AmandaBowen
Junior Member
CA tenant living in Placer County.
I suspected mold problems when we moved in 10/2014. I notified our landlord with photos ofold that we had found when we took down wallpaper in the laundry room. His response was "we treat mold with bleach, do you want me to send someone with bleach?" I let him know that we would take care of theold that we found with bleach, but wanted him to know in case future issues arise.
Fast forward to January 2016, I suspected mold again as our bathroom floor had started to sink next to the bath tub and occasionally smelled mildew in the house. I ran a air test (my mold detective) then notified my landlord of the sinking floor. He sent his guy out to fix it, he pulled up the linolium (it was covered in mold) he did cut out the part of the floor that was rotted and then replaced linolium. while he was there he also replaced the shower handle that had broken off...
Next day, I went to give my son a bath, I barely pulled the new shower handle and it shot off the wall from water pressure and was shooting water out of the wall. Panicking, because I had no idea where the water shut off was... Finally got the water turned off about 10-15min later after I was able to round up a neighbor to help me find it. Resulting in the entire upstairs to be flooded. Which also meant that water was coming out of the vents into the laundry room and bathroom downstairs, also the garage and some water was leaking out of the roof by the front door! I let me landlord know right away.. Come to find out, the maintenance guy forgot to put the backing on the shower handle... My landlord never had anyone come out and dry up the house, he said it would dry up on its own... I received the mold air samples back with results showing Chaetomiun which is a mold that grows from significant water damage (mind you, I took this test before the flood happened)
Fast forward to May 2016, we went on vacation for a week , which means the house was closed up. When we got back it smelled like mildew (really bad!) I just opened the windows and sprayed some febreeze since I was some what used to the smell
a couple of weeks later I noticed my children (ages 1 and 2) were having bad runny noses, watery eyes, constantly sneezing and coughing. I chalked it up to normal seasonal allergies, but after monitoring for a couple of weeks I noticed that their symptoms would go away once we left the house. It immediately set my alarms off and I re tested (again with my mold detective) the house. Higher counts of Chaetomium were detected in the air. I immediately set my children an appt with an allergy specialist.
Allergy specialist checked mold results and immediately asked for landlords address to send him a letter letting him know the environment is not safe for the children. I let my landlord know of all of these new findings through certified mail. It took him 3 weeks to receive the letter. He contacted me once he received the letter... He offered to have one of his maintenance guys come out to inspect. His maintenance guy came a week later.. Walked around 'inspecting' for about 10 min. Emailed my landlord that he found no signs of moisture/mildew/mold, but did see a leak that had occurred (hole in the garage ceiling) but its bone dry now, and I was concerned about the quality of the air I should get an air purifier... (Crickets) I called an official mold inspector. He can out that same evening and tested several rooms. The garage was a surface sample and had found black mold, and the kitchen was an air sample and also detected toxic mold spores in the air.... Has my landlord breached contract? He has been notified 3 seperate times of mold issues, none has he ever taken seriously...and definitely hasn't tried to fox, just cover up... Can we leave? I haven't paid rent this month because our residence is uninhabitable. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
I suspected mold problems when we moved in 10/2014. I notified our landlord with photos ofold that we had found when we took down wallpaper in the laundry room. His response was "we treat mold with bleach, do you want me to send someone with bleach?" I let him know that we would take care of theold that we found with bleach, but wanted him to know in case future issues arise.
Fast forward to January 2016, I suspected mold again as our bathroom floor had started to sink next to the bath tub and occasionally smelled mildew in the house. I ran a air test (my mold detective) then notified my landlord of the sinking floor. He sent his guy out to fix it, he pulled up the linolium (it was covered in mold) he did cut out the part of the floor that was rotted and then replaced linolium. while he was there he also replaced the shower handle that had broken off...
Next day, I went to give my son a bath, I barely pulled the new shower handle and it shot off the wall from water pressure and was shooting water out of the wall. Panicking, because I had no idea where the water shut off was... Finally got the water turned off about 10-15min later after I was able to round up a neighbor to help me find it. Resulting in the entire upstairs to be flooded. Which also meant that water was coming out of the vents into the laundry room and bathroom downstairs, also the garage and some water was leaking out of the roof by the front door! I let me landlord know right away.. Come to find out, the maintenance guy forgot to put the backing on the shower handle... My landlord never had anyone come out and dry up the house, he said it would dry up on its own... I received the mold air samples back with results showing Chaetomiun which is a mold that grows from significant water damage (mind you, I took this test before the flood happened)
Fast forward to May 2016, we went on vacation for a week , which means the house was closed up. When we got back it smelled like mildew (really bad!) I just opened the windows and sprayed some febreeze since I was some what used to the smell
a couple of weeks later I noticed my children (ages 1 and 2) were having bad runny noses, watery eyes, constantly sneezing and coughing. I chalked it up to normal seasonal allergies, but after monitoring for a couple of weeks I noticed that their symptoms would go away once we left the house. It immediately set my alarms off and I re tested (again with my mold detective) the house. Higher counts of Chaetomium were detected in the air. I immediately set my children an appt with an allergy specialist. Allergy specialist checked mold results and immediately asked for landlords address to send him a letter letting him know the environment is not safe for the children. I let my landlord know of all of these new findings through certified mail. It took him 3 weeks to receive the letter. He contacted me once he received the letter... He offered to have one of his maintenance guys come out to inspect. His maintenance guy came a week later.. Walked around 'inspecting' for about 10 min. Emailed my landlord that he found no signs of moisture/mildew/mold, but did see a leak that had occurred (hole in the garage ceiling) but its bone dry now, and I was concerned about the quality of the air I should get an air purifier... (Crickets) I called an official mold inspector. He can out that same evening and tested several rooms. The garage was a surface sample and had found black mold, and the kitchen was an air sample and also detected toxic mold spores in the air.... Has my landlord breached contract? He has been notified 3 seperate times of mold issues, none has he ever taken seriously...and definitely hasn't tried to fox, just cover up... Can we leave? I haven't paid rent this month because our residence is uninhabitable. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
