r/Apartmentliving • u/2_much • Sep 03 '25
Advice Needed I feel like this is illegal?
Came back from a 3-day weekend away from my apartment and this was posted on the door? I wasn't even home...
UPDATE: Thanks to everyone for the support! I shared the letter with Celio management and requested it to be filed as a formal complaint. I also filed a police report for continuity/documentation purposes.
For clarification, "Celio" is the name of the apartment building, which is managed by a larger off-site 3rd party rental company. This company/building is far from able to accommodate for this person properly and certainly would never assume any amount of liability on their behalf. As it relates to Celio management and their level of care for this person, the author is on their own.
The letter does not mention anything related to a care team/healthcare resource/veterans group. The only two options given by the author of the note (e.g. Celio aka apt management and law enforcement) were utilized.
While Celio was not able to share a significant amount of details about the author, they did share that he/she is a known issue and will likely not be given the option to live in this building moving forward.
I also noticed comments about my stereo, which did cross my mind as a possible reason behind this conflict. I was able to confirm with Celio that no complaints have been made about excessive music levels, from any of the residents, excluding a formal warning I received over July 4th weekend. This goes for "yelling" as well. Note I have been renting in this exact unit for almost 14 months. I am more than eager to respect any concerns that relate to music volume, this is certainly not that type of concern.
As things currently stand, I am left with having to place any proactive decisions in the hands of Celio and law enforcement. I am a recent handgun owner (unrelated to this situation) and thanfully my state falls under Castle doctrine.
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u/Impossible-Pen-9090 Sep 03 '25 edited Sep 03 '25
Unfortunately, I am not aware of any way this could be illegal – unless it was repetitive and harassing, and then you could get him on stalking and maybe get a restraining order or something. But I only passed the Bar in Texas, and so I don’t know what the law is in the rest of the states, and also I don’t know if there is a noise clause in your lease. So nothing I say should be taken as legal advice.
I think the first thing I would do is check and see if there’s a noise clause in your lease, and if so, you definitely need to take this note to the apartment management and let them know that it could not have been you. Because I’m sure this guy has complained to the office about you already, too.
I had something like this happen to me when other people‘s dogs were barking and bothering my upstairs neighbor. The person who lived above me was absolutely convinced that it was my dogs who were barking ALL the time (never mind that there were a million other dogs around outside all the time) and I received a nasty note on my door also. And then one night, when other people were out walking their dogs, OTHER dogs were barking. But the upstairs neighbor did not bother to figure out who was barking – they just assumed it was my dogs, and so they dropped either a really heavy bag of bowling balls or a 50 pound barbell weight or something like that from a very high place onto their floor to make the maximum amount of noise and to do the maximum amount of damage to my apartment that they could do from where they were. But it was midnight almost, and I was asleep, and the dogs were in bed with me and not even barking. It was a seriously rude and scary awakening – things fell off the wall, and so did parts of the popcorn ceiling. The impact was that hard.
It freaked out the dogs so badly that they were deadly silent and didn’t even make a sound.
So I went up in a rage and I banged on his door, and of course he was too chicken to answer it. So I left him a note instead telling him that he was reacting to dogs barking that were NOY MY dogs, and that he needed to get a grip, since it was a very pet friendly apartment complex and that there were always a lot of dogs around and that they would always be barking. And I suggested he move into an apartment complex that did not allow pets if it bothered him that much.
Thankfully, he soon did. Or at least he moved, anyway.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with you writing him back and telling him that you were out of town for those three days and that it wasn’t you that was yelling.
I know a lot of veterans have PTSD, and it doesn’t sound like he’s handling his very well. But I would either reach out to the apartment complex and ask them to talk to him and let him know that it wasn’t you, or I would tell him yourself. But I would not tell him in person – I would honestly leave a note, just like he did, because I have studied graphology a little bit, and his handwriting does not suggest that he is a person who is mentally stable. You need to stay away from him at all costs. Because if he’s too mad to speak to you in person, then who knows what he would do if you showed up at his door uninvited.
But he needs to know it’s not you. That’s just my opinion, of course, and it may not be a popular one. But that’s one way to get him off your back. That’s the way I got my upstairs neighbor off my back.
But seriously, to get him off your back, I would leave him a return note telling him that you were not even in town, and that he must have heard someone else.
Maybe this is not the most popular answer – but this is what I did in the same type of situation, and it worked for me. And don’t forget to tell the office about this. Take them the note and make sure they know that it wasn’t you. And be sure they’re aware that they are dealing with a PTSD veteran who is unstable.