My neighbour stinks. No, really!

[Treevly]

I have a very sensitive sense of smell. In some cases I smell things which other people do not smell at all, such as certain chemicals and air pollution. It can be difficult.
Our home is a modern condo, 1-floor, in a middle-class condo community. This unit is a semi-detached structure, so we share a wall and foundation wall with a neighbour. Things have been fine for some years, but we have a new neighbour now and ..................... he smells bad. Yep, through the wall, or through the joint where the wall meets the top of the foundation, or perhaps elsewhere; somehow this guy's smell comes through. I didn't realize that it was him until I met him outside the house one day. Yeah, it's him. It's not what we call B.O., it's a rather sickly sweet smell which smells, oddly enough, a little bit like the agricultural herbicide, Roundup. It gives me a sore throat in 1 minute flat.

The smell mostly occurs in the laundry room and in the cellar below that room. Whether the smell travels depends, I think, on barometric pressure, wind direction outside, and perhaps where they are in the house. Air currents move around in houses, no doubt. ........ I jammed pink fiber insulation at the top of the foundation to seal it, but there is a section which is drywalled and my wife won't let me rip it out and seal the foundation top there. ........ I don't see any relief until warmer weather arrives, and then he will leave his windows open, and depending on which windows and which wind direction, it may just blow in our windows. ......... Even with my sniffer, I've only ever come across one other person with a noticeable and obnoxious smell. My wife can't smell it, and he has a wife and son, and they probably can't smell it either. I can't even quite nail down, with 100% accuracy, where it penetrates the walls or joints. I think I am stuck with the situation.

 

[St. Phatty]

Sound like your home could use Extra ventilation.

 

[Gypsy Nirvana]

- when his birthday - or Christmas comes around - say it with love - say it with a bar of soap - or many bars of soap - and if he doesn't get it the first time - keep giving him MORE SOAP -

- this is an interesting soap - made from recycled humans -

link: 'It's very good': how soap made from siphoned human fat left audiences in a lather | Adelaide festival | The Guardian

 

[flylowgethigh]

Positive pressure your condo to force his stink back to his half.

I was hoping this was about a grower you didn't know was growing.

 

[thailer]

A person who has diabetes can smell sweet if they’re not processing glucose. Maybe you should kindly tell him to get a test? Is there even a kind way to say that or a way you wouldn’t come off weird?

Google says also kidney and liver problems cause a sweet body odor.

 

[Frosty Nuggets]

- when his birthday - or Christmas comes around - say it with love - say it with a bar of soap - or many bars of soap - and if he doesn't get it the first time - keep giving him MORE SOAP -

- this is an interesting soap - made from recycled humans -


link: 'It's very good': how soap made from siphoned human fat left audiences in a lather | Adelaide festival | The Guardian

Yay, I'm from Adelaide.

 

[exploziv]

Not an original ideea, tho..

 

[St. Phatty]

I'm glad men's sweat smells different than women's sweat.

Now if we could just train our sweat to smell like Jagermeister, or Frangelica, or Cinderella99.

 

[Treevly]

""A person who has diabetes can smell sweet if they’re not processing glucose. Maybe you should kindly tell him to get a test? Is there even a kind way to say that or a way you wouldn’t come off weird? Google says also kidney and liver problems cause a sweet body odor. ""

HAH! Diabetes.... that probably nails it. Thanks. I thought it odd that the smell was somehow similar to the Roundup which the farmer sprayed across the road for his soybean crop. I recall that Roundup is based on some sort of chemical with sugar molecues or similar, and a search [Duckduckgo] shows that ""Glyphosate (the chemical which is Roundup) is an aminophosphonic analogue (??) of the natural amino acid glycine..."" and another search shows that ""Glycine is a colorless, sweet-tasting crystalline solid."" Yep. That nails it. The fellow is bestowing his sugar molecules on the world - and he smells a bit like Roundup!!
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""Positive pressure your condo to force his stink back to his half."" There's a good idea. I'll have to think about that. Furnace, A/C, windows, doors,..........
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""Maybe you should kindly tell him to get a test? Is there even a kind way to say that or a way you wouldn’t come off weird?"" It might be possible for me to work it into s a conversation some time. We don't talk often, but with weather warming, that will change a bit. I might tell him that I am diabetic (false) and see if he bites at the mention of it. He is of an age and weight such that he would be a likely candidate. I suppose it is possible that he IS diabetic, takes meds for it, and still smells like sugared pork.
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Perhaps the WORST part of the whole problem is that I now realize that air passes between the two houses. If smell can pass, so can a virus. I now have them (including their son who works in retail Big Box) in my SARS bubble, whether I want to or not. How do I rip out drywall and seal the top of the foundation and repair the drywall while wife is sleeping. {{{sigh}}}
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Thanks for the helpful answers.

 

[thailer]

It’s probably some sort of shared air ventilation. My upstairs apartment neighbor swore I was smoking pot twenty years ago. I was too. She said she could smell it by the vent for the stovetop and other vents in the place.

 

[thailer]

Maybe it would be better to tell the wife because she will probably nag him to go to the doctor? I’m not really sure how to remedy the situation but I think if he gets it under control with the glucose, you won’t have the smell but it is gonna be awkward to talk about and could lead to hard feelings with a new neighbor. I heard dogs can smell it so if you have a cool friend with a dog, get a service vest and tell them the dog is a diabetes alert dog and your friend could help and say maybe he should get checked?? Good luck!!

 

[St. Phatty]

I'd rather have a stinky neighbor than a neighbor with a noisy barking dog.

Tempting me to feed it Cannabis laced doggie treats because it JUST KEEPS BARKING.

 

[exploziv]

Yeah, also, if you can smell it through the drywall you will probably not manage to seal it properly if you take down the drywall anyway. Unless there is really a gap behind the drywall, which I doubt.
But some kind of shared ventilation seems to be a better explanation. Keep in mind some people will try to cover them, maybe you got one that is covered but still leaks.

 

[Treevly]

Yeah, also, if you can smell it through the drywall you will probably not manage to seal it properly if you take down the drywall anyway. Unless there is really a gap behind the drywall, which I doubt.
But some kind of shared ventilation seems to be a better explanation. Keep in mind some people will try to cover them, maybe you got one that is covered but still leaks.

My bet is on the joint where the top of the foundation meets the bottom of the main shared wall. I can't get at ALL of that wall because drywall covers it. That is definitely the area of smell, whatever the exact point or method of entry is. These joints tend not to be perfect seals, which is why many people caulk them. I said to my wife "I'd like to do some caulking" and she gave me a very peculiar look.

 

[Cuddles]

Treevly , can´t you explaint the problem to the landlord so he´ll fix it? remember, if you can smell him, he can smell what´s going on in your flat - I´m thinking weed etc

 

[exploziv]

Have you tried a carbon filter?

 

[mexcurandero420]

Burn some coffee which neutralizes the smell or some frankincense in the house.

 

[troutman]

Maybe, he's a murder and buried somebody in the basement.

 

[thailer]

I second the carbon filter. They have them for furnaces that are cut to fit at Home Depot. You could place them over the stove fan vent or floor vents? That with a hepa filter might help.

it’s also an excellent time to sell your condo if you own it. Maybe you can get enough to get a house with no shared walls? Probably the only way to help. It’s not like he is leaving trash out or hiding dead bodies lol

 

[St. Phatty]

it’s also an excellent time to sell your condo if you own it. Maybe you can get enough to get a house with no shared walls? Probably the only way to help. It’s not like he is leaving trash out or hiding dead bodies lol

Maybe he's making Pate from people's livers.

Like if Jeffrey Dahmer married Martha Stewart.

Gosh does he own or manage a deli ?