RPA Tenant Rights Blog » General Topics

Can Landlords Charge Non-Refundable Pet Deposits?

Tenant — Sat, 25 Apr 2015 00:18:53 +0000

For the pet lovers like myself, let me ask you this: would you agree with me when I say that it is becoming very difficult to actually care for pets without getting punished by all those fees? The apartment I’m renting has agreeable terms when it comes to pet deposits. But because of work, I have to move to another state and thus, I am looking for an apartment to rent. Of course, I will be bringing my pets with me. I have a dog and two cats. The problem is, in landlord is asking for $250 pet deposit, $300 Non-Refundable pet fees and a $25 pet rent per month. I didn’t think this was fair or even legal.

To cut the long story short, I filed a complaint against that apartment even if I did not really continue renting there. The complaint was mainly to warn other pet lovers like myself about that apartment complex.

For your guidance, I thought of sharing the following facts about pet deposits.

Is pet rent legal?

In all states, pet rent is legal as long as there are no discriminatory reasons why you are being charged this additional rent. Example of a discriminatory reason is that you are being charged pet fees because of your race, color, age, and sex and so on.

Is it legal to charge pet rent and pet deposit?

A pet deposit pertains to the money that you pay up front to ensure your landlord that there is coverage in case your pet damages the property. So just like your security deposit, the pet deposit is a one-time fee.

On the other hand, the pet rent is paid on a monthly basis and it covers the mere presence of your pet in the apartment complex. In some states, that rent is required because by law, pets are not allowed in an apartment complex. The only exception to this is if the pet is necessary for your functioning or if they are service pets. In some areas, pets are even considered as privileges.

Are non-refundable pet fees legal?

The answer would depend on your state. So you’d have to check your local tenant laws. Do not just believe everything on the lease because sometimes landlords would have their attorneys draft the lease to their advantage, with or without consideration of the existing tenant laws in your state.

However, know that in Massachusetts that fees are illegal.

If you don’t want the many pet fees and still keep your pet, then that is also possible. This is because there are apartment complexes that are built to be pet-friendly. In these apartments, there is a wide lawn for pets as well as a pet playground. The only catch is that these places are usually more expensive than the regular apartments.

Another option would be to rent a home or a private townhouse. These places are usually more agreeable when it comes to pet fees.

Of course, it may take some time before you would find that perfect place for you and your pet. Again, if you feel discriminated when looking for an apartment or if there is something in the lease that is contradicting your state and local laws, feel free to file a complaint and let others know about it. Here is the link that I used when I did that: http://www.rentalprotectionagency.com/complaint_center.php.

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Can my landlord evict me after a 3-day notice?

Tenant — Sun, 19 Apr 2015 23:00:19 +0000

There is a widespread confusion on the what the 3-day notice is about. As a tenant, I would dread the day when my landlord will mail me a 3-day notice because I was a little delayed on the rent. But as it appears, a 3-day notice is only given as a reminder that a payment is late or it is incomplete. There are many ways that you can prevent the mailing of such a notice. For instance, you can talk to your landlord and discuss the possibility of an extension. Well, this worked for me but I had to pay late fees and all that. I know it was my fault since it is my responsibility to make sure that I make the payments on time so I paid the fees.

Correcting Myths on the 3-Day Notice

Once the 3-Day notice is up, you will not be evicted or locked out. In fact, the 3-day notice is just the beginning of a lengthy process that will ultimately lead to your eviction – if you do not pay up.

After three days of no payment or no negotiation coming from your end, the landlord can then move to filing for a formal eviction process. You don’t want this to happen because if a resolution is handed down from the court, you will be evicted, your credit score will be affected and depending on how the notice was stipulated, you might also be charged for the landlord’s court costs.

In short, you will be made to pay more than the rent and your credit history will also be stained for a few years.

However, if you feel that the 3-day notice has been incorrectly used by your landlord, then it is your right to file for a complaint.

When Should You File for a Complaint

You file for a complaint if you are forcefully evicted after the 3-day notice. Always keep in mind that the notice is only supposed to be a reminder to pay up; otherwise, an eviction case will be filed against you.
If you already have your rent, plus late charges, but your landlord will not accept it and decided to still proceed with the legal actions then you should file for a complaint. You want to make sure that you intention to pay up is well documented in order to hold valid proof in court. Remember that an illegal detainer action must only be filed if you do not pay up or move out.
If you have been locked out. Your landlord cannot lock you out at anytime, and without the final decisions to your eviction case.

To file for a formal complaint, use the same link that I used: http://www.rentalprotectionagency.com/complaint_center.php. After filing, the RPA will step in and help you find a solution to your rental concerns.

PS: I used RPA’s services when I got into the same trouble with my landlord and I must say, I was truly satisfied with them. I paid $35 as a filing fee but I think that was better than having to face lawsuits and pay for lawyers.

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Breaking My Lease

Kissalvoe — Fri, 17 Apr 2015 10:22:10 +0000

I have been with my apartment complex in Albuquerque, NM since May. We signed an 8 month lease and it ends as of January 31st. However, I do not want to stay that long. I don’t feel secure in staying for a few more months.

Several times we have placed work orders for maintenance to fix a door or our ceiling fan (the light no longer worked!). It took 4 weeks for them to even go LOOK at the fan. They said they would replace it the following week but never did. Two weeks later, there was a leak, apparently from our master bathroom toilet, which flooded our apartment and the apartment below us. The call went to the office around 10am. I leave for work at 5am and don’t use that bathroom other than for showers.

THe office never recorded our new contact numbers from months before. They were always able to get ahold of us through our agent/alternate contact, but not on this day! They never notified us of the problem. Maintenance went in the apartment and ruined things with their negligence. They threw wet items all over the bed, onto the living room floor, filled backpacks with expensive electronic equipment and left it in puddles of water.

I didn’t come home til after 6pm and when I did, I had no knowledge of what happened. My apartment was thrown upside down. The carpet was torn up and a blower was running to dry underneath. All of the lights (that worked) and fans in the house had been running all day. All without our knowledge.

I took a complaint to my apartment manager who said it was our fault. The negligence was on OUR part because we “left the water running”. I asked him if I was supposed to shut the water to the toilets off everytime I left the house. He said it was a leak we didn’t report. And why? BECAUSE IT WAS A LEAK WE HAD NO KNOWLEDGE ABOUT. When I left for work that morning, there was nothing out of place. The floor in the bathroom was completely dry. He refuses to take any responsibility for the fact that nobody bothered to contact us, the fact that the maintenance men were negligent and not only ruined things on their own (NOT due to water damage directly from the leak), and that they left all electricity running for 8 hours, using up resources that WE have to pay for.

On top of all of this, and the reason I really don’t want to stay… The master bedroom, where the carpet was lifted for the blower, smells like mold. It’s damp (two weeks later) and smells moldy. The apartment manager refuses to work with us at all. What can I do to either make him work with us or get our of our lease so we can move somewhere SAFE and free of mold?

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Indian Male Moths in Apartment

marir89 — Tue, 02 Dec 2014 20:17:35 +0000

Hi – I live in a small apartment building. Recently I noticed we have indian male moths. My husband and I have been killing them left and right. We got rid of anything that was open (grains, cereals, rice, etc.) as we realized what the bugs were and what they liked. I reached out to the super and they got an exterminator in for a quote. The exterminator gave the landlord a quote and now they are expecting me to pay for it since they say it was brought in.

It could have been brought in from the supermarket or flown into my apt from another apt. Should I have to pay for this or can i fight it?

I am planning on moving soon as im afraid that my security deposit will be at risk due to this.

Any tupes on how I should proceed or what I can do?

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Help me this is gotten out of hand

Scott Raley — Tue, 29 Jul 2014 12:43:18 +0000

I’ve been renting for 3 years in a house from a spanish lady who works a lot.

I just found out about a year ago the house is going through some law case and she’s losing the house.

So I would always ask her Flora is her name should I be worried about moving? Why are you moving things out should I be looking for a place?

She would say no we can be here all year long.

We’ll that’s not the case she lied and took all my rent money over all those years.

She told my on July 7th that I need move out in 2 weeks.

That wasn’t enough time to find a place.

I’m struggling because there isn’t many places to move into since I rent a room.

So she took it upon her self when I wasn’t there to break into my room with a lock on it with out prior notice and take all my belongings out and move them all down stairs and said get your stuff or I’m throwing it away.

How wrong is that?

What should I do now?

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Renter

Tom — Fri, 20 Jun 2014 17:12:54 +0000

I am aware of the Philadelphia Lead Paint Regulation

[named Lead Disclosure and Certification act] states that a Landlord can NOT evict a tenant, if they are not in compliance with the regulation [IE Providing the Tenant with children 6 and under, with a "Lead Safe" or "Lead Free" certificate.

LANDLORD CAN NOT CHARGE RENT OR EVICT IF HE DID NOT FOLLOW THE LEAD PAINT REGULATION !!!

Fellow tenants, Wake Up. This is our chance at getting the safety rights for ourselves.

The cheap landlords who do follow and provide us with the official Lead Safe Certificate, certify the safety THEMSELVES !

How can we trust them to ensure Lead Paint Safety ?

can the Fox watch the henhouse ?

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My rights

Denise — Thu, 01 May 2014 00:36:34 +0000

I have begun to feel so anxious in my apartment… The family living above us…husband , wife , and two children, six and seven graders, has been making my life here miserable! The wife is a common denominator in my different incidents around my town. She is barred from two town sporting venues and I believe she has three restraining orders against her from starting with parents at different schools. She knows how to push people’s buttons. I had a problem with her on several occasions where she tries to antagonize me, I have asked nicely to lose my phone number and stop texting me! This has finally stopped but lately, we can’t even walk around my house. I have a fifteen year old who has a room right below hers and my bedroom is below their kids room. If we get up to go to the bathroom, or open a door, go to the fridge or move in our bedrooms…. Someone bangs their feet so loudly my house shakes! It’s beginning to feel as if we can’t move in our own apartment! The other night my son was writing a paper with headphones in and I was watching tv on the couch…the time was 9:30 and neither one of us was moving and this feet banging went on for ten minutes. My sin asked that I called the police , but I didn’t . We have a new landlord, because the last one had to sell because they never paid the rent! I feel they are doing this purposely hoping that we leave. I pay my rent on time every month since I moved here three years ago and don’t want the new landlord to think I complain a lot but it is getting crazy! Two weeks ago , I had to let him know that I could not reach my oil tank safely because they have blocked it with their things… They have still not moved their things and I am unable to read how much oil I have in my tank! What do you reccommend ?? Please help me! I don’t even want to come home some days!

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fell asleep waiting on a repair man

Robert — Wed, 02 Apr 2014 09:59:17 +0000

I work nights and I generally go to bed by 2pm at the latest. My AC went out and the handy man my landlord uses doesn’t get off work till 5pm so he can’t do any repairs till after that. I called him during the week and he explained about his job and I said how I can’t really do that time so how about the weekend? He said that’s fine he’ll be by after lunch on saturday. I waited on him saturday but fell asleep, he arrived at my house at 4:15pm (which isn’t after lunch to me) I still have his voicemail asking me to come to the door in which he says it’s 4:15. I slept through his knocks and now my landlord is charging me a 40 dollar fee for "being a no show" No where in my lease does it say I will be billed for repairs if I miss the repair man. I wouldn’t have agreed to the appointment if I had known it would have been after 4pm. I have been working 6 days a week so I had to go to work that night so I HAD to sleep.

Can my landlord charge me 40 dollars for falling asleep? After 4pm is like 1am to me.

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Landlord won’t fix air conditioner

Sick,Tired, and Scared — Thu, 27 Mar 2014 19:12:21 +0000

I live in Arizona and have been renting a mobile home from what I thought were caring people. My landlords own a small trailer park and some off property rentals. I happen to live in one of their off property trailers that I moved into because it had central air instead of window unit air conditioning and 2 years ago my central air conditioning unit broke down in July. The problem with window units as opposed to central units is that if the electricity goes out when power is restored the central unit will turn back on, unlike the window units that have to be turned on manually. In Arizona the summers are brutal and with pets my rental trailer can reach 100 degrees VERY quickly. I work all day and am in constant fear of power outages.

Here is the problem…when I ask them if they will fix my A/C they tell me that they don’t have the money for repairs; but last year they made sure that their personal home got a brand new A/C unit. Also they have bought luxury cars and just recently bought a small motorhome for their vacations. I have read the Tenant/Landlord Act and have paid my rent as it advises.

When my neighbor asks for their trailer to be repaired my landlords make sure they repair theirs right away. Last summer their central unit needed a fan motor so the landlord told my neighbors son to jump my fence and take the one out of my unit since it is broken down anyway and just yesterday my neighbor told me that he also said he’s going to take my unit out and leave me with the window units.

Can ANYONE help give me some sort of direction to go so that I can get some help, I live alone and don’t have extra money to do the repairs myself and then “take it off of the rent”. I feel I am being taken advantage of and I’m scared..I even had to drop my rent 25.00 a month because of my job salary being less than before.

Please somebody help!!!!

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Can my Landlord do this???

Frustrated in Kansas — Mon, 24 Feb 2014 07:24:27 +0000

My husband and I rented a room in an older couples home last October (2013). He was 67 and still working 30+ hours a week and she is 60 and hasn ‘t worked in several years do to health issues stemming from fybromyalgia and a few other things. Being a former nurse and fellow fibromyalgia sufferer, I thought it would be nice to live with someone who understood what I went through on a daily basis and it’s fufilling to me to help people who need encouragement. She had been basically bedridden for 2 years or more after a fall that broke a bone around her hip, but she did not need a hip replacement. The agreement was my hjusband or I would cook 4 nights a week (usually Monday – Thursday), split the grocery bill,pay 375.00 in rent, and I would do about an hours worth of housework (dust the livingroom, vacuum ect.) and we would all take a turn cleaning the bathroom. Unfortunately, that’s not how it worked out.

We met "P" when she came to pick us up for an evening over at their home. On the way back we stopped at the gas station to buy cigarettes and a soda. She had her hand out from the beginning asking us to buy both for her. My husband, being a nice guy, paid for her drink and Marlboro cigarettes. (Red flag #1) Pulling into her drive she felt "shaky" and asked me to help her get seated out on the back deck and please make her a peanut butter sandwich. I noticed as I searched through the unfamiliar kitchen, that they had very little food…peanut butter and bread was about all they had. (Red flag #2)

"P", her husband, soon came home from work and had little to add to the converstation. He’s a quite man. He’d have to be as she fills up the silence with questions that go past the normal boundries of decency. I remember being extremely hungry as I had not eaten all day and someone suggested ordering pizza,so that’s what we did, and you guessed it…we paid for that as well. (Red flag #3) After all the pizza was eaten I was definately ready to go home and go to bed for tomorrow was moving day, BUT she didn’t want us to leave. She asked us if we didn’t want to just spend the night. We declined and her husband drove us home.

As we were falling asleep, my husband said, "She is going to nickel and dime us to death." I wish I would have listened to my husband!

Next time: I take a trip down the stairs, backwards and I catch my landlady snooping through my pills while I’m taking a nap.

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