The Quiet Home Checklist
- Fill all floor and wall cavities with mineral fiber acoustic insulation.
- Insulate heating and air conditioning ducts by using fiberglass flex ducts, fiberglass duct board, or by wrapping or lining the ducts with fiberglass insulation.
- Install resilient underlayments (carpeting and padding) throughout your home to help reduce impact sound transmission.
- Install resilient mats between subfloor and finished floor to help reduce impact sound.
- Caulk around windows and use weather-stripping at the bottom of your exterior doors.
- Use solid wood or mineral core doors with insulation where privacy is required.
- Install acoustic ceiling panels.
- Reduce sound transmission with double or triple pane glass and storm windows.
- Select quiet, high quality appliances.
- Install telephones, doorbells, intercoms, or audio built-ins on interior walls only—never on common walls or corridor walls.
- Caulk holes made by wiring that penetrates connecting structures with elastic non-hardening caulk or dry packing.
- Seal openings around ceiling fixtures so that they are airtight.
- Make use of plants, draperies, and wall hangings throughout your home. The “soft” objects in a room may absorb more sound.
- Minimise window sizes facing noisy areas.
- Ask your builder to develop a well-planned layout to minimize the noise of flowing water, and insulate walls containing drainpipes.
- Ask your builder to seal under all bottom plates as the walls are being built.
- Ask your builder to avoid undercutting doors, if possible. Frequently, doors must be undercut to get proper air circulation for the HVAC. A simpler solution to ensure proper circulation is to keep doors open when rooms are not in use or provide transfer registers.
