Lease Agreement Law | Analysis of a District Court Judgment Holding That a Lease Agreement Cannot Be Terminated on the Ground of Inter-Floor Noise

In this case, the plaintiff, A, entered into a lease agreement for an apartment unit in the OO Apartment with the defendant, B, and moved into the unit.

From the moment the plaintiff moved in, the plaintiff complained of distress over inter-floor noise from the unit above to both the apartment management office and the defendant and requested measures. In response, the defendant and the management office conveyed the fact that an inter-floor noise complaint had arisen to the resident of the upper unit and requested caution on several occasions.

The problem, however, did not improve at all, and the plaintiff, suffering mental distress as a result, went so far as to lease a separate officetel unit.

Even so, the defendant took no measures whatsoever in response.

Accordingly, the plaintiff argued that the defendant had ‘failed to perform the obligation to allow the lessee to use and derive profit from the leased object and had violated the duty of repair of the leased object,’ and, claiming that achieving the purpose of the lease agreement had become impossible, the plaintiff asserted that the plaintiff would terminate the agreement and that the defendant must therefore return the lease deposit, and filed suit.

The defendant, on the other hand, countered that the former lessee, who had resided in the apartment for seven years before the plaintiff leased it, had shared the upper and lower units with the resident above for approximately two years and seven months and had never filed a complaint on the ground of inter-floor noise during that period, so that it could not be found that inter-floor noise exceeding the tolerable limit* asserted by the plaintiff had occurred.

*Tolerable limit: the threshold up to which the parties can mutually endure the degree of harm when an infringement of environmental rights, pollution, noise, or the like arises and interferes with or harms another person's life.

With respect to lease agreement law, the court ruled in favor of the defendant.

First, the court explained that the standard that multi-unit housing must satisfy in relation to inter-floor noise is a construction standard imposed on the business entity that constructs and supplies the multi-unit housing, and is not an obligation imposed on the owner of the multi-unit housing.

The court also determined that, as for the ‘obligation to make efforts not to cause harm to other occupants and others within the multi-unit housing through inter-floor noise and the like’ prescribed in the Multi-Family Housing Management Act, that obligation rests on ‘occupants and users,’ and is not prescribed for an owner of multi-unit housing such as the defendant.

We have analyzed, in relation to lease agreement law, a court judgment dismissing the plaintiff's claim seeking to terminate a lease agreement on the ground of inter-floor noise.

Real estate matters such as these and 🔗lease disputes tend to involve demanding legal procedures and the collection of evidence required for proof.

The 🔗Construction and Real Estate Group of Daeryun Law Firm LLP is staffed by attorneys experienced in real estate matters who, through close consultation with each client, present a solution suited to the client's circumstances.

If you are facing difficulties due to a lease-related dispute, you are welcome to request a legal consultation with the Daeryun Construction and Real Estate Group at any time.