Can a landlord retaliate/evict for turning them in?

[I Love Koalas]

We have lived in our rental for around two years. About a year ago, we started having a problem with the electricity. I woke up one morning and it was just … out. We went out for the day, and it was fixed by that evening. Shortly thereafter though, we suddenly started having partial power outages. The landlord sent an older gentleman in to look at the lights – perhaps he was an electrician, but I'm not sure. The problem appeared fixed. 30 minutes later, we were back to only partial power. But that lasted only a few minutes. I told the landlord about it, but he didn't send anyone to take another look. Over time, this became an issue. The partial power outages became more normal, and after several attempts at talking to the landlord about the issue... he purchased us a (to be fair, brand new) extension cord and insisted we plug out TV/computer into it. What he wasn't realizing (or caring about, maybe) is that with only one outlet in the living room working consistently, this meant we could not have our lamp plugged in alongside a space heater in winter/or the air conditioning in summer and still watch TV or be on the computer. It meant that during the outages, we had no overhead lights – the only light in our apartment would be the lamp. Anyway, I tried to bring up that I thought the cord was a fire hazard, which seemed to upset him. So for the time being, I dropped the issue. We just kind of gave up and stopped using our overhead lights, because that seemed to help with the power issue. Down the road, we decided to try using them again, but were very cautious with how much stuff we plugged in at once. Everything with the electric was semi good until recently. All of a sudden I was sitting in my living room, in the dark. I went to check the other lights, and none of the overheads worked. The difference is, it's now not just a few minutes at a time. Not long ago, it was several hours, but was back to normal in the morning when I got up. Then, last night it was back to partial power from around ten thirty last night until....well, overhead lights are still out now. So my husband will come home in the dark, need to shower in the dark, and cook in the dark.


When the time for fire inspection came around, the day prior, he posted a notice on the front and back door of the apartment building – and asked the tenants who have extension cords to hide them! Seriously, after he'd insisted to me it isn't a fire hazard. I took a picture of this note.


The apartment has bedbugs, and I know of at least one other unit that had them before the tenant moved out. Now we've also found we have roaches. That particular problem the landlord is actually trying to fix, thank goodness. He said that around 4 of the other units have them as well, but he is trying to say it's our fault, and that they're worst in ours. I find this hard to believe because a.) we definitely didn't have them when we moved in and b.) I've kept the laundry up off of the floor and the kitchen area clean and free of dirty dishes, because I know apartments can have that problem, and I didn't want it.

We want to move but cannot afford it, because we're going to be replacing **everything** we own, so this problem does not follow us to a new home. Electronics and furniture especially must go. The landlord is actually coming in once a month to spray now, which is great, but also tough because it means we have to go to a hotel. (I'm sensitive/get sick from the chemicals, as does my spouse, and the landlord says 'well, that's not my fault.) Why didn't he do a preventative spray once a year like every other landlord I've ever encountered? Then we wouldn't be paying for a hotel room.

Seriously, what do I do with all of this? Moving would be extremely difficult right now. If I turn him in to....who, even...? … to try to get him to fix the electrical...can he in turn evict us? Our rent is totally paid up, but I'm afraid such a thing would infuriate him. What course of action should I take? There's a thing in my lease that says if the apartment become uninhabitable, my lease ends. What do I do?? (Kansas resident.)

 

[adjusterjack]

You do what you have to do. If you act out of fear, he wins.

Study the Kansas landlord tenant statute for the landlord's obligations and your remedies.

https://law.justia.com/codes/kansas/2017/chapter-58/article-25/

 

[FarmerJ]

are you in a multi month fixed term lease ? ( 12 months at a time ? ) or are you month to month ?

 

[LdiJ]

We have lived in our rental for around two years. About a year ago, we started having a problem with the electricity. I woke up one morning and it was just … out. We went out for the day, and it was fixed by that evening. Shortly thereafter though, we suddenly started having partial power outages. The landlord sent an older gentleman in to look at the lights – perhaps he was an electrician, but I'm not sure. The problem appeared fixed. 30 minutes later, we were back to only partial power. But that lasted only a few minutes. I told the landlord about it, but he didn't send anyone to take another look. Over time, this became an issue. The partial power outages became more normal, and after several attempts at talking to the landlord about the issue... he purchased us a (to be fair, brand new) extension cord and insisted we plug out TV/computer into it. What he wasn't realizing (or caring about, maybe) is that with only one outlet in the living room working consistently, this meant we could not have our lamp plugged in alongside a space heater in winter/or the air conditioning in summer and still watch TV or be on the computer. It meant that during the outages, we had no overhead lights – the only light in our apartment would be the lamp. Anyway, I tried to bring up that I thought the cord was a fire hazard, which seemed to upset him. So for the time being, I dropped the issue. We just kind of gave up and stopped using our overhead lights, because that seemed to help with the power issue. Down the road, we decided to try using them again, but were very cautious with how much stuff we plugged in at once. Everything with the electric was semi good until recently. All of a sudden I was sitting in my living room, in the dark. I went to check the other lights, and none of the overheads worked. The difference is, it's now not just a few minutes at a time. Not long ago, it was several hours, but was back to normal in the morning when I got up. Then, last night it was back to partial power from around ten thirty last night until....well, overhead lights are still out now. So my husband will come home in the dark, need to shower in the dark, and cook in the dark.


When the time for fire inspection came around, the day prior, he posted a notice on the front and back door of the apartment building – and asked the tenants who have extension cords to hide them! Seriously, after he'd insisted to me it isn't a fire hazard. I took a picture of this note.


The apartment has bedbugs, and I know of at least one other unit that had them before the tenant moved out. Now we've also found we have roaches. That particular problem the landlord is actually trying to fix, thank goodness. He said that around 4 of the other units have them as well, but he is trying to say it's our fault, and that they're worst in ours. I find this hard to believe because a.) we definitely didn't have them when we moved in and b.) I've kept the laundry up off of the floor and the kitchen area clean and free of dirty dishes, because I know apartments can have that problem, and I didn't want it.

We want to move but cannot afford it, because we're going to be replacing **everything** we own, so this problem does not follow us to a new home. Electronics and furniture especially must go. The landlord is actually coming in once a month to spray now, which is great, but also tough because it means we have to go to a hotel. (I'm sensitive/get sick from the chemicals, as does my spouse, and the landlord says 'well, that's not my fault.) Why didn't he do a preventative spray once a year like every other landlord I've ever encountered? Then we wouldn't be paying for a hotel room.

Seriously, what do I do with all of this? Moving would be extremely difficult right now. If I turn him in to....who, even...? … to try to get him to fix the electrical...can he in turn evict us? Our rent is totally paid up, but I'm afraid such a thing would infuriate him. What course of action should I take? There's a thing in my lease that says if the apartment become uninhabitable, my lease ends. What do I do?? (Kansas resident.)

The electrical problem is potentially very dangerous.

Electrical fires happen when there are problems like that with electricity. You really need to get out of there. It is not safe to continue living there.

 

[FarmerJ]

You asked about retaliation , I did look thru that list of statutes and didn't see any titled addressing retaliation so I opened a few and stopped since this machine was giving me grief. I suggest if you could not find out if your state had written a law addressing retaliation by a landlord that you contact a tenants rights / tenants advocacy group in one of your states larger cities to ask if there is a statute they know of that addressed retaliatory actions by landlords when a tenant calls inspections. No matter what the term of your current rental agreement is if your state defined landlord retaliation and set a time frame like where I live if a landlord say in the first 90 days ( unless it changed ) after a tenant calls inspections then tells a tenant to get out it was considered to be a retaliatory eviction and if challenged in a court the LL wont win unless the termination of the rental agreement happened say 4 months after calling inspections . BUT what you have to know is that if inspections comes out and writes work orders there is a chance the LL will refuse to comply and inspections could condemn the apartment which not only cancels what ever your lease term is but you can end up homeless because inspections can also make you move out if they condemn. the truly stupid thing is that this could be something as simple as a bad circuit breaker or one of the connections like behind a light switch or say behind one of the ceiling lights has failed like a wire nut that never was put on tightly and just needs to be re done . ( BTW for simple things or smaller power use items extension cords may not be ideal they are safe for short term use and should not be over loaded so things like a table lamp should be okay compared to trying to run a window ac or a portable electric heater with a extension cord )

 

[quincy]

You asked about retaliation , I did look thru that list of statutes and didn't see any titled addressing retaliation so I opened a few and stopped since this machine was giving me grief. I suggest if you could not find out if your state had written a law addressing retaliation by a landlord that you contact a tenants rights / tenants advocacy group in one of your states larger cities to ask if there is a statute they know of that addressed retaliatory actions by landlords when a tenant calls inspections. No matter what the term of your current rental agreement is if your state defined landlord retaliation and set a time frame like where I live if a landlord say in the first 90 days ( unless it changed ) after a tenant calls inspections then tells a tenant to get out it was considered to be a retaliatory eviction and if challenged in a court the LL wont win unless the termination of the rental agreement happened say 4 months after calling inspections . BUT what you have to know is that if inspections comes out and writes work orders there is a chance the LL will refuse to comply and inspections could condemn the apartment which not only cancels what ever your lease term is but you can end up homeless because inspections can also make you move out if they condemn. the truly stupid thing is that this could be something as simple as a bad circuit breaker or one of the connections like behind a light switch or say behind one of the ceiling lights has failed like a wire nut that never was put on tightly and just needs to be re done . ( BTW for simple things or smaller power use items extension cords may not be ideal they are safe for short term use and should not be over loaded so things like a table lamp should be okay compared to trying to run a window ac or a portable electric heater with a extension cord )

From the link adjusterjack posted, Kansas statute 58-2572, “certain retaliatory actions by landlord prohibited:”
https://law.justia.com/codes/kansas/2017/chapter-58/article-25/section-58-2572/

 

[I Love Koalas]

Sorry, only the initial reply came to my inbox. I just found some more in my spam folder.

Someone was asking the term of our lease. It started out as a 12 month, (which time frame has gone by) and is now a month to month. The mention above about the building possibly being condemned and / or considered not livable is part of what I'm scared of...because we'd still have to try to find a new place to live and replace everything.

I went out to take out the trash the other day, and found a truck from the energy company parked here. They thought it was a loose wire outside... but that only took care of it for four or five hours and then...back to partial outage. I was talking to some of the other tenants recently, and there are a few others that are really fed up with the conditions, too. One mentioned she in the process of moving out, and will be turning all this into the authorities. Thank goodness, this looks to all be out of my hands.

 

[quincy]

Thank you for the update.

 

[FarmerJ]

So were your neighbors having the same problems with parts of their apartments wiring not working ?

 

[I Love Koalas]

The tenant that is leaving soon mentioned an extension cord was needed at their place too because of the electric. She didn't say if it was an issue with their overhead lights, though. This building is pretty good size for our area, so it may be rough trying to find exactly where the issue is (unless maybe the electrician that inevitably will have to come out at some point has a machine that will help pinpoint exactly where the issue is). The landlord did mention they think it could be an issue with the wiring to the living room ceiling fan, since he installed the fan himself. I'm not sure about that though, because this is affecting all overhead lights in our apartment.