Discussions
Bad Landlords
Posted by Epicharis • 7/09/09 • Subscribe to this Discussion [RSS] • Report This Topic
Topics: landlords
Have you had a terrible landlord? What did they do to get on your bad side?
My landlord is constantly sending round workmen (who are always unqualified mates of his) with as little as an hour's notice, giving them keys to my house! Right now there are two people demolishing my bathroom...I found out that my landlord had decided to redo the bathroom yesterday evening and they turned up at 8am! I now have no bathroom until Tuesday and no water while they're working! GRR!
User Comments
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Ah, I had a landlord like that! Mine would also just come in whenever they felt like. I'd come home and find them there.
One time they had a dinner party and decided to use my roommates' and my stove for the extra hors d'oeuvres, so we had to stop cooking dinner and let them use it.
I was glad to get out of there. -
Didn't they give advance notice before they start drilling and digging?-
Nope, told me on Monday that he was going to come round with a builder to look at the bathroom, and then last night texted me saying that they'd come round today to start work!
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So it might be a case of not being informed at all........
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I own rental property and I would never behave in such a way towards my tenants. I rented for 10 years before I could buy my first house and I have always treated my tenants the way I wanted my landlords to treat me.
Unfortunately, I have found this to be pretty much a one way street. Tenants sign leases that they subsequently ignore, from smoking inside the flats to being angry when they want to move out before their lease expires and we remind them that they are responsible for their rent for the term of the lease. One woman went so far as to advertise her flat for rent and expected us to just take any tenant she found!
I have spent thousands repairing damages caused by tenants, had things stolen from our furnished unit (which is now rented unfurnished, as the tenants stole everything, including the refrigerator and bed!). They waste water and electricity, damage property and don't tell us when repairs are needed until the problem is a disaster...why report a leaking pipe when you can wait until it bursts? I've paid hundreds to have locks changed and multiples of new keys cut because people can't be bothered to return their keys...but what new tenant wants to move in when the old one still has keys to the flat?
I am sure there are bad landlords out there, but my experience is that the majority of renters are far from ideal as well.-
I was originally thinking of buying a rental unit years ago and decided not to. It was real cheap but reasons like this are why I didn't. I am a renter now and I don't give my landlord any grief and he is a cool landlord. No surprise visits and I keep the place up, I am going to paint the back door on the back deck soon just because it needs to be done soon. He usually tells me to take money off the rent for anything I do but I am not really concerned with that as I do live here and like to make it look nice
However I have a friend who recently got evicted by a landlord who wasn't all that great (granted a lot of her tenants weren't either) anyway she started foreclosing and was trying to sue the tenants of 2 apartments for $5000 and $8000. Now if rent is $750 you mean to tell me you are going to let these guys live there that long owing that much? Anyway I lived there over a year ago and she never made any repairs to our apartment (even the dangerous ones that were there when she showed us apartment), failed 3 safety inspections, allowed drug dealers to stay in the apartments even after it got raided, would never return my call anytime I called her and just wouldn't deal with the place. So now that she is in forclosure she is suing everybody and evicting them so she doesn't have to pay their rent for the first 6 months elsewhere. She even tried adding my name into the suing game. I moved out well over a year ago have not signed a lease in over two years. Didn't get her anywhere though. -
SV - I think there is a nasty cyclical nature to renting/leasing. Good landlords quickly turn sour, and good tenants quickly turn nasty because they wind up dealing with so much crap that eventually, everyone stops caring all together.
I try to be the best tenant I can be, but honestly, there comes a point when your work or efforts end up being trashed (verbally) by the landlord so that I no longer want to continue taking care of the property I rent. If the landlord can't be bothered, why should I? That doesn't mean that I will intentionally trash the place, or allow damages to go on until it's a major problem (that is an inconvenience to ME) but like the rental I'm in now - after being told how badly I've "trashed" the place, and what a bad job I've done, the repairs and maintenance projects I started are now half finished because I am not willing to put in my time, money and efforts into a place if I'm only going to be sued or harassed about it later (even if it improved the place and was done with permission).
I'm just not going to do it.
On the other hand, I treat every new landlord as if they were the best until they prove me wrong, and I would expect landlords to treat tenants the same way. You just never know if your new tenant/landlord will be awesome or a nightmare. Take this place for example, the other tenant that was here was also awesome. She was just...simply awesome. But the landlord took advantage of it, and she moved out after a year. Now the landlord has not enough tenants and is foreclosing on the property. But the lesson still isn't learned for her. Now that the cash flow has dried up she no longer wants to deal with the obligations of being a landlord. (Not that she ever did, mind you).
*sigh* -
I really feel bad for SiuilARuin, his landlord should have given him enough time to make arrangements.
I totally agree with you SweetV. I am going tru this right now. I rented my fully furnished house. After a few months the tenant told me that she could not pay the rent and needed to go back to her country in few days. I was jammed cos the agreement is for 2 years. I heard her story and decided to let her terminate the tenancy without asking her to pay anything. She left and I trusted her and took her words that there is no broken items and the house is in good condition. I had no time to check the entire house cos my dad was admitted in the hospital. When I went in to check a few days later,it was horror. My coffee table was broken an fixed and repainted in an ugly way. My vase was missing. The wall and chairs were scribbled. My kitchen cabinet had a hole in it. My pillows were missing.I have been a very nice landlord and this is what I get in return.
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But you live in the house. He has no right has he? Unless you are without contract...-
well right now I don't have a contract because my contract finished in June but he agreed to let me stay on as no one else was moving in until September...so I can't really shout at him or he'll kick me out! He has always been like this though, coming round at short notice and giving people keys to the house.
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I think you can find another place. Rents are cheaper right now...
However once the contract terminates, automatically is get renewed... so he is a fraud that's what I take -
It's different because it's a student house. And the whole reason I'm staying an extra month is because I don't want to have to move twice as I'll be moving in August.
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Oh boy have I had bad landlords! But you guys already know all about my sagas
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Bad landlords, the consequences of the capitalism
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I immediately thought, "This topic has Anok written all over it" when I read the title.
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LOLLOL You got that right! (Both of you!)
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My current landlord is comparable to a slum lord. He hires the cheapest contractors which always makes me ave to replace furniture or something. The roof leaks so we cannot use the 3rd floor, the drywall behind certain walls is crumbling so I have to repair it on my own and still pay full rent, the stove has not worked for months hence the reason we eat take out or microwavable food only, oh the list goes on. I had to get a lawyer and threaten to withhold the near $1000 a month to get him to agree to repair everything next week. -
wow this is so familiar. happened to me as well. my landlady would check out my stuff even my magazines. well well well the next day she was addressing me strangely with a funny smile on her face. as luck would have it she found out about my gay magazines and dvds(not porn). -
This guy is such a joker...in addition to the annoying last minute visits he's also useless when it comes to fixing things. I've been here 2 years and in the first year my ceiling collapsed after it rained all day and my room got soaked! He took a whole week to come round and sort it and while he did fix the roof (or rather, get his brother to) he just duct-taped a piece of cardboard over the whole and left it like that for the next 7 months! I found out from the previous tenant that the ceiling had leaked the previous winter but the landlord had just done a temporary fix!
This year I moved to a different room in the house and in the winter the whole room got damp and went mouldy because he had gotten the cheapest double-glazing put in with no consideration for the ventilation which was necessary in this house. When I complained to him his response was that I should have kept the heating on full and the window open all the time! And he said he'd come round in 3 weeks to get rid of the mould on the walls! So I ended up having to bleach the walls myself while throwing away loads of stuff that had been ruined by the damp! Fortunately one of my housemates had moved home so I took her room but he's planning on renting the room out again this year without sorting the problem! I'm going to write to the next tenants after they move in to tell them to keep an eye out for damp so that he can't claim it's a new problem.
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