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Landlord does not do her job but try to raise the rent

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mckuma3

Junior Member
What is the name of your state?What is the name of your state?What is the name of your state? Alaska

We have rented 1st floor of a house since last Oct. as a month-to-month contract.The landlord lives upstairs.

In the mid of May, the boiler broke and we lost the entire heat of the house, but the landlord didn't do anything for a week or so. So we called her and asked to do something with the heating system because it's required to do so as a landlord by law( and it was cold!). She said that because she works in daytime, she doesn't need any heat in the house and she turns off the heating system in June every year anyway and she has had no complaints from renters before.However, she brought us a one-room-size electric heater after that.

A few days later(5/31), she brought a letter which says that she is raising the rent due to the increase of oil prices from 7/1, and everytime one of us saw her, she told us that she was going to buy a new boiler very soon, so we assumed that she was going to provide a new heating system by oil from 7/1, but she didn't. We still have the little heater only.

So, we paid only for the amount of rent without the raise, but she still expects us to pay the raised part of the rent. We wrote her a letter and gave her a Notice To Landlord Of Need For Repairs And Deduction From Rent to repair the heating system and terminate the existing rodents problems including the access repairs( this has been a problem since we moved in but she didn't do anything but gave us 4 mice traps since the rental started) by 7/31.

In return, she called a pest control and they left only 2 mice traps although mice come into all over the kitchen and we left their droppings as they are so that pest control people can see the route.

After that, she handed us a letter which says that she is going to get a new heating system installed by 7/31, and now we owe her 5% interest with the raised part of the rent and if we don't pay by 7/23, she's going to breach the rental contract.

We'd like to pay the raised rent if she really provide us the heat and mice access repair, but at this point we can't believe her until it happens.

What kind of options do we have? Can she charge us the 5% of interest as the late fee leagally? Please help us!
 


mckuma3

Junior Member
Well, yeah.. Thank you for your suggestion. Actually, we are planning to move out of Alaska next year, so we had tried to put up with her incapacity as a landlord so far so that we don't have to move again before we leave. We even arranged a repair back in March when we had big plumbing problems, and bought mice traps ourselves, because she just had a breast cancer operation.After that, she tried to have us help her to put the fence in her backyard for dogs, but we refused because we thought that is landlord's responcibility.

Alaska is great to visit, or stay for a while, but hard to live.They say the housing cost is most expensive in US and many young people are leaving because they just can't afford it, or even if they can, you have to put up with low quality renting spaces and landlords, and it's sucks!

Anyway, if you give us any advice besides moving to CA :p ,we'd appreciate it!
 

ENASNI

Senior Member
You know it is hard, because your state does have a repair and deduct statute in it. You seem to have been able to use it, however she did try to give you alternate heat, and did call an exterminator.

Unless someone from an outside source, like a igloo :p ... oh I mean housing authority says it is not passing muster, you really should just deal with her patches until she gets the boiler (?) fixed. ( Sorry I live in Sunny California too, a boiler is what I put on when I want some corn on the cob!)

The rent raise should be negotiable because of the problems.

Try again with a written letter using some lingo from this.
http://www.touchngo.com/lglcntr/akstats/Statutes/Title34/Chapter03/Section180.htm
 

JETX

Senior Member
mckuma3 said:
What kind of options do we have? Can she charge us the 5% of interest as the late fee leagally? Please help us!
As an 'at will' month-to-month tenant, you have very few options. They are simply.... pay the rent as noticed by the landlord (30 day written notice required) or move.
From your post, it appears that the landlord did provide proper notice of the rent increase.... which means by your not paying the full amount, you are in breach of your month-to-month lease.

As for your 'repair and deduct', you must follow the following from Alaska code:
Section 180. Wrongful Failure to Supply Heat, Water, Hot Water or Essential Services.
(a) If, contrary to the rental agreement or AS 34.03.100, the landlord deliberately or negligently fails to supply running water, hot water, heat, sanitary facilities, or other essential services, the tenant may give written notice to the landlord specifying the breach and may immediately

(1) procure reasonable amounts of hot water, running water, heat, sanitary facilities, and essential services during the period of the landlord's noncompliance and deduct their actual and reasonable cost from the rent;

(2) recover damages based on the diminution in the fair rental value of the dwelling unit; or

(3) procure reasonable substitute housing during the period of the landlord's noncompliance, in which case the tenant is excused from paying rent for the period of the landlord's noncompliance and, in addition, may recover the amount by which the actual and reasonable cost exceeds rent.

(b) A tenant who proceeds under this section may not proceed under AS 34.03.160 as to that breach.

(c) Rights do not arise under this section until the tenant has given written notice to the landlord. Rights do not arise under this section if the condition was caused by the deliberate or negligent act or omission of the tenant, a member of the tenant's family, or other person on the premises with the tenant's consent.
 

mckuma3

Junior Member
Thank you for the reply!

Dear ENASNI:

>You know it is hard, because your state does have a repair and deduct statute in it. You seem to have been able to use it, however she did try to give you alternate heat, and did call an exterminator.

Yes, she did, but we are not satisfied because both of them are not working well...we still hear the sound of mice every night(she said it takes 2weeks to eliminate, but I doubt it because they put only 2 small mice traps! - we have killed more than 30 mice before she called them and still loosing our foods) and we still live with big prastic boxes every day. The heater has 800W and 700W switches but we can't turn both on because it blew the circuit breaker.

>Unless someone from an outside source, like a igloo :p ... oh I mean housing authority says it is not passing muster, you really should just deal with her patches until she gets the boiler (?) fixed. ( Sorry I live in Sunny California too, a boiler is what I put on when I want some corn on the cob!)

So maybe we should pay the rest of the rent before it gets more interest and call any authority guys...We haven't found out who to call yet, though.My husband says that this apartment is violating housing codes, so we can try to call a inspector?

>The rent raise should be negotiable because of the problems.

That what we thought, but she seems not. Anyway, I think we should try that.

>Try again with a written letter using some lingo from this.

Thank you. The letter we gave her is under this law and we made it clear that part. Currently, she hasn't mentioned anything about repairing the access of mice though.
 
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mckuma3

Junior Member
Thank you for the reply!

>
JETX said:
As an 'at will' month-to-month tenant, you have very few options. They are simply.... pay the rent as noticed by the landlord (30 day written notice required) or move.

Yes. When we got the notice, we were going to pay the raised rent even if we don't like this place and landlord because we thought that we both are currently very busy with our job and have no time to pack or look for a new place, but we are thinking about moving out now.

>From your post, it appears that the landlord did provide proper notice of the rent increase.... which means by your not paying the full amount, you are in breach of your month-to-month lease.

Time-wise, she did give us a proper notice, but she is not providing us the service that she is trying to charge for. This is the point that we are not comfortable with. Or the reason of increase rent doesn't matter at all even the landlord specifed the reason in writing?

>As for your 'repair and deduct', you must follow the following from Alaska code:
Section 180. Wrongful Failure to Supply Heat, Water, Hot Water or Essential Services.

Yes, this is what we did on 7/10(gave her a letter and notice. What we wrote was:-------

You are notified that in our rental unit the following essential services are
in need of repair:

1) The Heating system
2) Removal of rodents from the premises and repair access

We did not couse these problems, not did our family or guests.

If you do not repair these problems by July 31, 2005 we will arrange for the repairs ourselves, and will deduct the cost of the repairs from our rent, as we permitted to do under AS34.03.180
------------------------------------------------------
Hope this will work, but we haven't gotten any words from her about fixing the holes made by mice...
 

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