Best way to soundproof a condo ceiling?

April 1, 2022 2:30 PM

Moving into a new condo in three weeks, and I am wondering what the best way to soundproof it will be. Details: previous owner tells me that there's no insulation above the drywall, just empty space. Hardwood floors in the unit above me. I can hear a lot of noise above me--I can hear their conversations more clearly than any I have ever experienced in my 22 years of renting. If you have had this experience, what materials worked well for you? (I would love material that will help me retain cold air in my space as well, although I have a finite budget).
posted by sugarbomb to Home & Garden (7 answers total)

Rip the drywall down and insulate with Roxul Rockboard 60 or 80, or other kinds of rockwool you have available. This will tearing up much of your ceiling, but dry-walling really isn't that expensive and doesn't take that long, and any decent contractor should be able to do the job.
posted by The_Vegetables at 4:26 PM on April 1, 2022

When i lived as a teenager in a row house, sharing a party wall with another row house that had been divided into apartments we had the same problem. The solution my mom came up with was applying pretty thick cork tiles to the wall, maybe 1/2" thick. It was brown and textured and they were OK with that. I suppose you could paint it if you prefer white.

There is a lot of cork flooring now - my parents did this in the 70s - and maybe you can find attractive cork flooring that would look great and substantially reduce sound to apply to the ceiling. After the cork tile was installed we heard only occasional loud shouting up the stairs or the front door sometimes slamming, and this was muffled. We had an old house with solid plaster walls so not easy to soundproof with drywall.
posted by citygirl at 5:16 PM on April 1, 2022

Pursuant to The_Vegetables above, after the insulation you can also add things like resilient channel to mount your ceiling drywall (it helps isolate the drywall from the rest of the building structure). You can also double-sheet the ceiling, using a flexible product like Green Glue in between the two layers of drywall (if you're using flexible mounts, make sure they can carry the load of two sheets).
posted by aramaic at 5:24 PM on April 1, 2022

You could also have someone blow in dense pack cellulose insulation. You'd still have some drywall work to do but it would be patching a series of 2-4" holes rather than complete replacement.
posted by Mitheral at 7:27 PM on April 1, 2022

It occurs to me, by the way, you might want to make sure the fire barrier between your unit and adjacent units is intact and complete BEFORE you do any insulation work that would cover up the evidence -- while I say this mainly because if you blow insulation into a shared space (which, again, should not be shared at all) you'll potentially create issues with the neighbors (insulation falling out of their light sockets), I also say it because fire separation is important and once upon a time the only way I could get a condo board to pay attention to a persistent leak was to point out it was jeopardizing fire barrier integrity.
posted by aramaic at 8:24 PM on April 1, 2022

This doesn't answer your question, but I just want to add this as someone who has trouble with noise from upstairs neighbors in a condo - HOAs generally have rules about soundproofing that it sounds like these people are not following. Most require heavy duty soundproofing underlayment under hardwood or carpeting. You should look at your CC&Rs. IANAL, but if the seller knew that the upstairs neighbors were not in compliance with HOA rules about soundproofing, they probably needed to disclose that before you purchased. And the HOA should be enforcing the rules about soundproofing, so they may also be at fault (unless the seller never told them and they didn't know to do anything). You might not be interested in the legal aspects of this, but it sounds like something that is going to cost you quite a bit of money to fix. From another person who spends a lot of time hearing the upstairs neighbors, I wish you the best of luck.
posted by kms at 1:09 AM on April 2, 2022

There are sound attenuation experts who can evaluate your space and recommend the best solution, and also an affordable solution. The experts that sell sound attenuation systems will usually give an estimate for free. The ones who don't sell anything except expertise will probably charge for their work.
posted by KayQuestions at 10:04 AM on April 2, 2022