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Stupid Landlord :-( (Long Rant)
Posted by Epicharis • 8/21/09 • Subscribe to this Discussion [RSS] • Report This Topic
Topics: *weep* why are people so mean?
I had a row with my ex-landlord yesterday and it's still got me a little agitated 
He's ruined my day off!
It was a dingy student house when I moved in and it was a cleaner dingy student house when I moved out. He tried to blame scuff marks on the walls made when the builders redid the bathroom on me, yelled at me for leaving crap all over the place (crap like a working TV that was there when I moved in and other things that had been left there by 5 years of continuous tenants), blamed me for water damage to the paint on the walls...water damage from his faulty roof, and basically complained about the place being dirty.
When I moved in the place was so yukky I had to clean literally everything...every shelf, every fork! But as I was moving in with some friends who had lived there the previous year I didn't mind the dinginess too much.
Over my 2 years there I was the only person who did any cleaning at all (one of my housemates didn't know we had a vacuum cleaner, another didn't know we had a broom until they saw me using them). And as for most of my second year there I was living with strangers I didn't like I didn't feel I should be responsible for the mess they left me with. They didn't do any cleaning at all before they moved out, they didn't even empty the fridge or do their washing up let alone anything else! So I told the landlord that I wasn't going to do that, because it's not fair - we all had separate contracts with him so if he had a problem he should take it up with them. Having said that, I did clean the house, I just didn't do their washing up or break my back cleaning things that hadn't been cleaned for me.
While I was there there my room was flooded due to a leaking roof, and it took him 5 days to come round, so I had to sleep on the sofa. Then he left me with a piece of cardboard taped over the hole for 7 months. I moved out of that room into another the following year and as he'd gotten dodgy double glazing done without proper venting the entire room got damp and the walls turned mouldy. He blamed that on me - apparently I stored all my damp washing in there with the window shut...there was less than a foot of floor space in that room, I couldn't have fitted a clothes horse in there if I'd wanted to! And all he did about it was tell me to bleach the walls and have the window open permanently all winter! He has left me answerphone messages at 8am saying he's given a workman keys to my house and he'll be there at 9am. When he told me he was coming round (with an hour or two's notice) he was always late, and he would notify me of builders or decorators starting work the evening before they arrived! He was a horrible landlord!
He called me up yesterday to say he is going to return my deposit but that if I ever dared to contact him for a reference I'd be sorry because I've turned his house into a sh*thole. He says I told him the place was really clean when the others moved out so he gave back their deposits, though I never would have said that, and so he calls me a 'f*cking liar' and says he's going to call up all of our utilities suppliers to see if I've bothered to pay the bills because I probably haven't done it (even though all the bills were paid by my via direct debit and EVERYONE owes ME money). Then he hung up on me!
So I'm feeling really crap now...and worried that as he has my forwarding address he might try to get spite me by contacting my employers and bitching about me. I wouldn't put it past him...he named his children the names his brother had wanted for their kids just to spite him!
Somebody cheer me up!
(I doubt anyone will have read all that!)
User Comments
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If he speaks out against you without sufficient proof, you can take legal action against him.
Does that make you feel better?
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not really...I'm an impoverished 23 year old nanny with no 'support network'...taking him to court is not really an option for me!
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Epi - citizens advice bureaux are there for this reason.
Worse comes to worse, I'm au fait enough with legalities that I can draft a letter for you that will assert your rights and make him think again. I'm sure, for example, the local council would be interested in the conditions in which he houses students.
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I think he is just taking out a load of aggression on you and has no intention at all of doing anything.-
hope so! I still feel crap though I hate being shouted at!
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I'm planning on writing to the university to tell them they ought to remove him from their housing list.
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Excellent idea, but make sure he doesn't find out it was you, if he has all your other info.
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Well, my friends also wanted to complain about him, but didn't want to do it while I was still living there, so there will be a few letters of complaint about him.
Yes...super-British...I solve everything with letters! -
Excellent
I feel a strong letter coming on myself lol
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I don't really know what to say, Epi, except the guy sounds like a jerk and I'm sorry for your problems with him.
However, you should know (in your heart) that you did the right thing--and that he is in the wrong. Don't give him the power of ruining your day off. Try to let it go if you can!
Sometimes when I am really pissed at someone, I write that person a letter really telling him/her off. I don't usually send it (although I sometimes have when it was a particularly ascerbic and good letter) but it always makes me feel better to rant.
Of course you ranted here--so perhpas you are now feeling better?-
Personal arguments really stress me out...I hardly ever have them, but I tend to take things like that personally, so I keep going over in my head trying to work out if he was right, because I don't understand how he could be so horrid if he wasn't!
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Epi--you know if you were right. If this place had FIVE solid years of tenants with no professional cleaners coming in--then he is totally out of line. In the U.S., he would never win his case because landlords are responsible for 'normal wear and tear' which is what yours sounds like. Things like damage from water or fixing the house--that's not your fault.
Keep in mind that there are *many* unbalanced people out there. tons of them! This guy is likely one of those unbalanced people! -
I think he does have small man syndrome...and he looks like a Sontaran from Doctor Who which amuses me...
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People heap their shit on the wrong target all the time, you know what is right, so stick to your guns missus.
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Oh small men can be very nasty! I get their anger a lot because I am tall. And they are always particularly nasty and hateful to tall girls!
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They also hate students.
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everyone hates students...even I hated students when I was a student!
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They are awful
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I would keep in mind that one statement:
He called me up yesterday to say he is going to return my deposit-
true...but he did say that before I called him a horrible landlord and told him that when I had moved in the place was disgusting...don't know if he'll still be returning it!
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Epi--that sounds like something I would say! Yikes!
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Tell him you'll report him to the state for being a slumlord, and that you'll be contacting every agency that has anything to do with rental codes.
(And then do it).-
I'd love to, but I don't really want to bring down the heap of sh*t that will no doubt fall upon me if I did!
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If he is as bad as you say he is, then no trouble is going to come to you. I've done it myself - it's the right thing to do. He cannot threaten you for his indiscretions and lack of responsibility.
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take him to court? he does sound like a mofo though. -
I wouldn't bother arguing directly with him, as he'll convince himself that what he's said is true and just think you're a...horrible tenant. But I definitely would write that letter to the folks who referring students to him for adequate housing. Let him see what life is like without those referrals. -
Well, atleast you got your deposit back right? Last house I rented I made sure to shampoo all the carpets, clean the walls, bleach everything in the bathroom (almost killed me), and fix everything my roomies ever altered. I was the sole person on the lease so the only thing I really cared about was getting my $1400 deposit back. -
Your rant could have been written by me when I was 23, living in a moldy, leaky, drafty house with three other university students.
Students and people with little income are the renters who end up dealing with the unscrupulous landlords out there. Some of these people purposely take advantage or provoke a situation. I've known some of them to deliberately find fault (when you move out, of course) so they can justify keeping the deposits. These same landlords cannot be found when you have a problem, I might add. When I lived in another city, I never got my deposit back from a building manager, in spite of leaving the place pristine. She said she would mail me the cheque. As if. I phoned, drove out on my day off, but could never catch her in. Then she moved without a forwarding address and I was out $300 bucks.
The only thing that gives you some leverage, if he tries to keep your deposit, is that he had separate contracts with each of you. He would be hard pressed to thus find you responsible for the alleged damage and not return your deposit, particularly since he returned the deposits to the others who would be deemed equally responsible.
My advice? Get your deposit back and move on. I hope you will have better living conditions soon. -
I don't know if I'm reading your rant wrong .... but it seems that the dinginess and the mess was caused by your friends for not cleaning and not by the landlord. You said they were staying there the year before so if the place is disgusting and they had been living there it's their fault. And then when your stranger housemates left they also left the place in a mess.
The landlord is just pissed off at the mess left behind by the other tenants- but you're the one left with the hot potato. -
I'm sorry for your troubles. In future, make sure you take pictures of everything when you move in & out. At least you'd have evidence then. -
What an absolute SODDING Pucker Face.
You go girl - and you chipper up. YOU HEAR ME? (shouting loud so you can hear this American... from America... )
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