You have to go beyond calling. Writing a certified letter is the only official way to document your attempts to contact him.
If he doesn't fix the issues in whatever time limit you demand - or can demand by law - I would stop paying rent to get his attention but also because justice is on your side.
Any future issues with your not paying can be explained - just KEEP your Documents to show any future landlord. But it sounds like he might be the type who wouldn't respond to a legal letter either.
Contact your local health department. He might not listen to you but I guarantee that he will take their calls. It does not matter where you live, water is required to be supplied.
No you cannot withhold the rent. You must notify the landlord in writing when you need repairs. If he does not reply or make an effort to fix the problem within a reasonable time then you call the city or county inspectors to report the problem and they will force him to fix it.
We have a month to month thing with him so I don't really know if that qualifies as a lease, src50. I've had apartments before and it's always been 6 months or a year lease.
This is kinda a backwoods area comparatively and people habitually don't follow the law around here for some reason. And yeah I was thinking it'd probably be a risky thing to do. Thank you for your reply.
You should KNOW whether you have a lease or not. If not, you should be looking for a new place.
It's time to pay a visit in person to your landlord and start looking at local real estate!
He sounds like a terrible landlord and you don't deserve to have to deal with his crap! tbh
As a landlord he should be doing everything in his ability to ensure that you're enjoying your stay in his residence, and that you're in good health. Living in fleas -- which you've mentioned you're allergic to -- is certainly not something a decent landlord would allow to continue.
I don't encourage it, mainly because it's mean and landlords typically look forward to your rent money, but holding your rent is definitely something you could do for a few months to make him take action.
Evicting tenants because they aren't paying rent is a very difficult thing for landlords and it usually takes months of paperwork, lawyers, and even a court hearing to complete. I wouldn't do this because of those reasons, but you definitely CAN do that.
EDIT: I also don't recommend keeping your rent because it will be harder to find another residence with that on your rental history.
Our landlord does not answer his phone. He has it so you cannot leave any messages or get a hold of him in the case of an emergency. Our water is currently not working. Sometimes it doesn't work at all, but mostly it's a little trickle. This has been going on for more than 2 weeks and has happened before. It lasted more than a month then.
Despite his occasional reassurances he repeatedly has stood us up. Other than that the apartments have been infested with fleas and I'm extremely allergic to them. When it first started up I had to go to the hospital to get an allergy shot and antibiotics. He said he'd call out an exterminator he asked us to speak to the other tenants for him. We did this. The next day we called the exterminators to confirm and they said he didn't give them his account information and they weren't running a charity.
I don't think we have a contract, but doesn't have have at least some obligations as a landlord? There just isn't many places to move other than here or else we'd be out of here. Can I withhold my rent until he fixes the water problem?
