bullettoothtony

Greetings,
This may be a long shot but I wondered if anyone on here knows anything about the legal rights of people renting properties to live in in colorado.

Since moving in to a rental property in August I have had frequent problems with the landlord and frankly I want to know if this is grounds to break our contract. While I realise that all rental contracts may be specific I wanted to know if there are any state laws that our landlord may have broken either in or out of our contract.

So here is a short list of some of the things are landlord has done:

Entered the property without our notice

Some work needed doing to the yard- Without knocking in the front door some of her workers have climbed over the garden fence ( bending our gate lock).

The fridge/freezer is always breaking down resulting in the loss of food. Repeated half assed fixes. Landlord originally didn't believe that it was broken and threatened to charge us for the repair man call out if no problem with the fridge freezer was found.

Pipes in the basement ceiling have burst causing leaks which have soaked the carpet. Landlord agreed to have carpets cleaned at her expense due to water marks and the rescinded the offer.

Landlord has received written reports of a problem with the gas cooker rings which has not been resolved ~3 months later.

Landlord comes in to repair items and doesn't clean up after - for example in order to inspect pipes in the basement a hole was cut in the ceiling leaving debris over the carpet. This was not cleaned up after.

So what do you think? Any advice is appreciated.

Thanks

scrubbedexpat091

Maybe this link can help.

Tenants Breaking a Lease in Colorado | Nolo.com

"When Breaking a Lease Is Justified in Colorado

There are some important exceptions to the blanket rule that a tenant who breaks a lease owes the rent for the entire lease term. You may be able to legally move out before the lease term ends in the following situations.

You Are Starting Active Military Duty

If you enter active military service after signing a lease, you have a right to break the lease under federal law. (War and National Defense Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, 50 App. U.S.C.A. §§ 501 and following.) You must be part of the “uniformed services,” which includes the armed forces, commissioned corps of the national Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), commissioned corps of the Public Health Service, and the activated National Guard. You must give your landlord written notice of your intent to terminate your tenancy for military reasons. Once the notice is mailed or delivered, your tenancy will terminate 30 days after the date that rent is next due, even if that date is several months before your lease expires.

You Are a Victim of Domestic Violence

State law (Colo. Rev. Stat. § 38-12-402) provides early termination rights for tenants who are victims of domestic violence, given that specified conditions are met (such as the tenant providing a copy of a police report).

The Rental Unit Is Unsafe or Violates Colorado Health or Safety Codes

If your landlord does not provide habitable housing under local and state housing codes, a court would probably conclude that you have been “constructively evicted;” this means that the landlord, by supplying unlivable housing, has for all practical purposes “evicted” you, so you have no further responsibility for the rent. Colorado law (Colo. Rev. Stat. § 38-12-507) sets specific requirements for the procedures you must follow before moving out because of a major repair problem. The problem must be truly serious, such as the lack of heat or other essential service.

Your Landlord Harasses You or Violates Your Privacy Rights

There is no state law in Colorado that specifies the amount of notice a landlord must give a tenant before entering a rental property. If your landlord repeatedly violates your rights to privacy, or does things like removing windows or doors, turning off your utilities, or changing the locks, you would be considered “constructively evicted,” as described above; this would usually justify you breaking the lease without further rent obligation."

Pulaski

I don't think individually those are major problems, though collectively they are not good for you. A landlord has a right to enter the property to do repairs. Usually that requires "reasonable notice", but for a burst pipe that might mean just knocking on the door and announcing his arrival. Access to the outside of the living area to perform maintenance and repairs doesn't seem unreasonable - did you lock an otherwise unlocked gate? Leaving dust and dirt on the carpet is irritating, and shouldn't have happened, but I assume you have a vacuum cleaner.

I would expect a good landlord to make reasonable offer on spoiled food, but that would depend on how long the landlord took to repair or replace the fridge. If the replaced the fridge after 24 hours I don't think you'd have much reason to complain.

Sounds to me like you should just leave, it is unlikely that a landlord will waste time trying to sue a tenant who leaves. In any case they can only sue for actual losses, which immediately become $0/mth when the unit is rerented.

Tarkak9

Best to get an attorney who specializes in tenant-landlord disputes .... not only to see if you can break and leave w/o recourse BUT I easily can foresee further issues and headaches for you down the road affecting your security deposit and pursuing additional monies from you after you move (not to mention affect your rental and credit history). A friend of mine is an attny in this area, PM me so that you can see if he has any insight for you or point you in the right direction.

.... that's assuming they intend to rent it; its their property, they could keep it vacant or claim have planned to sell it in August when the tenancy is up (who would want to rent it for 4-5 months until then??) - therefore they are suffering losses due to someone breaking/defaulting on the current lease agreement and pursue the tenant for the unpaid rent installments. It'd be up to a tenant to file a counter suit etc. Overall, the true challenge is collecting on a judgment but a LL would be able to affect a tenant's rental and credit history (esp if a judgment is on record) .....

scrubbedexpat091

No law in CO for a landlord to actively try to rent the place? Here if a tenant breaks a lease the landlord has to prove they are actively advertising and attempting to find a new tenant, if they choose to sit on the place and do nothing to find a new renter, the landlord will lose.

I had to break a lease once, but it was a large management company, they never did anything, was likely going to cost them more to sue considering I only left 2 months early.

Pulaski

Your advice is legally sound though not at rooted in what happens in the real world. Paying an attorney under such circumstances is almost certainly throwing good money after bad. Similarly few landlords have the time or money to sue a fugitive former tenant, not least because hypothetically if they win it is just about impossible to collect on the judgment from someone who is, by virtue of being a tenant, highly mobile. In any case most landlords find excuses most of the time to keep the security deposit, so it is probably already "gone".

Tarkak9

.... which is subjective and discretionary. Word of mouth or even a posting on CL is enough to satisfy any such attempt. All a LL would have to show is that they did so etc, and simply represent too once any interested party was told it was for only 4-5 months; no one was interested thereafter (even if they also tried for 1.5 years as noone wanted to lock in to such commitment) .... plus, in 5 months time, LL doesn't want to go through the process all over again. Besides, LL can always decline an application (as long as they don't violate Fair Housing ... which the burden of proof is on applicant) and doesn't have to explain why - could be over their credit score which is subjective and grounds for declining someone anyway (I've decided to look for 800 fica vs 720). August-Sept are the best times to find tenants so until then, LL suffered damage until such timeframe arives; if they truly want to be an arse and push it.

Small claims .... no attorney nor their fees necessary. Cheap as chips to file. But, if tenant wants to hire attny, its their dime. As I said before, yes, the real challenge would be collecting on a judgement - however, there is a reason why many LL require a cosigner (especially with student situations) which work in their favor and increases the redemption ability of judgements etc. Could even go to the lengths to get paperwork to go to employer to garnish wages etc, I know of time when a person went to the length of collecting on a judgement by having the ability of repossessing a car .... since it was listed (and also is regarded as) a person's asset and they had the paper to show they declared it as such and went through the channels to collect. People do weird things per se.


I do agree that the security deposit is probably "gone" esp by the antics of the OP's LL regarding the carpeting and other things as (she) will try to pin everything on them ... which is why I mentioned they need to speak to legal counsel. Its obvious that the LL is erratic and therefore I wouldn't 'underestimate' what they are willing to do; its clear now they have little regard they have for their tenants. As I said before, a judgment on file will follow and may cause more problems for someone later on down the road. Ive known looney LLs who have felt hard done by their tenants just as much as their tenants have felt by their LL.

Anyone can simply break a lease, but does one want to go infront of the courts to explain why etc. Yeah, 75% of the time, LLs won't bother to go such lengths, but the risk would be if you were forced to fall in the other 25%? (it wouldn't be present if it didn't exist!). All it takes is one person to make a nuisance for oneself.

OP - check with local housing or city as they may have some resource addressing landlord-tenant disputes because imo what you have been describing doesn't really impact your lease enough to violate quiet enjoyment (or otherwise) and arbitrarily walk w/o potential recourse if you were to. Customarily, 24hr notice is needed to enter but if it were for emergency repair purpose, no notice is needed. If it were daily entrance, then ya, you may have a case, but once in a while might not work in your favor. Repeatedly saying "no" to her to enter could also work against you. Regarding the yard ... usually is tenant responsibility now in CO, so LL can say that one wasn't maintaining it satisfactorily to lease provision so hired a crew to do whatever; and you can't deny such access by locking gate. Its a pity that there wasn't a matter regarding the furnace and a carbon monoxide risk then there would be grounds for constructive notice and immediate termination (after 72 hours of registered notice of condition and LL failed to fix it in that timeframe) and full return of the SD (its a CO thing) .... the condition of the gas range I don't think would fall under such provision and ability.

scrubbedexpat091

Landlords are just shady most of the time in my view, they won't fix something but are the first to whine when something doesn't go their way.

Leases are such a pain, only had to break mine because I got a new job in a new location, only option is to move and break lease. Not having a job means rent isn't paid anyhow.

bullettoothtony

Thank you for all your replies and advice.

Of note is that we did not place a lock on the back gate independently. We had the permission of the LL.


Additionally, when we moved in there was a hole dug in the garden. A trampoline was there - you know the ones that are at ground level. Anyways the landlord filled it in as per the contract/lease. The hole was filled mostly with mud but she also had a door buried in there. Given we signed a lead paint agreement when we moved in do you think this could be grounds for breaking the lease?

scrubbedexpat099

Tom Martino the troubleshooter.