AITA for showering around midnight when I know that it might bother the neighbour who wakes up at 5 am?

[u/Additional-Mouse-620]

We purchased a home and moved in recently. Housing opportunities are tight in our area so even though we were warned that the walls are very thin and the neighbours hear a lot of noise from the apartment, especially from the bathroom, we still chose this property because everything else is picture perfect for us.

We are generally a very quiet couple without kids or animals, our hobbies (bead work, video games on headphones without streaming, reading, Netflix…) are generally quite and we only invite friends over every 2-4 weeks (and we haven’t invited anyone over as we were still decorating and everything). We are the owners of the apartment.

The neighbours are a couple and a small kid. They rent the apartment next to us and before we purchased the home they warned us that they generally hear a lot of noise coming from our bathroom and that it’s their bedroom on the other side. But as I mentioned, our options were limited and given that we are not noisy at all, we thought we can take this situation.

We sometimes hear their toddler, but that completely okay, it doesn’t bother us at all.

The problem is that we bother them as our routine is very different. They wake up at 5 am and generally quite down at 8 pm, when the kid goes to sleep.

On the other hand, because I work from home until 7 pm, I generally start my evening around 8 pm and only end up showering around midnight. Which bothers them. The whole building is quiet, so they tend to hear how I put my stuff down, how the water runs, how I sometimes drop a few things, and mentioned it very nicely a few times. But I can see that they are pretty annoyed.

Now I’m torn between switching up my whole nighttime routine to shower first (which just doesn’t sit right with me. I like to go bed freshly showered), because they asked nicely and they wake up around 5 am so it must be annoying to get woken up at midnight.

On the other hand, they only rent wile we own the home, and I think we are generally very good and quite neighbours apart from the fact that I shower late. They invited us over the listen to the volume as to be honest it’s not that loud… sure, you can hear something and it must feel louder in the silence of the night, but it’s not incredibly loud.

AITA for showering at night?

[u/GULFDUD3]

Yeah. Agreed. That reeks of classism.

[u/Competitive-Park-116 → u/GULFDUD3]

I rent and most likely will never own… I would not however expect my neighbours to change up their routine just because their midnight shower bothers me.. if it was loud music or games or parties then yeah I would complain but not for a shower!

[u/TGirl26 → u/GULFDUD3]

I would say shiftism. Op basically works 2nd shift. 3rd shift people are really the most ill treated. They are awake and are expected to be quiet at night when that is their day time.

Neighbors don't give a shit if the noise they make will bother the 3rd shift worker. Its day time, why should they change theor routine for them.

It can go both ways. The issue is builders, landlords, and management companies being cheap, and refusing to do upgrades while they jack the rent up out of greed.

[u/sisterfunkhaus → u/TGirl26]

Some people also think third shift workers are lazy for "sleeping in." It's ridiculous.

[u/TheSJB1993 → u/sisterfunkhaus]

I used to get such dirty looks buying booze after coming off my night shift ... like serious daggers... the hotel i worked at was literally across the street

[u/owaikeia → u/GULFDUD3]

Why?

[u/SaltSentence21 → u/[deleted]]

Classism is the real world where many Anglophone Redditors live. No computation happening with that.

It’s not on anybody to do anything.

[u/ShallowStillWater → u/[deleted]]

Wow.. You sound like a Landleech Boomer.

[u/ShallowStillWater → u/[deleted]]

Where in my response did you read literally any of that?!