Who told you that, because I doubt it very much. We live in a 1930s semi, and before he got broadband via Sky, our neighbour used to connect via our router (it's OK - he's a good friend and we gave him the password). So this was two hallway widths and two driveway widths from router to laptop, through two internal and two external walls.
I can also get signals from at least three nearby houses (all the same as ours), and the only thing that stops me using their routers is the lack of password.