the countryside". Anyone who asks for silence is labelled neurotic. In countries like Switzerland, Sweden or France, respect for others' rest is the norm. Here, the bar becomes a decibel competition and terraces an extension of the living room. Noise pollution puts Spain at the top worldwide, alongside Japan, but with a difference: there the nuisance comes from traffic; here, from people.

Solutions: from rural exodus to guerrilla warfare

The only definitive escape seems to be a detached house. Those who can flee to semi-detached houses or homes with land. But even that is no guarantee: dogs, barbecues and parties transcend walls. Others opt for creative revenge: speakers at full volume while they go for a walk, sardines on grills to ruin hanging laundry, sugar in exhaust pipes. The most pragmatic invest 90 euros in custom-made earplugs. An individual solution for a collective problem.

With these ingredients, the question is whether the Spanish property market is correctly pricing the cost of noise. For now, demand for detached houses keeps rising, and new-build flats, however expensive, don't guarantee rest. Until regulations require real acoustic insulation and civic education improves, inconsiderate behaviour will remain the unwritten tax of living in Spain.

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