Tenant’s Rights

My landlord called at 8:05 this morning. Lucky I was awake because I wouldn’t have been pleased if he had woken me up. Especially when I found out why he was calling.

The apartment house I live in is for sale. It has been for sale forever. Actually I am now on my fifth landlord and I have only lived here for about 11 years. I think it is five, might be six. Anyway, the building gets bought by people who have grandiose ideas about what they can do to the property to improve it, make money and be rich. Then the reality of owning a building that is over 100 years old sets in and they get discouraged and sell it. Reality set in for my current landlord over a year ago and the building has been on the market ever since. Of course, with the way the real estate market it and with the condition of the building, it isn’t selling. That, and I think he is asking too much for it. With the amount of work that needs to be done, no one wants to pay so much for a place and then have to sink money into it to fix it up. So it is sitting here with a for sale sign out front continually.

Which is why my landlord was calling this morning at 8:05 am. He told me that the place was going to be shown to a prospective buyer tomorrow (Friday) at 3:30 pm. I said ok and that I would be sure to be home and the place would be neat and clean.

I was working all day today on the computer and didn’t even bother taking a shower until close to noon. Since I live by myself and people really can’t see into the apartment during the day, I don’t always cover up completely when walking from my bathroom (next to the kitchen) to my bedroom (next to the living room). I mention this because of what happened at 3:30 today which is Thursday (not Friday).

At 3:30, as I was walking into my kitchen, I see three men approaching my door. The older one reached for the screen door and started yanking on it. And he kept yanking on it, like if he kept yanking on it, it would open. But it was locked.  It is always locked when I am in the apartment. Just because, for some reason, when people approach my door and stand on the step, they will try to open the screen door before knocking. Then, if the screen door was unlocked and they had opened it, when I open the other door, there would be nothing between me and them. I prefer the security of talking through a screen door (which this time of year is actually a storm door).

After watching him yank on the door for a while, I opened my door and said “may I help you”.

“We are here to see the house” he said.

“No,” I said,”That is tomorrow at 3:30.”

“No,” he said, “It is today at 3:30.”

I opened the screen door and he handed me his business card. It all seemed legitimate so I let him and the other two men with him into the apartment. They stood around in the kitchen and immediately noticed the water stains on the ceiling. The broker (older man) asked me if they were new and I said that some were, some weren’t. I further explained that there was a leak from the bathtub, which is above my kitchen sink area, years ago and that landlord (the second one, I believe) I had at the time decided to tear out the plaster that had become stained and moldy and then put a drop ceiling over the whole kitchen area. That was her solution to the water leaking problem. Of course, it didn’t fix the it which is why I have water stains all over my kitchen ceiling. My current landlord has promised to replace the ceiling tiles but he has done that before and the leak still hasn’t been fixed so they will probably just get stained again.

That seemed to discourage the prospective buyers. I then pointed out that the bathroom was over there, the one door was to a storage closet and the other door went to my spare bedroom. No, please don’t go in there, it is a bit of a mess right now. They then wandered into the living room and inquired about the other two doors. I said one was to a closet and the other was to my bedroom. No, you can not go in there. My bed has not been made and it is a mess since I was expecting you tomorrow and not today.

After another minute, all three left and headed to the front apartment on the first floor. I almost texted my neighbor to warn her but I didn’t get a chance before they were actually at her door.

She doesn’t have a screen door and the three guys simply unlocked her door and walked into her apartment. No knocking. No announcing. Just walked right in. She was in her night shirt and ran quickly into her bedroom. Her teenage son stood guard outside her door and watched what the men did. After they had inspected the kitchen and his bedroom, they thanked him and left.

Needless to say, she was livid!. She immediately called me and asked me WTF was that??? They didn’t even knock not to mention THEY WERE A DAY EARLY!!!

After we compared notes for a few minutes, I said I would call our landlord and tell him they were a day early. When I told him what had happened, he apologized and said he would call and find out why they came on Thursday instead of Friday. I then called my neighbor back and told her that he was going to find out what happened.

It occurred to us, as my neighbor and I were talking, that the prospective buyers and the broker never went into the two empty apartments (both upstairs apartments are vacant right now) and they only saw two rooms in her apartment and two in my apartment. How can anyone make a decision on whether or not to buy a place by only seeing four rooms in the whole building? Our only conclusion was that they were so discouraged by the condition of the rooms they saw, they really didn’t want to see more. Of course we are just guessing but it we can’t think of any other reason they would look at a potential real estate investment in such a minimal way.

My landlord called me a while ago. He said that it was his mistake. They were scheduled to come on Thursday, not Friday. He apologized over and over. I said it was ok, mistakes happen. Of course I didn’t point out to him that, according to the tenant’s rights laws, he has to give us 24 hours notice before we have to let someone into our apartments. Since they must have called him on Wednesday, he should have called us on Wednesday, not Thursday morning at 8:05.

Who knows what happened there. He may have become distracted and then confused about what day they said there were going to come. He may have misunderstood what they said. They may have mis-spoken. Like I said, who knows? Kind of irrelevant at this point.

I did ask my landlord to tell the real estate agent that they need to knock before coming into people’s apartments. If my screen door hadn’t been locked and I was taking a nap (which I usually do in little or not clothing), they could have walked right in on me. Actually, in thinking about it, my bedroom door is hooked on the inside when I am in there to keep the cat out (the door stopped latching years ago so hooks keep it closed) just as it is hooked on the outside of the door when I am not in the bedroom. If I was in my bedroom with the door hooked and I heard someone trying to open the door, I would have called 911 then stayed in my bedroom until the cops came. Wouldn’t that have been a big brouhaha? Then there is the potentially embarrassing situation that could have happened if I was in the shower and then walking from the bathroom to my bedroom wearing nothing but a towel, or even less for that matter.

My landlord did say he would pass that on to the real estate agent…that they need to knock before coming into the apartments.

This is one of the major drawbacks to living in someone else’s property. Yes, I do have some rights. But my landlord, with proper notification, can come into my apartment any time he wants and have other people come into my apartment any time they need/want to and I have no control over it. As far as I am concerned, this is my home. I mean, it is my home but it feels less so when people can just come walking into it anytime they want. Every time my landlord calls to tell me he or someone else was going to come into the apartment I become very much aware that this is really not my home. Just a temporary spot to lay my head until it is time to move on. Someday I would love to have my very own house. But, being as I am unemployed, that day gets pushed further and further into the future. Oh well. All in good time, I guess.

In the mean time, I will guard my rights and keep my screen door good and locked when I am home. That will have to do for the time being.

PS I should mention that I have refused to let a real estate agent into my apartment. When the place first went on the market, my landlord didn’t tell us that the house was going to be shown. Some people knocked on my door (the screen door) and said they were there to see the apartment. I said that I wasn’t notified about this and they said that it was scheduled. I said that didn’t matter and that I needed to be told 24 hours in advance and my landlord never mentioned it to me. And, no, they can not come into my apartment. They looked a little disgruntled and left. That was when my landlord started calling to let us know when the place was going to be shown. Which is also why he apologized so profusely today. It is a right and I will insist on it each and every time. This is, after all, my home…as temporary as it may be at this point.