Yup yup. First email, when me and my bf first moved in over a year ago: "hey there's probably a crack in the wall under the window or something because when it rains, water gets into the apartment. It's not a big deal but we have to keep towels under the window all the time which is annoying, can you send anyone to check it out?"
In response, landlord's son who is in charge of maintenance even though he has little to no experience with construction comes over and says we should check where the crack is and "tape it over or something", no further help is offered at all.
Now that the moisture has caused black mold to grow in the walls and we've been noticing some iffy things with our health, I'm seriously considering legal action. We weren't even given any help with the mold apart from the landlord's son telling me to spray bleach on it.
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Edited 4 years ago
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· 4 years ago
I'm not sure about the exact laws where you live, but in Ohio the landlord has 30 days to make repairs and if they don't then you can do what Maddy Annie in the post said and hire a 3rd party contractor to fix it and bill your landlord for it
I live in Czechia and the law is kinda vague about that unfortunately, it says that if the landlord doesn't fix the issue "after being asked repeatedly", you can get someone to fix it and the landlord has to knock the expense off your rent. If they refuse to do that as well, you can take them to court. The thing is though, the leaking windows and the mold are definitely connected but *technically* a different issue which we reported only twice since noticing it so I don't know if we have the right to do that yet, and the law doesn't say anything about further damages caused by the landlord's negligence of the original issue. The landlord's son told us they have a guy who takes out the windows, fixes them and then puts them back but he's busy now. Which means it could be months before anyone even comes to fix it but it also gives them the wiggle room to say they've totally been working on it the whole time.
We could just move out without doing anything about it but tbh it feels irresponsible because they're just gonna find another poor sod who's either ignorant of the issue (the mold is cleverly hidden behind a bookshelf, I wondered why it was placed there when it didn't make sense with the space at all, well now I know) or willing to live in a moldy apartment for financial reasons.
It's sweet that you don't want this to happen to anyone else. But you have to take care of yourself and your health. Living in a mouldy flat just so someone else won't have to is a bad idea. See if there are any government agencies you can get involved - maybe the health department or building code inspector? I'm worried that the landlord won't completely take care of the mold, in which case you should move out. Leave an honest review on any websites the flat might be posted to, or maybe leave surreptitious notes about the issue around the flat for the next tenant to find. Take care of yourself.
That's very kind, thank you. I don't want to ruin my health just to teach my landlord a lesson she probably wouldn't learn anyway. It still feels wrong to let other people live there and be exploited the same way we were. I was thinking of leaving a note for the next tenant, yeah. Maybe I'll just do that.
In response, landlord's son who is in charge of maintenance even though he has little to no experience with construction comes over and says we should check where the crack is and "tape it over or something", no further help is offered at all.
Now that the moisture has caused black mold to grow in the walls and we've been noticing some iffy things with our health, I'm seriously considering legal action. We weren't even given any help with the mold apart from the landlord's son telling me to spray bleach on it.