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heat, "as is" lease, withholding rent, nervous bre

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heat, "as is" lease, withholding rent, nervous bre

Postby frankbk » Fri Dec 05, 2008 12:26 am

I share a four bedroom apt. with 3 others in brooklyn. Our heat doesn't work. We pay all the utility bills. We have our own thermostat and boiler (in a basement that we don't always have access to and isn't connected to our apartment) and the landlord claims that our apartment is a single unit with an "as is" lease and that it is therefore the tenant's (my) responsibilty to fix the boiler/ whatever is wrong with the heat and continue to pay rent. I've been back and forth with 311 for over a month and haven't gotten them to issue him a single violation because they generally don't call to let you know that an inspector is coming, when they do call they won't even give a date for the inspection, much less a hour to hour time frame. Now one of my roommates is dead set on withholding the rent. I haven't been able to get a hold of any free legal advisors. I make ten beans an hour and can't afford a lawyer, a boiler or any of that.

When I had originally moved into the place I was a sublettor and never saw the lease. My roommates all left at the end of that lease saying they didn't like the neighborhood. I didn't mind it so I stayed and found new roommates. I signed the new lease and had just renewed it when this happened. The landlord only wanted one person on the lease and so I bear all the legal responsibility for all of this...right?

Now what really kills me about all of this is that there were some red flags from the beginning. When i signed the first lease he tried to get me to pay him the last month's rent from the previous one, which he had already recieved in advance when my roommates had signed the lease. But I left him a firm message and he never mentioned it again. The apartment has/ had central a/c which stopped working last summer. The landlord refused to fix it and referred me to a paragraph in the lease. When I read it my jaw dropped, though I thought I'd at least scanned it before. It basically says that the tennant has 5 days from signing the lease to report anything that they feel is in need of repair and after that bears all responsibility to repair and maintain all "furnishings, appliances and the premises themselves." Now this is vaguely worded and taken in its broadest sense basically means that the landlord collects rent and denies any responsibility for anything else. Neither I nor any of my roommates thought it was worth a big battle over a/c and the repair would have cost close to $1000 so we left it non functioning. I called the landlord specifically to ask him about the meaning of the paragraph in question and told him I wouldn't be comfortable signing a renewal lease if this was meant to include things like, heat, exterior door locks etc. And he said, "No No...that's my responsibility." e.g. lied to me to get me to sign a renewal. Now we're two months into the new lease and the heat has stopped working. The LL immediately referred me to the very same paragraph in the lease and hasn't budged. I've threatened to take him to housing court and he's said, "Go ahead, you'll lose." He then advised me to call 311 pretending to be a landlord, explain what the lease says and they'd tell me that the tenant's responsible. I haven't done that, as I try not to be a lying sack of...but I digress.

Basically what I'm curious about is whether there are exceptions to the warranty of habitability(other than condo's and coops) having to do with single units or leases that specifically preclude it. And also if its smart to withhold rent, or better to just pay it and take him to housing court.

Thanks
frankbk
 
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Joined: Thu Dec 04, 2008 10:05 pm

Postby lofter1 » Fri Dec 05, 2008 12:24 pm

Please clarify:

Is yours the ONLY residential unit in the building?

Is the Boiler shared by ANY other units (commerical or residential)?
lofter1
 
Posts: 765
Joined: Tue Aug 03, 2004 1:01 am

yes/ not sure

Postby frankbk » Fri Dec 05, 2008 9:18 pm

There is one other residential apartment upstairs from us. Their heat
works. There is a store on the ground floor. We all have our own thermostats, and I believe separate boilers. I went down to look at the boiler and couldn't make heads or tails of anything. The boiler/ boilers are in the back of a basement being used as a store room by the
store guys, surrounded by boxes and stuff.
frankbk
 
Posts: 3
Joined: Thu Dec 04, 2008 10:05 pm


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