RPA Tenant Rights Blog » Health Hazards

Health Hazard

selfaware74 — Tue, 26 Nov 2013 21:08:11 +0000

I have notified my landlord, maintenance, attorney, and the housing authority regarding a fly infestation problem I am having in my apt. I notified the landlord and maintenance on the 19th of August and maintenance did not come to look at the problem until the 31st of August. Maintenance took pictures of all the dead flies on and below my window sills in my back bedroom. He also sprayed around the windows outside that same day. That seemed to help until I noticed on Saturday, September 5, 2009 that there were numerous dead flies on the window sills in my back bedroom and on the floor below. I called and left a message for maintenance, but did not receive a call back that day. In a few hours, the window sill in my bedroom and 2 window sills in my living room were covered with dead flies. I called maintenance again on Sunday, September 6, 2009, but have still not heard anything and it is now 3:30 p.m. on Tuesday, September 8, 2009. I wrote an email to the housing inspector at lancaster county housing authority yesterday and printed out a copy of the email and mailed it to my attorney. I have not gotten any calls from maintenance or the housing authority as of yet. Will it hurt my receiving section 8 rental assistance if I call the state health department? Thank you. I am a graduate student and receive disability.

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Slumlord

Tenant — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 06:21:07 +0000

I have been living in my apartment for about 3 years now. My landlord is elderly and she only comes around to ‘clean’ up the apartment from the 1st to the 5th so that she can collect rent as well. The apartment complex is quite small, 5 apartments in all, but the maintaince is never kept up.
In the upstairs apartment the carpet was completely delapted. Upon removal, which was only done upon persistence and refusal to pay for it or live in it ourselves, was demeed unsanitary and a health hazard by the carpet installers. Since carpet has been put in, the lamient has still yet to be installed, 3 weeks later. Therefore we are still walking on the unsanitary carpet in our hallways and kitchen. The kitchen sink’s faucet is lacking the proper installation to make it steady. At any moment we could move it and the pipes could burst. When we moved in the blinds were brown and moldy and the windows were covered in micliem (dangerous mold). All our vents are covered in rust and inches of dirt. Our heaters don’t work and our landlord refuses to compensate for it. Also our counters are peeling up. The landlord also refused to paint the dirty walls that were covered in brown and black stains, so we ended up painting it ourselves with no compensation either.
As for the apartment below, the major problem is the bathroom sink. It continuosly over flows because of the ancient plumbing. When it overflows it not only floods the bathroom it also begins to seep down into the apartment below. Additional problems include the kitchen fan that is broken. One of the burners on the stove doesn’t work. Finally, after multiple complaints, the renter demanded the bathroom faucet get fixed. She refused to do it immediately but the next day (after she walked in without authorization) she told the renter that he had to vacate the building for good without any compensation.
Also, none of the fire dectors work and there is no fire extinguisher.

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Apartment Air Quality

Matthew — Fri, 11 Jan 2013 08:42:28 +0000

Hello,

Would someone be able to suggest an air quality test or testing company in Los Angeles? There is a continuous flow of white dust/poweder that coats everything in my place. I run a Roomba twice a day and it is filled each time with dust. I am worried it is due to the recent construction of the building (year ago) and that it is toxic.

Thanks,
Matthew

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Apartment Electrical problems

Veronica — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 07:01:58 +0000

The power supply on 2 of my TV’s have been blown out do to poor electrical maintainace in my duplex. Is the owner liable for repair costs to fix my TV’s? Isn’t the apartment electrical problems something the landlord should be responsible to maintain. Can I get my landlord to pay for damages to my ty’s due to poor apartment electrical supply?

I’d love to hear what you all think. Thanks!

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Bad lease, bugs and safety issues How to leave?

Tenant — Sun, 02 Sep 2012 03:35:15 +0000

Hi, I live in Tennessee. We have lived in this apartment for 17mos now. A lot of our problems started when neighbors moved in 3weeks before our 1st lease was up. Our apartments are setup like duplexes to give you a layout idea. The new neighbors’ boyfriend decided one night to beat the crap out of her, bust in her door, break out the windows and steal her car. I had to call the police and they took over 30mins to respond. I also found out the boyfriend had a gun. Guns go through walls and my baby’s room is right next to their rooms. Anyway, I felt very unsafe after all of this and by our lease they should have been evicted within 3days of the episode. Instead the apartment waited 2weeks to fix the windows and we ran out of timeto find a new place. After that during the 2week transient period of not knowing if we were staying or going, we had phone calls from the apartment management to both myself and my husband by 2 different people saying that if we signed the new lease by the end of the month our rent would stay the same. We go in and renew the lease because we have no where else to go. Well rent rolls around and we recieve a note saying we still owe them another $50. I have no idea what for. I go in and talk with the manager. He pulls out the lease and shows me where an actual number for the rent amount should have been typed in and we find typed out word for word the amount that is being deducted from the standard rent and the place saying the final rent amount and dates tha it is valid blank. It says we will recieve a deduction of $ one hundred and forty. It doesn’t say from what though. He turns another page and shows me that marketrate is $720 and says our rent is 140 from 720…so 580. Nevermind the two other blanks he says. I wondered if the lease was even valid at this point. Because the rent went up we haven’t been able to pay it on time since and he accepted partial payments, then he moved to another complex and the new lady says she won’t take partial payments which after late fees bumps our rent up to 645mo. I don’t even make 600 a mo and my husband barely makes 1100mo. So now we can’t afford the place at all. And the last two things are ants and handicap accessibility. Our apartment, the neighbors’ apartment and several other units are all super invetsted with black ants. They get into everything, bite and regardless of how much I clean they stay. The office is aware of the problem as everyone complains about them,but they don’t do anything about them. Last I am expecting baby #2. I already had back issues and now I have been considered temporarly handicapped. I am getting a handicap placard and have been given strict restrictions on walking and stair usage. I may have to use a wheelchair soon too. Our apartment is a 3bdrm, 2 story townhouse. I can no longer climbthe satirs both inside and outside. We don’t have 3bdrm handicap apartments here, only 2bdrm and they are actually higher in rent. I am wondering if I have good grounds to terminate my lease early? It’s not up til March of next year, but my back, peace of mind, and safety can’t wait til then.

Our lease does say that under no circumstances can the lease be terminated early. It does say we can be evicted for no longer meeting program money caps on income per month, but even if evicted we still lose our 350 pet deposit, 150 security deposit, and have to pay them 1 months rent and a fee of 1680 within 2weeks to break the lease. I don’t have that kind of money to break the lease. I actually don’t mind them keeping the depositsso long as we can leave without paying anything else. The apartment does some small paint touchups, blinds replaced, carpet cleaning and some carpet patches need replaced by the door but nothing major.

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Should I retain legal counsel before I talk with the landlord ?

Ari — Fri, 25 May 2012 08:17:15 +0000

Hi,
I just found asbestos wrapping the pipes in basement. It is crumbling and dusty. I sent a sample to a testing lab and it came back >70% asbestos. We don’t have forced air, and there isn’t much communication between the basement and the living area so we’re not in any immediate danger AFAIK.
I need to tell the landlord now, to get her to have it fixed.
She’s been pretty upset when other things needed to be fixed (dishwasher, refrigerator, ceiling fan) and I’m worried she’ll retaliate by raising the rent (or not renting to me when the lease is up) or keeping the security deposit (even though there’s nothing we did to the house – it was this way when we moved in).
Moreover, the pipe-insulation has been loosely wrapped with duct tape in the recent past, before we moved in. I assume someone knew it was crumbing and tried to tape it up. Whether they knew it was asbestos is another issue…

What are my legal rights and responsibilities here?
Should I retain legal counsel before I talk with the landlord?

Thanks,
Ari

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Apartment fire

Nick — Sat, 05 Feb 2011 05:11:03 +0000

This is tricky, and I hope someone here can help. My roommate and I just recently moved into an apartment (the first of december). On the third of december, our neighbor set his unit on fire, causing extensive damage to his and smoke/water damage to ours.

We have a company working on the restoration, but they’re taking their time (due to insurance issues…all parties involved have insurance). It’s sucking money out of my insurance and that’s going to run out soon (we’re on week 2 and this was only supposed to take “2-3 days”)

However, the apartment complex won’t meet with us, citing that ‘it wasn’t their fault the fire started’. We’re just trying to figure out why we have to pay rent for a month/month and a half that we weren’t able to actually LIVE or even MOVE INTO our unit. Everyone is pointing fingers at each other and i’m wondering what our recourse is towards the apartment complex?

Do we have to pay rent because of this? I know insurance will cover it…but it seems silly that we have to put up the money first and let insurance take their time to reimburse us. Isn’t the apartment liable for ANYTHING? Why are we the ones being punished out of all the parties considering we’re not at fault?

Are we able to escape our lease? This certain circumstance/displacement issues aren’t covered in the lease. They won’t give us time to discuss moving to another unit or anything.

They’re basically washing their hands of it completely…and I’m not even sure where to turn.

Thank you for your time!

~Nick

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