Yeah, in my early twenties, and we called it the shit house due to our eventual exposure to copious amounts of human feces. Not exaggerating. Ahead is a long, shitty story with a landlord so cartoonishly evil that I might not believe it if it didn’t happen to me.
It was great when my ex and I moved in - a cute, if small, two bedroom daylight basement, and the landlord was a really friendly guy. No warning signs at all. The landlord paid us well to do repairs and improvements and we felt like we really lucked out. A few months in, we came home to find the place reeked of sewage and there was a puddle of water in the laundry room, backed up from the floor drain. We called the landlord who sent out a plumber. The plumber snaked the line and got it to drain. Yay! We mop up, get paid for it by the landlord, and life continues.
A month or so later, we come home to find the whole place flooded. We had several inches of sewer water in most of the apartment. We had been gone for a few days and apparently the neighbors did all the laundry. We call the landlord who apologizes profusely, says he’ll replace any damaged items, and said he’ll get a plumber out. We stay at a friend’s place for the night.
The next morning, the water is still there. We call the landlord to ask WTF is going on. He testily explains it was late on a Saturday when we called, that he’s not going to pay night and weekend fees, and the plumber will be there the next day, on Monday. We reiterate that there’s literally standing shit water and that we can’t live in the house. He relents and agrees to send them same day. The plumber snakes the line again, while griping how he told the landlord YEARS AGO this would keep happening unless he replaces a double 90° juncture some idiot did when DIYing the main line.
We call the landlord, tell him what we learned, and ask why he didn’t fix the issue if it has been known for years. Shockingly, he goes absolutely ballistic on us, aggressively going on about how the maintenance of his property is none of our business, that it was inappropriate to ask the plumber anything and that he’d be firing him for talking with us, and that he liked us as tenants but that was changing. We explain the place needs to be professionally cleaned, having been steeped in sewage for days. He refuses, telling us to clean it ourselves.
What. The. Fuck.
We realize we’re now in a hostile situation with a mentally unstable landlord. We had eight months left on the lease and we were both up to our ears in schoolwork. My ex refused to move because she is a moronic pushover, so we stop doing any work for the landlord and refuse to communicate with him except in writing or email, for which he mocks us in every email “for having our feelings hurt”. We eventually get him to send in his handyman who does a wholly insufficient job cleaning the floor. He keeps saying he’ll reimburse us for damaged furniture but keeps making excuses for why he needs another week after week after week. I want to talk to a lawyer but my idiot ex still wants to do nothing until at least the semester ends. She claims she can’t handle the stress.
We talk to the upstairs neighbors and find out this is a common occurrence and why the last tenants left. We learn they’ve been fighting him for months because the door to their oven will just fall open unless they prop something against it. They have two small children and it’s a huge hazard. They send him a demand letter and he evicts them. We drive away new tenants for a month by posting about it online and simply letting prospective tenants know what had happened when we see them. Eventually a new family moves in after the landlord slashes the rent.
A bit later, we go out of town for a week and come back to 6+ inches of water in the entire place. There’s literally a few pieces of shit and toilet paper floating in the kitchen. We inform the landlord, who says a plumber will be out the next day. We demand same day, he says they’ll see us tomorrow. Unbeknownst to my idiot ex, I talk with a lawyer that day who says the best they can do is a letter demanding they remediate immediately and cancel our lease (we lived in a conservative state with landlord friendly laws and basically no renter protections). I accept, letter is sent and delivered the next day.
The landlord mocks me by email for contacting a lawyer, but agrees to let us out of the lease. We soon find a new place and begin moving, but have to pay a double deposit because my ex had bad credit and we wouldn’t let the property manager contact our current landlord. We calculate prorated rent on the shit house and send it in. He fires back a blistering email about how he agreed to let us leave early but we still had the pay for the entire month. I talk to the lawyer who tells me the landlord has no standing. I tell the landlord to go pound sand. He responds threatening to sue us and goes on in great length about how he knows we don’t have much money and he’ll destroy us with legal fees “when he wins and we have to pay for his team of lawyers”. Dipshit ex folds again and just pays without asking me first. We give up on getting him to reimburse us for furniture - I want to sue for all of this but ex says she needs to put her education first and can’t handle it.
Epilogue: ex and I soon break up when she demands we immediately have an open relationship or she’s leaving. It later comes to light she had been fucking a mutual friend for awhile. I still keep tabs on shit landlord - he’s a slumlord in a different shitty conservative state. I’ve been married for ten years and my partner would destroy someone like that landlord. Big upgrade.
Yeah, in my early twenties, and we called it the shit house due to our eventual exposure to copious amounts of human feces. Not exaggerating. Ahead is a long, shitty story with a landlord so cartoonishly evil that I might not believe it if it didn’t happen to me.
It was great when my ex and I moved in - a cute, if small, two bedroom daylight basement, and the landlord was a really friendly guy. No warning signs at all. The landlord paid us well to do repairs and improvements and we felt like we really lucked out. A few months in, we came home to find the place reeked of sewage and there was a puddle of water in the laundry room, backed up from the floor drain. We called the landlord who sent out a plumber. The plumber snaked the line and got it to drain. Yay! We mop up, get paid for it by the landlord, and life continues.
A month or so later, we come home to find the whole place flooded. We had several inches of sewer water in most of the apartment. We had been gone for a few days and apparently the neighbors did all the laundry. We call the landlord who apologizes profusely, says he’ll replace any damaged items, and said he’ll get a plumber out. We stay at a friend’s place for the night.
The next morning, the water is still there. We call the landlord to ask WTF is going on. He testily explains it was late on a Saturday when we called, that he’s not going to pay night and weekend fees, and the plumber will be there the next day, on Monday. We reiterate that there’s literally standing shit water and that we can’t live in the house. He relents and agrees to send them same day. The plumber snakes the line again, while griping how he told the landlord YEARS AGO this would keep happening unless he replaces a double 90° juncture some idiot did when DIYing the main line.
We call the landlord, tell him what we learned, and ask why he didn’t fix the issue if it has been known for years. Shockingly, he goes absolutely ballistic on us, aggressively going on about how the maintenance of his property is none of our business, that it was inappropriate to ask the plumber anything and that he’d be firing him for talking with us, and that he liked us as tenants but that was changing. We explain the place needs to be professionally cleaned, having been steeped in sewage for days. He refuses, telling us to clean it ourselves.
What. The. Fuck.
We realize we’re now in a hostile situation with a mentally unstable landlord. We had eight months left on the lease and we were both up to our ears in schoolwork. My ex refused to move because she is a moronic pushover, so we stop doing any work for the landlord and refuse to communicate with him except in writing or email, for which he mocks us in every email “for having our feelings hurt”. We eventually get him to send in his handyman who does a wholly insufficient job cleaning the floor. He keeps saying he’ll reimburse us for damaged furniture but keeps making excuses for why he needs another week after week after week. I want to talk to a lawyer but my idiot ex still wants to do nothing until at least the semester ends. She claims she can’t handle the stress.
We talk to the upstairs neighbors and find out this is a common occurrence and why the last tenants left. We learn they’ve been fighting him for months because the door to their oven will just fall open unless they prop something against it. They have two small children and it’s a huge hazard. They send him a demand letter and he evicts them. We drive away new tenants for a month by posting about it online and simply letting prospective tenants know what had happened when we see them. Eventually a new family moves in after the landlord slashes the rent.
A bit later, we go out of town for a week and come back to 6+ inches of water in the entire place. There’s literally a few pieces of shit and toilet paper floating in the kitchen. We inform the landlord, who says a plumber will be out the next day. We demand same day, he says they’ll see us tomorrow. Unbeknownst to my idiot ex, I talk with a lawyer that day who says the best they can do is a letter demanding they remediate immediately and cancel our lease (we lived in a conservative state with landlord friendly laws and basically no renter protections). I accept, letter is sent and delivered the next day.
The landlord mocks me by email for contacting a lawyer, but agrees to let us out of the lease. We soon find a new place and begin moving, but have to pay a double deposit because my ex had bad credit and we wouldn’t let the property manager contact our current landlord. We calculate prorated rent on the shit house and send it in. He fires back a blistering email about how he agreed to let us leave early but we still had the pay for the entire month. I talk to the lawyer who tells me the landlord has no standing. I tell the landlord to go pound sand. He responds threatening to sue us and goes on in great length about how he knows we don’t have much money and he’ll destroy us with legal fees “when he wins and we have to pay for his team of lawyers”. Dipshit ex folds again and just pays without asking me first. We give up on getting him to reimburse us for furniture - I want to sue for all of this but ex says she needs to put her education first and can’t handle it.
Epilogue: ex and I soon break up when she demands we immediately have an open relationship or she’s leaving. It later comes to light she had been fucking a mutual friend for awhile. I still keep tabs on shit landlord - he’s a slumlord in a different shitty conservative state. I’ve been married for ten years and my partner would destroy someone like that landlord. Big upgrade.