Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with roommate and landlord

How to get rid of a new roommate who, it turns out, has a rap sheet?

UrbanEye — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:44:58 -0800

Just signed a 5 month lease with 4 roommates found on Craigslist, then found out one guy has a criminal record a mile long! How should I begin to deal with this so things don't get physically dangerous, or legally murky? I am a current tenant at an apartment which will soon have 3 new tenants on a lease, and 2 (including myself) who have been there for a month or so. The landlord wants everyone to be on a one year lease, but one tenant is moving out in mid July. So, we signed a lease that's good till July and we will need to find a replacement for the person leaving in July before signing the one year lease.

Anyway, myself and the other tenant staying on found two really cool, nice people for the apartment. Unfortunately, the landlord sort of went over our heads and gave our fifth room to someone we had shown the place to, but had not confirmed as someone we liked.

Turns out that the 5'th roommate got out of jail two months ago, (a fact learned due to alcohol). A quick check of online court records brought up a substantial list of retail theft, drug, and criminal mischief charges. We (obviously) knew nothing about this beforehand.

The 5'th roommate has also made our lone female roommate, (the other tenant staying on from before) very uncomfortable with his lewd commentary. Upon finding out she was married, he said "that must be hard, but you have guys on the side right?" *wink* *wink*

I foresee a very complicated situation developing very fast. I don't want to live with a thief and a creep, but I also don't want to try kicking out a man who's been to jail and has been charged with "resisting arrest", "simple assault", and "criminal mischief".

My landlord may or may not know how to handle this in a mature way.

My roommate is giving me a concern

ictow — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 09:07:45 -0800

What should I do to protect myself from my roommate's mess? Three of us moved to Chicago two months ago. We all had different strategies of attack. I saved money beforehand so I could be unemployed and not worried. It's worked out. One roommate pounded the pavement to get two or three jobs. It's worked out. The third decided to rely on her charm and good luck. It hasn't worked out.

For October rent she had to get a loan from her mother. Beyond that she's in debt for another $500. She just got a job a week and a half ago, but won't be getting a paycheck till the end of this month. As such, she can't pay November rent. She has offered no solution to this, and doesn't seem to understand or care why it really worries me. She says she'll be able to pay both November and December rent on December 1st, but that's by no means a sure thing. I've insisted that she call our landlord and try to work something out, but so far all she's done is left a voicemail.

We're all three on the lease, and I just don't want to get screwed by her laissez-faire attitude to her own finances. So my question is: what do I do? Consider eviction a non-option, at least until December. Should I pay her rent and get stuck trying to get paid back? Should I leave it between her and the landlord? He's a nice guy, so I'm not worried about immediate repercussions, but this is all new to me. I'm not used to living with someone who can be so irresponsible.

Any/all advice welcome. Do what you can to calm these frazzled nerves.

How do I best navigate through a bad landlord/tenant situation?

SeizeTheDay — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 23:07:32 -0800

Complicated, messy NYC roommate/landlord question: 4 roommates share a 3 bedroom converted into 4 (with permission). One roommate signed a lease for a new building without getting permission from current building to transfer name on lease to new roommate. Said old roommate now refuses to pay six months of rent (remainder of lease). Much, much more inside. So three out of 4 roommates want to get out of current lease by assigning the lease to new people. This was never a problem in the building before, but now building has new ownership, and they’re making this difficult/impossible.

Two roommates are unemployed and need to get out. One of two refuses to pay remaining 6 months of lease (even though he lied about his income and signed a new one year lease in NJ). Third roommate that wants to leave has signed a one year lease (in another building) starting in May.

Leasing agent for landlord will not give us a straight answer about assigning lease to other candidates. We gave management 3 very viable replacement candidates, including all application material. This morning one of the candidates was explicitly rejected by management because it was for the converted room (despite giving us (the current tenants) no notice of this). They refuse to comment on the other two applications.

I am one of the three that wants to move out. I am willing to pay my 6 months remainder of the lease to avoid credit problems, court appearances, etc. but (as I said earlier) one roommate refuses to pay the next 6 months and other two roommates refuse to cover the deadbeat’s share (and eventually sue deadbeat). Important note: landlord refuses to accept partial payments of rent, so if deadbeat doesn’t pay and we don’t cover his share, leasing agent won’t cash our checks.

Leasing agency refuses to break the lease. Deadbeat refuses to pay. And the third roommate that wants to leave (who signed elsewhere) is starting to think that he should refuse to pay as well and let them sue us all.

I don’t want to be sued. I want to pay my 6 months and get the hell out of this situation. Ideally, I want management to take the applicants we gave them to replace us, but if that’s not going to happen, I need to know what my best option is. Should I: 1) Refuse to pay and let them sue, knowing full well they’d sue anyway because deadbeat won’t pay. 2) Pay my rent and pray that they cash my check and understand the situation (I’m going to camp out in the office on Monday until they at least hear my case). 3) Promise the landlord a check for the full amount of my share if they leave me alone. 4) Something else?

What happens if they sue me? Will I be on the hook for the entire unpaid amount (which may be up to $30000, assuming no one pays ever from now until lease end)? Can I use old checks to prove I only paid x dollars/month and the judge will only require me to owe x? I really have no clue here.

I’m in NYC. I have contacted legal aid and lawyers. I will be speaking with a lawyer that specializes in this on Monday. But I don’t want to pay $300/hour given how ignorant I am of this situation, because that consultation would end up costing me hundreds alone. So before I go to the lawyer, I’d like some anecdotal and street advice about my options. Sorry for the length. ANY help at all is unbelievably appreciated right now. Thanks.

Lease extension to an awful roommate?

Anonymous — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 11:48:57 -0800

Roommatefilter: My roommate/renter has asked for an extension to her lease with only a week's notice; I don't like living with her, but don't have anyone waiting to move in, either. I rent out the extra bedroom in my condo using a written lease based on a standard Massachusetts template. The term of the current tenant ends Feb 29. The lease allows for conversion to month-to-month at the end of the term with my consent and 30 days written notice. On Feb. 23 she asked if she could stay through the end of March. She is an international student and was originally planning to leave the country at the end of Feb, but has postponed to April to wait for an interview. We are both female and mid/late-20s; I work somewhat more than full-time, and she is completing a part-time internship.

I don't currently have anyone waiting to move in to the room, mainly because this roommate has been driving me crazy since she moved in and I was really looking forward to taking a break for some peace and quiet for a month or two. Briefly, she has no consideration for me (noise, parties, smells, not locking doors, unexpected overnight visitors; waking me up in the middle of the night because she's so drunk she needs help getting into bed without passing out) or my home and possessions (ruining pots and pans, breaking dishes, staining carpets, never cleaning up after herself or replacing or repairing damage). Most of this isn't malicious, as far as I can tell, but just careless; I can put up with it, but it's a big source of stress to spend every day wondering what's going to be broken when I come home. The rent payment is helpful, but I can certainly do without it for several months.

Am I an awful person to kick her out for not following the rules in the lease, making her move when she's only here for a month more and when I was planning to have the room empty? It seems mean to throw her out when she's only going to be in this city for another month; it would be difficult to find another sublet for that term. Or am I a wuss for caving and letting her stay when I was so looking forward to having the house to myself, and when she has blatantly disregarded the terms of the lease? She's the kind of person who's used to getting her way about everything, and I have a perverse urge to break that.

more details at anon.mefi.landlord@gmail, if necessary

But I WANT to sign the lease!

purplefiber — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 11:53:29 -0800

Can my new landlord leave me off the lease? I'm moving into a new apartment soon. The two people who currently live there (roommate A and B) have been in the apartment for two years. The first year they cosigned a year long lease, and since then they have been month to month.

Now roommate B is moving away and I am moving in. They checked this with the rental agency, to see if we'd have to do an application/credit check for me. The rental agency said no, that they would make roommate A the sole tenant, and I would be a subletter from her. So they don't need to check any background on me, but basically I would have no rights to the place. If roommate A decides to move, I would have to move as well, or be subject to any kind of rent increase they wish to impose.

I want to be on the lease, both for the stability of rent control in the event that roommate A decides to leave, and also for reasons of building good credit. Do I have the right to insist on getting my name on the lease? Roommate A agrees that it would be best for us both to be on it. If I am to bring this up with the rental agency, should I do it before moving in, or a few months down the road, once they see that I'm a good tenant, pay rent on time, etc? We are in California.

Any advice much appreciated.