alexander468
Active Member
State: MA
Lease termination events:
I moved into a room in an apartment with a shared entry and shared common areas in Cambridge MA on May 1, 2020 on a separate lease for the room in my name only. The lease runs until August 31, 2021. The lease is self-renewing with an automatic 4% rent increase unless either party gives 90 days notice of termination, so the deadline for that termination notice was around the end of May/beginning of June, 2021.
On May 1, 2021, I wrote to the landlord demanding that the 4% rent increase be waived or I would terminate the lease. My reasons were that the apartment had unexpected flaws that had not been corrected and the housing market in Boston and Cambridge had changed, so I could find something better for less, but my preference was to stay at the same rent for another year.
In spite of multiple attempts to get a straight answer from him during May, the landlord never wrote or said anything about either demanding or waiving the 4% rent increase. Instead, his emails contained tangential matters such as a response to issues about the TV in the living room that tenants had a couple years ago before I moved here. The living room never had a TV while I've been here. His emails made little sense. With the 90-day notice for automatic lease-renewal-with-rent-increase looming over my head and no other information, I wrote the landlord on May 31 to terminate our lease.
In June, the landlord advertised my room on Craigslist for Sept 1, 2021 at a lower rent than I've been paying under my current lease before the 4% increase. Apparently, he is willing to sacrifice some money to prevent me from living here. He never explained why. I paid rent on time, didn't cause problems here, wasn't a pain in the ass (with the one possible exception written below), and he has written that he will write a good reference for my next tenancy.
COVID-19 events:
In late July 2020, the city of Cambridge enacted an emergency order in response the COVID-19 crisis requiring that real estate showings in multi-unit buildings with a shared entry take place with at least twenty-four hours notice given to all occupants and advised occupants to vacate during showings to minimize exposure and maximize social distancing. In early November, 2020, the landlord's real estate agent stopped by with a potential tenant to look at a different room in the apartment after giving no notice to anyone. I wrote an email to the agent, my landlord, and the other tenants demanding that everyone follow the city's emergency orders and threatening to contact the state real estate agent licensing board if showings without proper notice continued during the pandemic. The landlord and the agent both wrote apologetic emails, and showings without 24 hours notice didn't continue, but the room remained vacant.
Was I a pain-in-the-ass for the threats in that response? In spite of his half-hearted apologies, I believe that the landlord thinks so, and that is why he didn't reply to me during May when I needed to reach a decision about my continuing tenancy, and that is why he is willing to lose money to see me gone.
On May 27, 2021, Cambridge rescinded those emergency orders effective on June 15, 2021.
A little evidence for landlord retaliation:
In two wildly inappropriate emails during late June, the landlord reassured me that he would always give me 24 hours notice when showing my room as if I had demanded this in November as a personal matter instead of in connection to a local public health order. I emailed the news to him that Cambridge had rescinded its emergency order. A few days ago, the landlord was showing a vacant room to a potential tenant when I left my room and saw them. The landlord asked if the potential tenant could also see my room. I said, "Yes of course," and willingly showed my room with no notice. The landlord seemed surprised that I was willing to do that, and I again informed him, this time in person, that Cambridge had rescinded its emergency order and the only reason I had demanded 24 hours notice in November was to comply with the local government's orders during the emergency.
When I mentioned the local government, he smirked at me and nearly laughed in my face. In multiple emails and in his Craigslist ad, the landlord has espoused strong pro-Trump, anti-government, anti-regulation political sentiments that (in my view) are bizarre and inappropriate for real estate listings and emails to tenants. The lease itself (before I demanded changes) contained several ridiculous and most likely illegal clauses that the landlord proudly states are a result of his previous court battles with "housing activists." Two examples: Tenant grants landlord the right to tape all phone conversations, but landlord does not grant the tenant the same right. If the tenant places any funds presumably due to the landlord in escrow, then the tenant agrees to follow the exact same Massachusetts laws for those funds that landlords must follow for last-month's-rent and security escrow.
Questions:
I was the one who terminated the lease because the landlord failed to give a timely answer to my demand to waive the automatic 4% rent increase. Can the landlord's failure to reply be considered retaliation?
Over six months passed between my threat to complain to the real estate agent licensing board and the landlord's (in my view) retaliatory actions. Is this too long to file a complaint?
Lease termination events:
I moved into a room in an apartment with a shared entry and shared common areas in Cambridge MA on May 1, 2020 on a separate lease for the room in my name only. The lease runs until August 31, 2021. The lease is self-renewing with an automatic 4% rent increase unless either party gives 90 days notice of termination, so the deadline for that termination notice was around the end of May/beginning of June, 2021.
On May 1, 2021, I wrote to the landlord demanding that the 4% rent increase be waived or I would terminate the lease. My reasons were that the apartment had unexpected flaws that had not been corrected and the housing market in Boston and Cambridge had changed, so I could find something better for less, but my preference was to stay at the same rent for another year.
In spite of multiple attempts to get a straight answer from him during May, the landlord never wrote or said anything about either demanding or waiving the 4% rent increase. Instead, his emails contained tangential matters such as a response to issues about the TV in the living room that tenants had a couple years ago before I moved here. The living room never had a TV while I've been here. His emails made little sense. With the 90-day notice for automatic lease-renewal-with-rent-increase looming over my head and no other information, I wrote the landlord on May 31 to terminate our lease.
In June, the landlord advertised my room on Craigslist for Sept 1, 2021 at a lower rent than I've been paying under my current lease before the 4% increase. Apparently, he is willing to sacrifice some money to prevent me from living here. He never explained why. I paid rent on time, didn't cause problems here, wasn't a pain in the ass (with the one possible exception written below), and he has written that he will write a good reference for my next tenancy.
COVID-19 events:
In late July 2020, the city of Cambridge enacted an emergency order in response the COVID-19 crisis requiring that real estate showings in multi-unit buildings with a shared entry take place with at least twenty-four hours notice given to all occupants and advised occupants to vacate during showings to minimize exposure and maximize social distancing. In early November, 2020, the landlord's real estate agent stopped by with a potential tenant to look at a different room in the apartment after giving no notice to anyone. I wrote an email to the agent, my landlord, and the other tenants demanding that everyone follow the city's emergency orders and threatening to contact the state real estate agent licensing board if showings without proper notice continued during the pandemic. The landlord and the agent both wrote apologetic emails, and showings without 24 hours notice didn't continue, but the room remained vacant.
Was I a pain-in-the-ass for the threats in that response? In spite of his half-hearted apologies, I believe that the landlord thinks so, and that is why he didn't reply to me during May when I needed to reach a decision about my continuing tenancy, and that is why he is willing to lose money to see me gone.
On May 27, 2021, Cambridge rescinded those emergency orders effective on June 15, 2021.
A little evidence for landlord retaliation:
In two wildly inappropriate emails during late June, the landlord reassured me that he would always give me 24 hours notice when showing my room as if I had demanded this in November as a personal matter instead of in connection to a local public health order. I emailed the news to him that Cambridge had rescinded its emergency order. A few days ago, the landlord was showing a vacant room to a potential tenant when I left my room and saw them. The landlord asked if the potential tenant could also see my room. I said, "Yes of course," and willingly showed my room with no notice. The landlord seemed surprised that I was willing to do that, and I again informed him, this time in person, that Cambridge had rescinded its emergency order and the only reason I had demanded 24 hours notice in November was to comply with the local government's orders during the emergency.
When I mentioned the local government, he smirked at me and nearly laughed in my face. In multiple emails and in his Craigslist ad, the landlord has espoused strong pro-Trump, anti-government, anti-regulation political sentiments that (in my view) are bizarre and inappropriate for real estate listings and emails to tenants. The lease itself (before I demanded changes) contained several ridiculous and most likely illegal clauses that the landlord proudly states are a result of his previous court battles with "housing activists." Two examples: Tenant grants landlord the right to tape all phone conversations, but landlord does not grant the tenant the same right. If the tenant places any funds presumably due to the landlord in escrow, then the tenant agrees to follow the exact same Massachusetts laws for those funds that landlords must follow for last-month's-rent and security escrow.
Questions:
I was the one who terminated the lease because the landlord failed to give a timely answer to my demand to waive the automatic 4% rent increase. Can the landlord's failure to reply be considered retaliation?
Over six months passed between my threat to complain to the real estate agent licensing board and the landlord's (in my view) retaliatory actions. Is this too long to file a complaint?
