augigi

Jenney, if I had all those issues with non-repair or damages, I'd move!@!! I certainly wouldn't pay MORE rent.

Bob

Aye, that's to the premises, it's not to your habitation though, they still need your permission to enter your actual apartment unless in an emergency and you can refuse it if not in your presence.

If they have given you the reasonable notice, and you are present, you can't refuse them to do inspections of the smoke detectors, but you can watch them look it over and tell them to bug off from snooping the rest of your apartment. It's in some other part of the law, I don't have a clue, nor care to look for it, but the cousin is a lawyer who told us about it. Also the landlord is obliged to put the deposit in a high interest account and give you the interest earned when you leave...which doesn't tend to happen

Just Jenney

Ok, folks -- we're going to go for it, ask for a specific reduction in our new rental amount and see what happens. Here's the text of the email I'm planning on sending -- it is a continuation of the email thread between me and the apartment manager here on-site. So it all makes sense, I've also included her last email to me (which I refer to in my request):

__________________________________________________ _______________________

OUR REQUEST THAT THEY REDUCE THE AMOUNT OF OUR RENT INCREASE:
Dear [Manager's Name],

Since receiving the information you provided and also getting our renewal notice the other day, we have discussed our options and have decided to stay where we are. However, we would like to ask that we get a $15/month discount off of the rent increase. In other words, instead of our new rent being $830/month, we are asking that you reduce it to $815/month.

Our reasons for asking for this reduction is three-fold. First and foremost, we have been excellent tenants during our residence at [Apartment Complex]. We have paid our rent on time every month for the past 7 years. We are respectful of our neighbors and of the community at large, as we always abide by the community rules.

Secondly, although our rent continues to go up, our appliances continue to depreciate from the normal wear-and-tear that's accumulated over the better part of a decade. Unfortunately, [Apartment Complex]'s policy to only update appliances in vacant apartments puts us at a disadvantage over other, newer tenants.

Lastly, in your last email (below) you offered us a $250 discount if we were to move to a different apartment. Reducing our new rent by $15/month, or $180/year, is a smaller discount than this previous offer. We therefore think it is a reasonable request to ask that this alternative, smaller discount be applied to our renewal agreement, particularly since we have never before asked [Apartment Complex] for anything in terms of a change in our rent in 7 years.

Please forward our request to your regional supervisor for review if necessary. We are looking forward to hearing from you regarding this; please contact me if you have any questions at all.

Best regards,
Jennifer & Mark [Surname]


HER PREVIOUS EMAIL TO ME:
Dear Jennifer:

Sorry I couldn't get back to you yesterday. If you wish to transfer to [the apartment next door, which will cost $900/month] after it is renovated you would fill out a new application and give us a copy of your most recent pay stubs (you and your husband), A check for $150 would be given with the application. Normally you would pay a full pet fee when you change apartments but I talked with my regional supervisor and she said ½ would be fine under the circumstances. So a $250 pet fee would be charge on the new apartment. We would have to do an inspection of your apartment to make sure about damages before we can go ahead with the transfer. Please let me know if you are interested so I can put a hold on that apartment for you.
__________________________________________________ ________________________


Personally I really don't know what our chances are. The fact that we would have to apply for the next-door apartment just like any Joe on the street -- pay stubs, application fee, PLUS inspection of our current apartment (which seems unfair to me!) -- doesn't make things look too positive. But you never know. The worst they can say is no.

Any suggestions on how we can reword anything are welcome. I want to send this off in the next couple of days, preferably.

Ok -- gotta go listen to Bush try to make excuses for how sucky things have gotten now...

~ Jenney

RoadWarriorFromLP

Seriously, is there some reason that you are refusing to simply make nice with the manager in person and plead poverty?

Email is easily blown off, there's nothing personal about it. Likewise, your recitation of the I'm-a-lovely-tenant/stuff-is-broken argument is anything but personal.

If I was the manager, I would send you a response saying that their costs had gone up, that you're getting the same rent increase as is everyone else (and it's a modest one at that), and that your rent is already below market, and politely remind you that the new, higher rent will be due on date X.

There's no logical reason to not increase your rent, so appealing to logic doesn't help. What might help is getting them to have a bit of sympathy for your personal plight. It's an appeal to emotion, not to fact. Because you can't win on the facts, using them will only go against you.

I think that you are confusing your desire to complain about your unit with a strategy that might get the rent reduction that you want. Neither approach is guaranteed to succeed, but yours is more likely to fail.

snowbunny

I do wonder what she'd said if you walked into her office, flopped into a chair, and said, "We're maxed out -- we can't afford the rent increase. What are our options?"

augigi

If I'm the landlord, the last thing I want to hear is that my tenants can't afford the rent. The first thing that says to me is "get a new tenant who can afford the place".

Tracym

I'd have to agree with that. Unless there are lots of vacancies, a "broke" tenant with a big ("dangerous breed)" dog wouldn't be the most desirable tenant.

If it's the standard rent increase for those apartments, my guess is that'll be that.

If appliances don't work, that argument should be able to be won.

Mold - as another poster said, they probably could be made to fix that.

BritGuyTN

very true

BUT

if the tenant is never late and other tenants don't complain that mitigates a lot of factors

BritGuyTN

its probably just mildew which is very different from 'toxic black mold' people get hysterical about

clean down with a bleach solution and repaint with a mildew resistant paint

job done

Rete

Not me. I went out and bought my own refrigerator and gave them back theirs.

I would suggest that you find a way to "break" the refrigerator in the next few months so that they have to give you a new one.

RoadWarriorFromLP

This would be an issue if the OP was a prospective new tenant who was balking at the rental rate -- nobody wants a new tenant who is going to stiff you straight away. But the OP has been living there for several years and has a history of paying rent, so that's not an issue here.

We're not talking about a detailed economic analysis with slide rule in hand here, but a play to the manager's sense of empathy, fair play, etc. Since the OP has no good reason to ask for the rent increase to be rescinded, the next best thing is to play nice and ask for a bit of mercy.

BritGuyTN makes a good point about mildew in general, but in this case, it sounds as if the problem is the result of waterlogged carpet. If there is mildew, it's probably in the carpet and/or the pad beneath it, and the only way to get rid of that is to replace those, something the manager seems unwilling to do.

Rete

There must a law on the books in VA that states that such an occurrence constitutes a full replacement of carpeting.

As for appliances here in NYS they are not replaced until they are unfixable. This is the reason why I purchased my one refrig and gave back the apartment owned one. I wanted bigger and better, not the refrig that is only a one door with a little freezer area inside. And no, I did not ask for a rent reduction because I'm a rent stablized tenant of 31 years.

Bob

if your renting, you shouldn't have to do that though

Just Jenney

Ok, well, it's done!

I sent the email this morning before work and I just checked my inbox to see if they had responded; they had. While they won’t bring the rental increase down (which I suspected they wouldn’t anyway, but figured it was worth asking about), before even hearing from me, they had already begun looking for newer appliances to replace ours with – washer, dryer, fridge and dishwasher. The only one they said they might not be able to replace is the stove but ours works fine anyway so that’s ok anyway. They even said they were looking for a microwave, which is strange since our apartment never came with one in the first place (plus I’d rather just keep using ours).

So while we’ll still have the same rent increase, at least now we’re getting more for our money. A newer (even if not brand-new) washing machine means no more extra rinse-and-spin cycles, which means a reduction in energy and water usage, and lower utility bills – yay!

As for the recent mold vs mildew discussion, honestly I’m not sure of the real difference, although I can tell you that whatever’s been under our kitchen sink since that water leak in 2002 is black and comes off when you rub something on it. The stuff in the bathroom is also black, and I’ve never heard of black mildew.

~ Jenney

Just Jenney

The affected areas have already been bleached (several times) and are not places that can be painted (bathroom tile, etc). The boarding under the kitchen sink should have been replaced from the get-go, but they refused because (according to them) it would be too difficult to recut plywood to fit in the same spot. So they just left it there.

~ Jenney