Comment by Kalium | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Kalium | Hacker News Reader

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> I also want to say that I tied home ownership (or at least living in a house) to having children - I don't want the stress of bothering my neighbors on top of child stress. So I haven't started a family, and I don't see a path to starting one. I think I have been priced out of having a family and it makes me so so sad.

I see this a lot. Generally I see it from people who were raised outside urban areas, with a very white-picket-fence lifestyle. It turns into a great deal of stress in people's lives and relationships, as they often literally cannot imagine having children without a detached single family house and a yard and so on. I've seen some of them take major financial risks to try and work up what feels like enough money, with depression resulting if doesn't work.

The people I know who grew up in urban apartments often have none of these hangups. They regard occasionally hearing your neighbor's children as a fact of life.

That's interesting! I actually grew up in single-parent household, have never lived in a house, and certainly have heard my neighbors children. Not urban, but suburban apartments. I guess I buck the trend (or maybe I'm reaching too high :-P )

I've even thought that, after infancy, apartment living is potentially BETTER for kids. Reasoning that there are more nearby friends and usually a playground or field to play in. I certainly had lots of fun with the neighborhood kids in the pool/large field/playground on the apartment grounds when I was young.

But, kids are noisy during quiet hours (before you can reasonably control them). I remember it being hard on my mom when my brother was young. Always 1/2 a step from eviction for noise complaints. I felt the stress as a child, I cannot imagine how hard it was on her. I don't want to do that...

I feel like human noises within your apartment should not be cause for eviction. If other people can listen to you, then the apartment is substandard and your privacy is at risk. Those walls are supposed to protect you from having neighbors casually spy on you.

Now, it'd be different if you were experimenting with a pulse detonation wave engine. That would be worthy of eviction.

> I've even thought that, after infancy, apartment living is potentially BETTER for kids. Reasoning that there are more nearby friends and usually a playground or field to play in.

IME, nearby and safe playgrounds and fields are more common in suburban developments with single family homes than apartment complexes, either in urban areas or even in the same suburbs.

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