Sunday, November 08, 2009

Nearly 3 Years of Constant Problems from Bronx Landlord

My husband and I moved into an apartment located at 740 Revere Avenue in the Bronx, NY in June of 2007. When we initially viewed the apartment it needed a lot of work and we were told that everything would be fixed by our move in date. Upon moving in we realized nothing had been done to fix the apartment. Over the last 2 1/2 years we have repaired the apartment ourselves. The appliances were broken and when we asked the landlord to replace them we were given the run around and then finally sent a “repair tech” who knew absolutely nothing about kitchen appliances. We fixed these ourselves as well. The same with a leaky kitchen pipe and broken toilet. Every time we brought a concern to the landlord, Mario, he called us liars and refused to resolve the issue. Many times he slammed doors in our faces or threatened to kick us out over complaints that should have been taken care of before we moved in. Although he can not fix our apartment he has been able to do major renovations on is own apartment below ours. We are often woken up at 5 or 6am to banging, power tools and yelling. We often times do not have clean running water. The final straw was the heat. Since we have moved in the landlord only turns the heat on when he is home. All day during the week and most weekends we are left without heat throughout the winter. We have been getting by with electric heaters. We confronted him about the heat and dirty water once again late in October, and were met with screaming and door slamming. He called us liars even though we had samples of the dirty water and record of the tempature in the apartment.  He threatened to evict us again and tired of the problems we found a new apartment days later. When we told him of our impending move he threatened to sue us for moving. We have no lease and are current on our rent. He is currently refusing to return security deposits made because he is angry, even though the apartment is in pristine consition.

All in all this apartment has been a nightmare from day one. We have had nothing but problems from the landlord for basic things. He refuses to provide heat or clean water as mandated by law, he is childlike and petty when attempting to resolve a problem. I recommend anyone to stay away from this building if you are looking for a clean, hassle-free rental. We have been good, quiet tenants who always pay our rent on time and have never had problems with a landlord before. Upon signing a lease elsewhere we had a huge feeling of relief knowing that we will be leaving all of this behind.

Thursday, March 12, 2009

unfair

my husband and I moved in to a three bedroom apartment with our two children and our newborn 2 month old baby.  It was a beautiful apartment but it came with a price other than the rent. we chose this apartment not knowing the nabior below us worked graveyards and slept durning the day, well offcourse 2 weeks after we moved in we recieved a complaint against us for our children being to loud.  now our children were toddlers Im sure you could imagine how this started off as perfect situation.  The land lord had asked us to move into another apartment and we kindly agreed to move from one thrird story appartment across the street to another third story appartment. Yes real generous on our part to agree to this.  But to our surprise after we agreed to this the land lord had offered the appartment to another couple two days after we decided to move into this other apartment.  They had no other appartment to offer us and as the months went on the landlord finally decided to try and evict us.  the owners of the property came over to our home telling us we need to move we kindly declined and told them unless they let us out of our lease in witch we will be requiring this agreement in writing we will not be leaving any time soon.  below are a few things we have had to deal with while living there.

1. Harrasment
the owners of the property kept telling us to move with out a notice to vacate, calling social services on us claiming our child fell three storys down, calling a community college on us about getting a daycare license at this time I was watching my nephew, colorado law dose not require me to have a daycare license if I am related to the child.
2. Invasion of privacy
on three seperate occasions the live in land lord entered our appartment first incident was two days after we moved in he said he was there to turn off the power so he dose not get billed for it. The eletric company informed us he could have just sent us the bill.  The other incident with out notice I walked into my front room to see two men standing there the landlord informed me that there was a leak downstairs and that he needed to take a look in the bathroom to see if it was coming from my apartment.  And last while the owners were trying to find a way to leagally evicted us the older lady walked into our apartment exclaiming she needed to take pictures of the bathroom for insurance reasons insteasd she started walking around the apartment taking pictures. 
3. discrimination
I am not going to say the deckers the owners of this property do not like kids but Im am sure they did not like our kids it was more of a favortism the lady below us had senority she had lived there for years and with our three kids who were toddlers at the time and her who worked graveyards and slept durning the day Im sure it was time that somebody had to go and it was us.  you can imagine that children are not quiet all the time and during the day they are usually most active no matter what I did to keep them quiet it was just not enough to keep the old lady who lived downstairs mouth shut

Lovely apartment bad management Two of my family members wanted to live there I did not hesitate to tell them my expirince Im glad they made the right choice of choosing to live else where.

Monday, January 05, 2009

No Good Deceptive Landlord

On October 13, 2008; my husband and I met with Citywide Properties (Larry DiVenuti) in Manchester, New Hampshire.  With Mr. DiVenuti’s sweet talking, my husband and I brought into his charming way and decided to rent an apartment with him.  Everything was going fine until December 8, 2008, January 2 & 3, 2009.  When we signed a 1yr. lease it stated that “The landlord will give the tenants a 24 hour notice before entering the apartment unless there is an emergency and all utilities are included”.  On 12/8/08 my landlord called me after he entered our apartment and said that he placed airfresheners and unplugged all my appliances.  I called my lawyer and was told to go to court and file a 540-A:4 Temp. Order that would keep the tenant to not enter our apartment unless we were notified or emergeny came up.  He has called me and left intimadating message to get me to back down like “eviction” and “making hell for me in court”.  On 1/2/09, the tenant above us threatened my husband and I by saying he would smash my car windows in, punch my disabled husband in the face, etc.  Called the landlord and he hasn’t done anything.  On 1/3/09, same case again.  The landlord promised to fix certain issues around the property..."hasn’t done a thing”!

This landlord is not the right type of person to rent from.  If I knew things then that I know now...we would not have giving him $1,300 for first and security.  I have talked to other tenants and have been told that he is a slumlord and they don’t like the tenants above us.  Landlord has made it clear that he wants us out due to my husband’s disability (which he knew about right from the start).

Saturday, December 20, 2008

Government crackdown on slumlords

Government of district of columbia has taken a lot of landlords to court seeking to collect rent and make repairs that landlords have failed to make.

A short while ago the district of columbia government sued many landlords who were said to have failed to keep rented apartments in decent repair.  The government wants an order allowing it to collect the rent and use it to pay for repairs.  Case is called something like District of Columbia v. Williams.  I think this is a great step and think it should be an example for other jurisdictions.  Bad landlords can cause many problems to many people and deserve to be called for what they are.

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

vacationperfectplaces61535

I found this place through vacation perfect places it is an apartment in Lima Peru.  The pictures are not reflective of the apartement.  It is old and dirty.  Not at all the penthouse they are depicting.  The building is in the worse part of Milaflores and the rent is twice or three times what you should play.

The landlord also took monies from my deposit for painting and cleaning and other normal wear and tear that should not have been taken out.  They also charge me for utilities and charge me for the cost of goign to pay the utilities.  It was a rip off.  DO NOT RENT THIS PLACE!!!
Believe me you will find a much nicer place for half the cost.  I learned the hard way.
The landlord was also abusive and charge me for things I never saw in the apartment.