r/Tenant

[US-MO]

Eight years in this apartment, older building, still has the old screw-in fuse panel instead of breakers. Whoever wired it put about three-quarters of the unit, the three main rooms plus both AC units, on a single 20 amp fuse. So it blows a lot. Always has. I’d made peace with it.

Last year it blew when I had both AC’s on and turned on the microwave, and when I pulled the fuse, both the fuse and the socket behind it were visibly burned. Not warm, burned. I reported it in writing. The maintenance guy came, put in a new fuse, and left. Nobody looked at the socket. Nobody looked at the wiring. New fuse, problem “solved.”

This week it came back, worse. It’s now blowing under normal everyday use, and the replacement fuse gets hot to the touch with just one AC running. I pulled it and the metal contact inside the socket is corroded and pitted. I don’t have an electrical license but I’ve seen enough to know a burnt, high-resistance connection when it’s cooking a fuse in front of me.

So I emailed the owner, attached photos, and asked for a licensed electrician to actually inspect the socket and wiring instead of swapping another fuse. His reply was one email that managed to say all of the following: that it’s already been “repaired,” that I’m the only tenant with this problem so I must be overloading the circuit, that I should “move out if there isn’t enough electricity for my needs,” and that I’m “free to terminate at any time.” He did, to his credit, agree to send a real electrician Monday. But the message was unmistakable, he’d rather I leave than fix it.

And here’s the part that reframes the whole thing. My lease happens to be up at the end of next month, and they just sent a renewal offer. Another twelve months, at a higher rent, to keep living in the unit with the fuse that overheats.

I’m fairly sure I know what’s happening. They’ve been renovating and re-renting the other units at higher rates, and I’m the long-term tenant sitting in an under-market apartment they’d rather turn over. That explains both things at once: why nobody will spend money properly fixing my wiring, and why the tone is suddenly “have you considered moving.” It’s not a maintenance problem and a lease problem. It’s one landlord who wants the unit back, and the hazard is just something he’d rather I leave over than repair.

The thing is, I’m house hunting anyway. I do want to go. I just need a couple of months to actually buy a place instead of getting forced into a short-term rental in between. So I want to ask for month-to-month, or a short two-to-three month extension, at my current rent, without accidentally blowing up the renewal offer and getting hit with “twelve months or out by [date].” Complicating it, my lease has a double-rent holdover clause, so I know I can’t just overstay the end date and figure it out later.

What I’m trying to figure out:

1. Is it worth pressing the safety issue, documenting the corroded socket, and escalating to city code enforcement if they try another fuse swap instead of a real fix, even though it probably makes the landlord want me out faster? Or am I creating friction for nothing since I’m leaving regardless?
2. How do I ask for the short-term/month-to-month arrangement without handing him the excuse to just end it? We actually want the same outcome, me gone, we just disagree on the timing, and on whether I should have functioning electricity while I’m still here.

Would especially appreciate hearing from anyone who’s dealt with code enforcement on an electrical hazard, or negotiated an exit with a landlord who clearly wanted their unit back.

There is a currently issue with my landlord. We have been renting this property since 2018 and paying a relatively decent priced rent for a 3 bedroom house in our area, in England.
Recently the landlord increased the rent by £400. Initially, he increased it by £600 but after a chat with him he decided to only increase it by £400.
Have in mind this property hasn’t had any reforms or any upgrades since we moved in.

EDIT: He did a section 13 for the £600 increase but then we had a meeting talking about it and agreed on £400.

The increase is due to him wanting to sell the house so I enquired about the price of the house which he told us it would be £325k which seems excessive for the area and the state of the property.
The house is in need of upgrading. I enquired how much I could get from the bank and I definitely can’t afford the price of the house (just qualified had a nurse with 3 kids).
I informed the landlord I couldn’t afford the property and he told me that there would be a further increase in rent in January.
I just needed advice, I’m looking for a cheaper house to buy now because I feel the landlord has been “sketchy”. When I asked for a new contract reflecting the price increase he was like who I had been talking to because this issue is between both of us.
Any advice would be appreciated.

So we live in Florida, in a decent neighborhood (not rich or gated, but nice neighborhood with well kept homes). The homeowner lives up north and doesn’t have any family in our town or close by. We’ve had numerous issues with the house over the years, a few examples I’ll throw out there are busted pipes in the walls resulting in major leaks, electrical problems resulting in us getting shocked when we touch certain outlets, leaks in the roof, deteriorating attachment on the house, etc… back when we were in regular contact, we paid out of pocket for the pipe repairs and she took it off of our rent, and maybe 6 months after that she sent her cousin down to fix our roof. This is where it gets a little wild. So this man was pushing 60, and he brought down his son with him, who couldn’t have been more than 14. He said they can’t do the whole roof because they don’t have a permit, so they’re going to do some now, and the rest later… A day into working, his son fell THROUGH my roof in my kitchen. He caught himself and was okay thank god, and they fixed the main leaks without anymore incidents. However, they left part of the built on attachment to the house open to the elements, which is where our breaker panel is located. Move forward 8 months or so, the homeowner keeps pushing back when the roof will be finished, mind you they left tools, a ladder, 20 packs of shingles, and a bunch of trash out back. As the weeks rolled on, we couldn’t contact her anymore. She never reached out from a different number about the rent that we usually send out via mail, and we honestly think she may have passed away. Still to this day over two years later, tools are still on my roof. I’m writing all of this because I want to put the money into the house to make the repairs needed to fix this place up, but my husband is worried a family member will come knocking one day and we will have to move or offer back pay for all this time we haven’t been paying. Is this place a lost cause? We can’t afford the rent on most places these days so is there any legal way we can become the homeowners here and put our money into making this house our home?

I have to make a decision by tomorrow.

I signed an 18-month lease and moved from Southern Maryland to Alexandria after accepting a new job in Arlington. The shorter commute was a major reason for the move, and I’ve only been living in the apartment for about a week.

The apartment wasn’t cleaned before I moved in, despite being told it would be, so my sister and I ended up cleaning it ourselves before fully unpacking. While cleaning, we started finding rodent droppings throughout the apartment. As we cleaned more thoroughly, we discovered hundreds of rodent droppings behind the stove, which made me question how long the issue had been there.

The landlord promptly scheduled pest control, which I appreciated. They found a hole behind the stove and plugged it but weren’t able to go behind the dishwasher unit (not legally authorized to move appliances) to check for openings. Based on their findings, they ruled no active infestation but felt this was a result of lack of treatment with the previous tenant.

However, the day after the treatment, we found droppings and a trash bag hanging from the kitchen door was chewed through overnight. Obviously, a current mouse issue.

Then the HVAC stopped working properly…during a heat wave. A technician determined there is a crack in the system that requires replacement parts. As of now, no one can tell me when the part will arrive or when the repair will be completed due to the holiday. I’ll have to wait to see when someone can get parts and then come out.

There have also been a few smaller maintenance issues (missing oven rack, inoperative building buzzer, tape in the fridge to hold together broken parts, etc.), but those are minor compared to the HVAC and rodent concerns.

Here’s what makes this decision so difficult: the apartment is $1,750/month with every utility included except Wi-Fi. If you’re familiar with the Alexandria/Northern Virginia rental market, you know that’s an incredible deal and significantly below what many comparable apartments cost.

I spoke with the landlord about my concerns, and to his credit, he has offered me two options:

- Terminate the lease and receive a full refund of everything I’ve paid.
- Stay in the apartment and receive a credit equal to half a month’s rent.

He’s allowing me to stay through Wednesday (4 days from now) if I decide to leave, but he wants my decision by tomorrow.

I’m genuinely torn. Financially, this apartment is an amazing value for the area, and moving again right after starting a new job sounds exhausting. On the other hand, I’d be committing to an 18-month lease without knowing when the HVAC will be repaired or whether the rodent issue has truly been resolved.

For those who rent in Northern Virginia, what would you do? Is the price enough to justify giving the landlord more time, especially with the half-month rent credit? Or would the HVAC uncertainty and rodent issues be dealbreakers, even at this price?

TL;DR: I moved into an apartment in Alexandria just over a week ago. It wasn’t cleaned before move-in, and while cleaning we found hundreds of rodent droppings behind the stove.

Pest control treated the unit, but afterward we still found droppings and a trash bag was chewed through overnight. Then the HVAC was found to have a cracked component with no estimated repair date. The landlord has offered either a full refund to terminate the lease or a half-month rent credit if I stay.

The apartment is an incredible deal at $1,750/month with utilities included (except Wi-Fi), so I’m struggling to decide whether the savings outweigh the uncertainty. What would you do?

my landlords just informed me they will be showing my apartment either monday or tuesday but said the window is between 6-8 pm. i read that they must show at a reasonable time (8-6) but couldn’t find any actual legislation saying so. imo this is an inappropriate time but is it legal?

I recently move out of a house that I rented from a private owner. When I moved in I had to get it cleaned plus my realtor had to make sure that they cut the grass because it was out of hand.

I wrote down and took some pictures of all the things I saw especially the cracks in the floor and the walls etc. plus it needed a paint job. Well the landlord said that’s all cosmetic and it will kit get fixed.

Okay now I have moved out and the realtor was like paint this and that and took pictures of the walls and floors. He said that the paint job etc will be deducted from my deposit. The crazy thing is the prior tenant told me they received their full deposit back and did not paint anything they just had it cleaned which I did too.

I even had the cleaner come back out due to the realtor asking.

Anyone ever went through anything like this? I always get my deposit back and it’s weird that I was told cosmetic when I talked about the floor and paint issues but now it’s going to be deducted.

TLDR: landlord refusing to fix serious issues and refusing to put things in writing. How do we maneuver through this?

So my husband and I moved from Texas to Indiana a week and a half ago and for obvious reasons, we couldn't do an in-person walk through. The place seemed great at first. It had just been redone since it was pretty much destroyed by the last tenants and we were admittedly desperate because our first rental choice fell through as we were in the process of loading up the truck and leaving.

Here's where the issues started. The first red flag we had was that the property manager absolutely refuses to put things in writing. If my husband asks a question over text or email, the manager will call to answer his question. Next, we were told that we couldn't move in over the weekend because the place hadn't been inspected and they can't do that over the weekend. Fair enough, I suppose. Except, the place had never been inspected when we moved in.

We're unfamiliar with renting laws in Indiana and my husband went by the municipal office to see if this (not being allowed to move in due to inspection) was allowed. It turns out that the inspector was never there and additionally, the place wasn't even registered as a rental (among 9 others that the landlord owned that also weren't registered as rentals). Because that let the municipal office know that our place wasn't a rental, the landlord is now being charged a $500 fee.

Now that we've moved in, we've also been finding tons of things wrong with the place that should've been fixed before they ever listed the place: a broken inner pane, two bathrooms (out of three) we can't use for showering because of leaks and possible mold, drawers that weren't repaired properly, etc. And most recently, after we brought in our own inspector, we found out a whole nother slew of issues like: a clogged exhaust vent (so our clothes aren't drying properly + risk of fire if we do use the dryer), the water boiler (on the 2nd floor) isn't properly connected to a drainage pipe in case of it breaking, AND on the roof, there's broken shingles as well as spots where there's no shingles OR paper (just plywood).

We've asked our property manager to remedy these issues as it can lead to unsafe housing (if not already), but he's not responding to our emails or texts. We're heavily considering finding a new place to rent or seeing if we can just buy some place, but we're not sure if we're able to break lease without paying for it heavily. We've been documenting everything and asked for copies from the municipal office and our inspector of their findings. We don't have any documentation of what our property manager has been telling us, but we do have texts between us and others detailing our situation as it was unfolding, but I'm not sure that counts for anything. I've also done some research on unsafe housing, but I don't know if we're quite there yet.

Basically, I'm looking for advice on how to encourage our landlord to fix things or legal advice on how to get out of our rental agreement without this guy taking any more money from us.

(Quebec, Canada)

My landlord recently redid the front balcony because the wood was rotting and broke many plants during the process. I tried to tell him to advise the workers to please be careful but now it’s a mess. I went out this morning to find garbage, bits of glass, a razor blade and the big bushes broken in many points.

He also told me that he would be redoing the railing “to code” and replaced the metal with a flimsy easily bendable railing. I tried to put my weight on it and the whole thing shook. I also had a chair out there (my bad - I should have brought it in earlier) which is nowhere to be seen. I’m sure the construction guys threw it out.

What can I do here? He didn’t respond to my last questions about the specifics of the construction. Frankly I’m furious because this is not the first time they’ve disrespected the garden. Last year they removed the 6 foot tall bushes out back without notice, which is when I learned they had total rights to do so. Now I’m left wanting them to clean up their mess but not wanting to sound as mad as I am. How should I move forward?

My wife was extremely distressed about this and wanted to move out just to get away from the land lady after she told us this.

With a hidden phone, I recorded her saying that they don't allow tenants with children to rent at the property as well. I didn't know this was illegal until a friend told me.

This happened 14 months ago. Wondering what my options are.

Hello 👋🏻 I live in , San Jose, CA. USA. I'm a 26 yr old. Educated, Female; I am a quiet tenant who has lived in my ADU at a house for 6 years. I am a hard worker and I have ADHD and guess tend to be anxious. There is one other tenant. He's really cool. All separate entrances, private. However, I've been feeling anxious because my Landlord put up a camera outside \*almost\* pointing at my front door. There is a second flood light (very bright bluish fluorescent LED) almost adjacent to it that almost pours/points into my bathroom window.

I am quiet, full-time employed, pay rent, like living here, all good. Sometimes there's skunks, shady folks, people speeding in their muscle cars, blasting music, etc...but it's relatively safe in my neighborhood --I just wish I would have been notified on paper about this. I understand my unit is in the backyard and people want to deter pests and criminals. However, when I walk to the kitchen at night and two cameras, one bright floodlight go off every time, it feels obnoxious and like I have little privacy. Sometimes I want to get fresh air when it cools off at night but I can't, it's driving me crazy.

This family is nice and has an autistic toddler an elderly Grandma, so I get the security worries and feelings of protection of family and property. I wouldn't hurt a fly 😭

I just really like my privacy, but just getting a Studio Apartment is so expensive right now. 😞

I am not mad or being weird I'm just trying to get an opinion. How would you feel? I know he has the legal right to put cameras on the outside of the house on the property. However I just get blinded by the flood lights whenever I want to go outside to the kitchen. I'm a night owl and I feel like I can't go outside at night. 😞

I recently moved out, and my landlord is charging me to replace the rubber boot in a front-load washing machine becuase of mold. I will admit that there was no mold when I moved in, but I probably forgot to open the door a few times. Would this type of thing be considered wear and tear or can my landlord charge me for replacing the boot?

Edit: Added before and after photos

https://preview.redd.it/vhnkgsgm52bh1.png?width=2620&format=png&auto=webp&s=3e9b54e3ed8fd4310da22c2d2e13d7a25b40dd09

https://preview.redd.it/9xw35tgm52bh1.png?width=2662&format=png&auto=webp&s=c604f8632e60489316558e38c74bd9a1292e7fc4

I’m in San Diego. My lease expires 8/6 and automatically converts to month-to-month if I don’t renew.
On 7/3, I received these renewal options:
9-month lease: $2,335
Month-to-month: $3,195 ($2,945 base rent + $250 MTM fee)
My current rent is $2,295, and I’ll be declining the 9-month lease.
The property is exempt from AB 1482, so my question is only about the notice requirement.
Since the lease automatically continues month-to-month, doesn’t California Civil Code § 827 require 90 days’ notice before a rent increase of more than 10% can take effect? Or is this considered a new tenancy because the fixed term is ending?
Has anyone dealt with this or know of any California cases or authority on point? Thanks

[us-oh]

So a commercial landlord can’t just enter a locked office correct?

I am going to get a PO box next week to solve part of the issues.

I think it was just drop off mail (business cards came). They entered my locked office and dropped them off. I do have a mail slot and there is a shelf above that the cards would have fit.

Another time I was working and the little old lady entered my office without knocking. So I lock the door. She tried to enter again but I locked my door.

No contact, message, etc. No note

edit: lease says:

>     5.1 Landlord's Rights Reserved.  Landlord reserves the right, upon reasonable prior notice and at reasonable times, to enter the Premises to inspect same, to show the Premises to prospective purchasers or tenants and to mortgagees, and to make such repairs, alterations, decorations, improvements and additions as Landlord deems necessary or desirable for the safety, preservation or improvement of the Premises

Edit 2:

Apparently her recommended solution is to put a “do not disturb“ sign up. Wtf

So I live in California, and I got a 3 day notice on May 8th. I had recently lost my job and was reaching out to VOA to help me out because I'm a veteran. There was some issues with my paperwork so there was a delay on the payments but we kept in constant contact with the leasing office. Just this week we finally got all the funds together to cover the outstanding ledger for 3 months and when we went up there to pay it, they suddenly said I also had to pay legal fees for the eviction process as well or they wouldn't accept the money to clear the ledger. There has never been any mention of legal fees since this entire process started, I haven't been served any court papers yet. We have the money to pay the outstanding ledger but they just won't accept it. I checked my lease and there's no clause saying that I have to pay for legal fees along with my rent while I'm living there, only if the apartments win as the prevailing party in court. I'm not sure what to do because it feels like they are just stonewalling me until the court date to try and force me to pay the fees.

(USA, OR)

I was really tired when paying rent and accidentally selected my old bank account in the payment portal. I realized my mistake the next day and paid my rent with the correct account. I was still early by a few days.

I received a notice from my landlord today demanding I pay a $35 NSF fee by the 4th. That is the day rent is officially due, including the standard 4 day grace period. The notice says if I don't pay the fee by this date, I will receive an additional $75 late fee and they may take legal action.

They already received my rent payment in full before they gave this notice. I understand that it was my mistake using the wrong account, so already paid the NSF fee. My concern is the demand it be paid at the same time this month's rent is due, or get a late fee. Does this sound legal?

UPDATE:

I read my lease. It states that payments go to rent first, then fees. It says nothing about when fees will become due.

I think the landlord just used a boiler plate form. Since I already made a second payment by the time they sent the notice for the $35 NSF fee, they threatened a late fee based on that, not the rent. They made a lot of mistakes including getting dates wrong. They are notorious for this sort of thing.

I live in a townhouse apt in OR and my neighbor has filed a complaint about the cleaniless of my backyard and told management that Im causing a massive bug problem for her. ( 100% false )

Now we keep getting multiple complaints about fireworks that we didn't do either.

They also keep smoking weed and we got an email about that too.

I've been advised to not react to any of these emails but I wish I could reply and say its not us.

She also is telling managment that her package was stolen right around the time we moved in and has had installed a security camera over there front door - my front door is right next to theirs.

And she's been waking us up every morning around 5am with her closet door making contact with the shared wall and slams her door - all year.

We told management about the door situation but nothing changed.

Also, she used to have assigned parking next to us but got it changed the first week or two that we moved in.

I put in a vacate notice 58 days ( 30 in required ) and the manager insisted on a premove out walk through immediately.

At this point the neighbors have done everything to get us evicted and ruined our friendly neighbor reputation.

Aside from the aggressive tatics management wont respond to the one noise complaint I had. The manager went absolutely silent when I told her about the doors slamming and waking us up.

We are living day to day in extreme aniexty.

We also submitted an ESA letter for one of our cats, we got a reply from manager stating she recieved it but no word on the next steps.

We feel outcasted. Does anyone have a kind words for this situation?

We are also worried that management wont give us a good reference.

Thank you

Maybe this is a hot take but I will take a standard property management company over a "private landlord" any day of the week at this point

My last landlord (some guy who inherited the duplex from his aunt) literally tried to charge me $400 out of my deposit for "dust on the baseboards". I had to fight him for two months just to get my own money back. they treat your security deposit like it's their personal slush fund and get deeply offended when you expect them to follow basic housing laws

Im in a new unit now that's just handled by jmk property management and it's so weirdly peaceful to just have a standard lease and an online portal. No more texting a random guy named Greg at 8am begging him to fix a leaky roof while he acts like I'm personally ruining his entire week

Im just so burnt out on renting in general tbh. the bar is literally in hell right now

I moved from a house after 10 years April 30th.

My original landlord went into a coma last fall and me and my neighbor ( whose house is also owned by the same guy) could not reach anyone. Around March we got word his son in law was taking over.

The houses were falling apart and for the 10 years I lived there nothing was fixed. My gas stove started leaking 6 years ago and I had no where to cook. The floors were falling in, we had severe rat infestations that the landlord would drop off poison and tell us it was part of the charm of living in an old house.

I put up with it because the rent was cheap and a great location.

I decided to buy my own house and did so in April. My neighbor just moved to a better rental.

Upon move out the don in law gave my neighbor his full deposit back. He had lived there 4 years. I expected the same.

The house was literally falling apart. Floors caving in/ceilings dropping dry rot all over. Both houses were in this condition. They did no maintenance not even tree trims and would not sign off for use to hire pest control.

The son in law started coming in before I even moved out “ getting it ready” for the next renter. He had never stepped foot in the house until I was moving out.

He never sent me a list for deductions. He ignored my certified letter. So after 57 days I filed a small claims case against the family trust the house is owned by.

2 days later I got a check in the mail for the full amount of the deposit. I sent a message that I had already filed a suit and would like if they would reimburse me for the filing fees and I would drop the suit.

I deposited the check and went to amend the case I had file due to getting part of the deposit back.

I went up pay my fee and my card was declined. I look at my account and they put a stop pay on the check. So now I’m negative 700 in my account and won’t get paid for 10 days.

My question is why the heck would they do a stop pay? I’m now worried they may try and sue ME.

The house has sat vacant since I moved out with the SIL doing diy repairs and got dinged by the city for multiple code violations that I reported. I know they are mad at me for that.

I live in an apartment complex with identical units. I’m moving out in late July, and informed my landlord on 3/25. Since then, he has shown my apartment 13 separate times, often with barely 24 hours notice.

I have an aggressive dog, so I have to make sure I’m home for every showing. I take my dog outside and walk him around while they show the place, which is usually ~30 minutes. He has been accommodating of my availability thus far and has understood that I haven’t been able to host showings certain days due to work conflicts.

However, at around showing #10, I began to wonder why my place hadn’t been rented yet. I googled my address and saw that it was actually listed as “off market”. I also have pet cameras in my house that run 24/7, so I scrolled back through the footage and found a clip of my landlord telling prospective tenants that “this unit is rented, but every other available unit is identical”! Obviously I can’t use this recording as proof of anything legally, but it showed me that he is using my unit as a “model unit” even though it has already been rented. This feels extremely unfair, especially given that I have to rearrange my day in order for them to show my unit.

I recently had a big shift in my work schedule, and told my landlord that I won’t be available to host showings for two full weeks in July. I also told him that it was “my understanding that my unit has been rented based on a google search, so I’d prefer if they showed available units instead”. He responded that my unit has definitely not been rented, and has proceeded to schedule several future showings during the weeks I told him I will explicitly not be available. He has shifted his attitude to not being accommodating of my schedule at all, stating that he has a right to enter the property at all times with reasonable notice. Which is true, but I feel this is unfair since my unit is not for rent anymore.

I simply cannot have him enter my home while I’m not there, as my dog poses a bite risk, and I’m not leaving him crated for 8+ hours a day. He is insisting on showing my house anyways anytime he gives me 24 hours notice, and will not respect my boundaries.

Am I being unreasonable by asking for him to work with my schedule? I’ve already allowed them to show the unit 13 times. I even told him that I’m moving out two weeks early and that he can have free range of the unit once I’m gone. I feel like I’m backed into a corner. I’ve never had to endure more than 5-6 showings for a rental unit before, and this feels so excessive and rude, especially knowing that he’s blatantly lying to and using me. Thanks for listening, any advice would be appreciated.