If you’ve ever lived in an apartment with ultra-thin walls, you’ll know how difficult it is to have a private life. Or, for your neighbors to have a private life, for that matter. Here, people share the most delicious secrets they’ve heard through ultra-thin walls that they definitely weren’t meant to.
1. When you hear something super sad
I learned that my neighbour’s husband was beating her. It was super sad. They had a 2 year old at the time and I knew she was a stay at home mom. So…one day I had a week day off work, went over with a cake, and made her my best friend. At the time she had a broken arm and two huge black eyes. She didn’t have any friends as she wasn’t from the area. I helped her with her kid, I helped her dump him, I helped her move back to her home province and we’re still best friend to this day.
Here’s some answers to some faq’s:
-I didn’t call the police as I was young and scared and didn’t know what to do. I was 18 at the time and had just move to the city. One of the most dangerous cities in the country. I was worried that their kid would get taken away, or that he would know it was me and try to beat me up. Contrary to seemingly popular belief, I’m a girl (as indicated by the princess in my username), and I’m not a sizeable one. I figured it would be easier for her for me to just be someone to talk to and she could decide if she wanted to call the police or not. When I went over that day I just the new neighbor wanting to make friends (this happened when I had lived in the building about 3 weeks), I didn’t even mention her eyes or cast that day. We just sat around and giggled and compared Archie Comic collections. We legit became best friends in the matter of hours.
-I have not seen Drive, but I guess I should check it out. I for some reason thought it was about Ryan Gosling stealing cars? Whateves, I’ll give it a go.
-It was a “McCain’s Deep and Delicious” marble cake, as I’m not a baker.
2. The juicy gossip on the Facebook nudes
My neighbor’s teenage daughter sent some nudes via Facebook and got caught by her mom. That girl got yelled at like I’ve never heard. And I heard it all because I turned off everything in my place that made noise and stood with my ear against the wall basically the entire time.
3. The guy that would be embarrassed to have an audience
My neighbour has been learning to play guitar for almost a year now, he’s gotten a lot better! Shhhhh!
4. This is our new Sunday night entertainment
In college, we could always hear a girl and her boyfriend argue. It went on for weeks. Each time, I’d mute the television and listen in. Housemates thought it was odd at first, but once they started hearing the crap this couple said, they were totally on board.
5. It was entertaining, until…
When I was younger, I moved into this new apartment complex. First night there, it started… Sex noises. Every night around 11pm I hear this couple having sex, loud sex. I admit that I found it a bit entertaining (because it never went on for too long) until a couple weeks later. I see the guy walking out of his apartment. 75 years old and quite husky. Nobody was having sex… I was listening to his porn over surround sound.
6. Uh… I can explain
I had cops called on me for suspected domestic abuse when I was fresh out of college. I lived alone at the time and what actually happened was (Continued)
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I lived alone at the time and what actually happened was that I beat the crap out of my box fan after a 5 game losing streak on SCII ladder.
7. Personal concerts are oh-so-sweet
My neighbor sings to someone through the phone about 3 nights a week. I don’t know what he is saying but it sounds like he really loves whoever it is he is singing to. I don’t really get annoyed by it because I think it’s a pretty sweet thing to do. It’s to the point now that if I don’t hear singing for a while I get a little worried about him.
8. The perfect neighbor
My neighbor is the perfect neighbor, single guy in his 40s, he makes no noise and is rarely home; I see him leaving sometimes in the morning always in a suit and tie, hair perfectly combed, and he drives a M6.
But one weekend each month his two sons come to visit him.
They’re both pretty young, and the week before they come I have heard him on the balcony talking with someone on the phone about the plans he’s made to do with his boys once they’re there.
Also once they’re at his apartment I can hear him read to them every night before bed.
9. “They couldn’t live without each other”
Lived in a four apartment strip back in the 90’s. Quiet, peaceful, perfect.
One Saturday afternoon, I’m sitting on the couch watching tv and hear a gunshot. Second later, another. I run next door and pound on the door, can’t get in.
So I call 911, tell them this and cops show up pretty quick.
Turns out the elderly couple next door did a murder-suicide pact because they didn’t want to live without one another.
10. Wine isn’t alcohol…right?
Some jerkwad who lives right above me is a lot louder than he seems to think he is. Just the other night, I learned he’s “quitting alcohol and switching to wine.”
11. Neighbors who appreciate food this much are worth keeping
My neighbors used to get really high and make crazy food and eat snacks loudly late into the night. My favorite thing I ever heard as I was passing by was: (Continued)
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“Dude. Yes.”
“And then put some friggin cheese in it dude.”
“You mean stuff it in inside the bell pepper??”
“Hell yes! And then put it in the oven!”
Loud moaning
12. Suspicious renovations in the middle of the night
My upstairs neighbours absolutely love to move their furniture around. I assume this is supposed to be a secret because it only happens between 3 am – 4 am.
13. The sounds of a new beginning
I heard my neighbor give birth when I was a kid. It was planned, there were a bunch of people there and she did it in a bathtub or something.
14. Today we’re broken up, tomorrow we’re together, repeat
My next-door neighbor used to constantly break up with her boyfriend and have loud sobbing phone calls with her friends late at night.
One time a friend even called the police because he was worried she would harm herself. I saw the police walking down the hall as I was coming home and they thought I was her at first.
Then they went into her apartment and spoke for 30 minutes about love, pills and the importance of staying resilient in the face of breakups. The officer was a great guy, but I heard way too much.
15. This guy’s a true adventurer!
I learned that my old neighbor’s kid is… an adventurer in the body of a nine-year-old boy. The first conversation I ever heard between mother and son was something akin to her shrieking, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO THE CARPET?”
“I’M DIGGING A HOLE, MOM!”
I often heard her crying and one time asking him if he’d prefer to live with his dad, because he seemed miserable with her. She thought that was why he was acting out. He ended up crying, too, and begging her to let him stay. So he did, and at least they seemed to get on better after that.
To not end on a sour note, the funniest thing I think I heard was her shrieking, “OH MY GOD, WHERE DID YOUR CLOTHES GO?”
“NOT HERE.”
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!”
“I’M FREE, MOM! I’M FREE!”
She scolded him, but after I heard him stomp off, I heard her laughing pretty hard on the other side of the wall.
16. This is so sad 🙁
I’ve learned that my neighbor probably abuses his wife…
Which of the 3am hallway arguments brought me to that conclusion? (Continued)
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Was it the one where she locked him out and he tried to break down the door? Or the one where four separate neighbors called the cops because they were screaming at each other for almost an hour?
No, the one that really fixed my impression of him is when he chased her down the stairs carrying a metal pipe and he swung so hard at her that he broke off a chunk of the concrete. I kept the broken shards as a souvenir for the cops. I really hope she gets out.
17. A lady and her cat
The woman next door has a relationship with her cat that’s… interesting. She’s a recluse in her mid forties. Nuthin’ wrong with that, but she doesn’t seem to be handling it well.
She treats it like a human, and I’m not talking about how much she loves it. Her relationship with it plays out as if he were an actual family member, dynamics and all. They have fights. A lot. Mostly, she feels that he neglects her feelings and doesn’t appreciate how much time she puts into being at work and doing all of the housework. She wishes he would at least help take the trash out. And when she has “sexy time” with herself, she doesn’t understand why he complains about having to go outside.
Last night they had another fight, but I got home late, so I don’t know what it was about. She spent about an hour throwing things, and eventually kicked him out for awhile. It’s weird.
18. Heh heh heh…
That their obnoxious music played late at night is played through a Bluetooth device that I can control.
Here’s a little backstory on how I’ve found it for those asking. I had purchased an Amazon Echo device and was setting it up when I realized there was a device available to connect to called Vizio Sound bar. I connected to it and played a song from my phone. Instantly I knew I struck gold when the walls started shaking and my wife runs in the room to complain about the neighbors. I said “No babe, that was me. I’m connected to their stereo” Let the petty revenge begin.
19. An apartment full of interesting people
My neighbor next to me has an unhappy relationship. The neighbor above me is gay and has dreams of going to Broadway. He also might be an insomniac.
20. Hey! We all want what we want, even if it’s an orgie
My neighbor that lives below us likes to host multi-person sex parties. I was suspicious when a group of dudes showed up after her boyfriend moved out. Loud music was playing, so I figured it was just a party and a group of dudes showed up at the same time. Then the music shuts off in the living, but turns on in the bedroom. Proceed to hear dudes cheering each other on, her asking them to “give her more dick”, high fives and other slappy sounds….it was awkward getting the mail the next day as she slowly walked her dog. She looked like she was hurtin.
21. “We appreciate her eccentricities”
Just got my first solo apartment and I’m loving it! Most of the people are my age and really cool….but there is this (Continued)
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Most of the people are my age and really cool….but there is this needle thin probably 50-60 older woman that walks the halls day and night. Every single day. She waits for people to come out of their apartment and then sparks up very strange conversations. Looked out my window the other night at about 1 am and she’s wandering around the parking lot picking up cigarette butts and smoking them.
I am always nice and patient with her and as she may have early signs of dementia like people keep telling me She could just be a very odd individual. Either way, I treat her with respect, and appreciate her eccentricities.
22. As if this actually happened!
Ex and I heard neighbors going at it (younger couple around our age). Their bedroom against our bedroom – layouts are mirrored.
We laughed really hard about it at first. Then it got really annoying. So we basically started making all the sex noises at the same time they did. After about couple months of doing the noises to them, I ran into the neighbor getting mail and we both cracked up hard. Came to find out they had heard us having sex first and started making noises. Which we thought was them having sex so for the past few months the 4 of us were literally laying in bed making sex noises at each other through the walls…
23. “You called Julia ‘Kari’ last night…”
This is about me.
I own a condo now but I used to live in a cheap apartment. At the time I was actively seeing three different girls. I lived next to a family of three (young child) and they were very quiet.
One morning, heading out the door, the mother said to me: “Hey, you called Julia “Kari” last night.”
That was how I found out I had thin walls.
24. How many guys can we fit in one dorm room?
There was two women that lived above me. College aged, same as me and my roommate. You could hear everything through the floor. Everything.
The woman above me had lots of sex. And that’s fine, but it was always loud and it was always at 4 am or 5 am. I had to work early a lot of days so it was really really irritating.
So one night, I stand on my bed and hit the ceiling with my shoe and ask them to quiet down. The noise stops but the talking starts.
Guy: “Did you hear that? I think someone was talking to us.”
Girl: “Nah. The dude downstairs is probably watching TV.”
Me: I am talking to you. The people on the third floor. Please be quiet. I gotta work in a couple hours.
Guy#2: “He’s definitely talking to us.”
Girl: “No he isn’t!”
Me: Wait? Two guys?!
Guy #3: “No. There’s three of us.”
25. This takes ‘we’re close’ to a whole new level
Sometimes I can actually feel when my neighbor (Continued)
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uses the toilet. If I’m in my bathroom, especially on the toilet, I feel a shift upwards as if they say down at the same table as me.
26. Tensions rising in this household
Everyone seems to have neighbors who have sex a lot. I heard my neighbors get into a fight because she apparently WON’T have sex with her husband anymore. Because of couuuuurse that’s her fault and couldn’t be anything to do with him.
27. “I know your pooping schedule by heart”
My neighbor poops at 430am and pounds on the wall due to constipation.
28. When in doubt, get ’em with glitter
I’m in a dorm. I know EVERYTHING about the love life of my three neighbors – mostly because they tend to shriek about it at 2 am. Also I know that I can take them down with glitter, as the one time someone put balloons and glitter on their door it started a screaming match between the girls that lasted all day. I have plans.
29. Nosy cops never make good neighbors
That the cop next door is way too nosy.
The kids who lived above me used to throw parties all the time. Loud music, drunken yelling, the works. He thought it was me, and apparently my RF/DC shirt (a parody of the AC/DC logo but for a science thing) was proof enough. He called the cops on me one night when the kids threw a party again.
I open my door in my starwars pajamas to two uncomfortable looking cops. They take one look at me, apologized, and explained the mistake. I found out later it was my neighbor when he got in my face about the noise I was making… it was my sewing machine… at 2 in the afternoon.
30. “It’s a coincidence, I swear!”
My neighbors get turned on and have sex after my gf and I have sex.
31. Oooooh this is worth eating dinner cold for
The family living next to me had a teenage daughter and her mom walked in on her laying face down in the bathroom floor trying to take a picture of either her nether regions to send to some 30 something guy she met online. I know all of these details because mom shouted them at dad when he got home from work and berated daughter for hours. Mom also called the police to report the guy asking for the pictures. I ate my supper cold because I didn’t want to make microwave noise in the kitchen because mom was on a roll and it was pretty entertaining.
Source for external photo: Shutterstock / Ollyy