Older houses seem to be far better in this respect than modern ones, I've
been in many where you can hear the phone, TV stairs etc etc.
Surely this should not be the case. This is something that building
regs
certainly _should_ be involved with.
One thing to notice is that things very close to the party wall come
through
a lot more (inverse square law I guess). Thus, the stairs and the
phone, which is generally right next to the wall on a telephone table.