Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with tenant and housing

Sober Housing Rent

Anonymous — Sun, 01 May 2011 09:26:19 -0800

Can my landlord raise rent on me in the middle of my 6 month contract with 30 day notice? Additional information: It's a sober house. I've lived at the sober house for four months, going on five. I received a text from the house manager there is going to be an increase in rent beginning June 1st.

Don't we have to sign new leases for this raise in rent? Or is there some other law or rule agreement that protects sober living that I don't know about?

This is not a halfway house. We are a community of people who have meeting requirements and sobriety requirements but we do not receive mandatory additional programming during the day. Furthermore, the spirit of the house is that rent is to be treated like the real world. We all signed a contract binding us to a 6 month agreement. Furthermore, we all put down security deposits.

FWIW: This is in MN.

I am curious how they can do this!

Thanks so much.

How to keep a Room

easilyconfused — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 16:03:36 -0800

I will have to be out of town for a few months. How can I persuade my landlord to keep my room at very small or no charge for four months until I come back? There are multiple reasons why I want to stay at where I am without moving my luggage around. Besides, if they must rent out MY room, I could always move into another room that they are renting out (since their other rooms for rent have been available for ages). Also, if they keep me, I'm probably staying for at least another year or two, which is surely better than having their room vacant for the whole time.

Cool Tenant Wanted

Bango Skank — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 13:14:35 -0800

I am about to close on my first house in three weeks and it has a small apartment underneath the main house so I am going to go from being a life-long renter to home-owner and landlord in one fell swoop. Help me to be a good landlord and attract good tenants. Since I am basically starting from scratch here I welcome any and all suggestions but I am especially interested in hearing from people who have been landlords and can offer some concrete advice on what has and has not worked for you. Some specific questions: did you write your own lease agreement or did you have a lawyer prepare it? How did you advertise your rental? What kind of questions do you ask prospective tenants?

And for all the renters out there what has made the difference between the "ok" landlords and the great landlords you have rented from?

Since my wife and I will be living in very close proximity (directly above them, sharing a driveway etc.) to whoever rents from us it is important to me that we have as convivial a relationship with them as possible.

Obligatory disclaimer: I know that you are not my lawyer and I plan on educating myself regarding housing laws in my jurisdiction.

Death for rent.

rmd1023 — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:16:23 -0800

Landlord-filter: What happens if my tenant dies? I own a two-family house in Massachusetts, and I rent out the bottom unit to a guy who is on rental assistance ('section 8'). He's sick, and in the hospital, and he may or may not be able to return to the apartment. But after the last ambulance visit, it made me wonder -- what do I do if he dies while living here? Do with his apartment full of stuff, that is, not with him. (With him, I figure "call 911 and start cpr if appropriate" would be the obvious response.) He either does not have any living relatives or does not have any relatives who live close by.

Who would be responsible for clearing out his stuff? Would I end up having to get rid of it and try to bill the estate if there is one? How long would the situation likely remain in limbo? (It's sort of the reverse of the situation in this previous question.

Can I somehow piggy back on my roommates rights to break the lease as of the Service members Civil Relief Act (SCRA)?

Bengston — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 13:17:23 -0800

One of my roommates is in the military, he just got noticed that he is going to be redeployed in May/June. Our other roommate recently moved out and we are subletting her room for her. The lease doesn't technically end until October 2010, but I would prefer to go earlier. Can I somehow piggy back on my roommates rights to break the lease as of the Service members Civil Relief Act (SCRA)? Long story short, moved to a new city (Chicago) with no place to stay so moved into a place with some people off craigslist. Thought if I wanted to, I would be able to sublet my room and move out in the future. That being said, one roommate beat me to it, and now my other roommate is getting called back to duty. I am not in love with the apartment in the first place, and don't really want to be responsible for finding 2 new roommates or living with complete strangers chosen by my other roommates. I did some reading online and see that my military roommate will have a right to break the lease, will I also be able to break it with him at the same time or am I going to get saddled with an apartment I don't want and can't pay for?

Subleasing tenant cosmetically damaged my table. How much, if any, of her deposit should I keep?

evadery — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 06:54:35 -0800

Subleasing tenant cosmetically damaged my table. How much, if any, of her deposit should I keep? I am in my late 20's and I had a tenant stay at my place for 4 months in the summer as I subleased another place with my fiancee (in town for the summer). She paid her rent on time, was courteous, kept the place in good condition, and all in all a good fit. Unfortunately, she left hair products on my antique wooden dining room table (passed from generation to generation) and left a large black waxy stain on it around the size of two fingers held together, but in an irregular pattern.

It was very noticeable, and compounding the problem, as I tried to remove it, I stripped some of the red from the previous refinishing of the table several years ago. So, before it it was pretty obvious and bad, and now it is very obvious and bad.

I have received a handful of quotes pricing out the cost of fixing the table, and the general guesstimate is around $300-$350 (not including transport of the table top, which may or may not fit in my car, and would cost $130 round trip at my favourite place). All parties say that touching up the area would be visible and not ideal, and the entire top of the table should be redone, but none of the legs, etc. The entire top would need to be redone regardless of whether I had removed some of the colouring, as the removal of the wax would necessitate the full work.

Other relevant facts:
-The tenant gave me a deposit of $825.
-The room is shared with a roommate, but I don't think there is any debate about who caused the damage.
-There are very slight discolourations on the table from resting glasses, etc, but before the wax I would have not considered getting it refinished under any circumstances.
-I will get it refurnished due to this problem, either now, or when I move out of my apt into a house (estimated time-10 months from now). I would not have gotten it refurnished otherwise.

So, hivemind, what should I do, and what is fair under the circumstances? If I did the work now, what percentage of the final cost should the tenant be charged? Thanks.

Can my landlord really kick me out?

krunk — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 12:19:28 -0800

My landlords want to kick me out and move into my apartment. They gave me the 60 days notice, but I have some questions about the validity of their notice. I was checking out the Residential Tenancies Act, and it seems that there is a clause that says they can't move in unless they have previously lived there (72 b), which they haven't.

Also, they said they would rather take over the apartment of the guys who live upstairs, but can't because they have a lease until March 2010. Since we are on month-to-month, they said they could take over our place instead.

Are either of these things true? Could they in fact take the other apartment instead?

Give me a fire by Christmas, please!

bunnycup — Fri, 14 Dec 2007 13:24:09 -0800

What, if any, are the effects of express warranties by landlord and landlord's agents under New Jersey landlord tenant law? Okay, yes, I am a lawyer, but I'm out of my zone of comfort and in a brand new state. Please take pity on me!

Prior to renting my home, the landlord's property agent (not my agent) represented that the fireplace and chimney were safe for use as a result of passing inspection. Further, during lease negotiations, as a part of an attempt to persuade my husband and I to accept liability for all repairs of any kind, two employees of the landlord represented that full inspections had been done within the last 12 months, the house had passed, and thus we could forsee no actual risk under such a clause. We nevertheless declined to agree to accept that liability.

Prior to using the fireplace, my husband would like us to obtain confirmation of its safety for use. My written query to the landlord was responded to as follows:

"You are correct that the standard NJ home inspection was done. However, that was only a visual inspection for any structural damage to the exterior, as this was the only inspection we were required to do. "

I feel that I received an express warranty that that the fireplace was safe from the realtor (a designated agent of the landlord), who used the use of a fireplace as a selling point, along with a more general (but also express) warranty from the property managers that a detailed inspection had taken place. I rely on no implied warranties of any kind, and do not assume that because the stove is in the house, it is safe to use.

I am not familiar with NJ law; I do not (and will not in future) practice in NJ. My prior education is with NYS and NYC property law, which as you may know is often quite different from other states. Without asking that anyone do in depth research here, any quick thoughts on an argument that I've got an express warranty as to the fireplace, or whether there is any wiggle room whatsoever for a contractual promissory estoppel type argument? I realize this is a fairly technical question, and am asking solely for the purpose of determining whether further research on my part would be worthwhile. If someone knows I am wasting my time, hearing that would be useful. I will not be relying on your answers as the basis of further correspondence, etc.

Thanks in advance for saving Christmas!

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.

We just moved into a rental house, and found the place filthy! What do we do?

itchi23 — Mon, 31 Jul 2006 20:36:30 -0800

We just moved into a rental house, and found the place filthy! What do we do? This past weekend, my wife and I moved cross-country to Charlotte, North Carolina. It was a pretty arduous trip - I drove a crazy, rickety moving van and the heat was unbearable, among other things. After a two-day trip, we arrived to find our rental house in an almost uninhabitable state.
It was filthy. Everything needed to be scrubbed within an inch of its life with bleach and everyother anti-bacterial, anti-microbial cleaner we could find. My wife's hesitant to use the kitchen! Holes in the walls, stains on carpeting, etc.
We saw the house about a month and a half ago, and while we saw it definitely needed a good washout, we were assured by the "property manager" that it would be given a good cleaning before we arrived. In fact, if given a good hardcore scrubbing and basic maintenence, the house would be really great. There were some other issues we needed to have taken care of before we arrived (knobs and handles missing from various appliances, some maintenence, etc.) and we noted them on the lease when we signed. Most of those things were taken care of, but our biggest issue is how dirty the house is.
Our landlord lives out of town, but explained that most of the day-to-day and maintenence issues would be taken care of by the "property manager." I only use that term in quotes because I'm not sure exactly her official role or title. Apparently, the landlord and the "property manager" used to have some kind of relationship, and after it ended they remained friends. He now lives out of town and left his ex-girlfriend to take care of this property for him. She was the one who told us that she'd "clean it up really well" and the place would look great once we arrived.
Once we did arrive and saw the places wasn't clean, we called our landlord and briefly explained the situation. He said he paid the "property manager" a lot of money to clean it up, and was interested in knowing how she did. It could seem like the "property manager" just didn't realize that we were moving in on that date - but I'm not sure.
Now here's where we don't know how to proceed.
We'd like to maintain a pretty amicable relationship w/ our landlord. He wasn't around to supervise the prep for the new tenants. All we would like is for the place to be cleaned real well and a fresh coat of paint. We'd be willing to do the work ourselves, and receive a discount in rent if he can't get someone to clean and paint. How would we address this in a way that will ensure we get some results, yet still maintain an amicible relationship? That's key for us, because our landlord hinted that he may be interested in selling the house in a year or two, and if that's the case, we might be interested in buying (if it passes inspection) and don't want to burn our bridges in this crazy housing market.

Landlord selling my building: Am I screwed?

logovisual — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 17:26:53 -0800

NYC: Our landlord is selling our building. We have a lease. What's going to happen to us? I just learned on Saturday that our landlord is selling the brownstone we rent the top floor of in Brooklyn. Somebody is already coming by to see the place tomorrow. We have a standard, legal lease; what are a new owner's responsibilities re: this lease, our rent, etc.? Does he/she have to honor them, or are we up shit creek? This is a surprisingly difficult topic to Google... My understanding was that they do have to honor the lease, but informally speaking, if that displeases them, they can make my life very difficult. Am I wrong in this, and they don't have to honor it at all?

Getting a lease with an unpleasant background

cmonkey — Wed, 07 Dec 2005 13:42:16 -0800

MetaFilter landlords: Please help me aquire a lease... Three friends of mine & I are looking for a new place to live. They all have low paying jobs, but great credit. I have a high paying job, but atrocious credit and no recent rental history (I've lived in houses for the last 5 years without being on a lease). My friends keep getting rejected because they're poor, so I need to apply with them. A few questions to those of you who rent property out:

1) Is there anything that I can do to convince a landlord that, regardless of my poor credit and missing rental history, I am actually a good tenant with a stable job who has never once paid rent late or destroyed a house? Any bribes that would work?
2) What services do you use for background checks? I'm curious what's in mine.
3) If a place says "no application fees" does that mean that they don't do background checks?

(This is a followup to this question, thanks for your help!)

What does 'month to month' entail?

Capn — Mon, 07 Feb 2005 09:31:48 -0800

I don't understand leasing and renting in Toronto [great deals and spectacular lake-front views inside]. I've been renting my current apartment for a number of years. And every year the super comes around with a lease to sign. After doggedly perusing the management for a couple of months and negotiating a fair rent, I sign the lease.

The lease looks like a standard form and is written in Leagalish, but it seems to me that I can just tell my landlord that I'm not signing the lease and then my tenancy becomes "month to month".

What does this mean? I assume it means I can move out easier, but is it easier for them to, say, evict me without cause? What are the supposed advantages to the renter and landlord of a lease? If I've signed a lease, and want to break it, can I do that if the landlord doesn't want to let me? Surely they can't force me to stay (or pursue me for the rest of the lease's term's payments) if I needed/wanted to move to another city, can they?