Ethics of Departing Tenant

[darkprincess74.livejournal.com]

So I'm moving out of my apartment soon but I'm questioning what I should do about the situation in the building. Basically the electrical wiring/infrastructure is maybe around a hundred years old, isn't reliable and definitely isn't safe. There are 7 outlets in the apartment most of which aren't grounded and the power is split between my apartment and another one on the same floor. My apartment and the other one were originally one apartment but was split up into two which letting the city know years ago. On a regular basic I never know what outlet will work or which room lights I'll be able to use. Also between the wiring is so ancient I haven't been able to use A/C at all this summer and this house is great at holding in the heat. The furnace is from the 60s and worked fine last winter but other tenants last winter didn't get heat sometimes. If for some reason the heat stops working in this apartment over the winter then no one could use a space heater because the outlets wouldn't take it. In the kitchen I can't use the fridge and the toaster or microwave at the same time. In the basement the wiring is hooked up to circuit breakers but for 4 apartments there are only two boxes of an average size. The boxes don't have doors on them and the wiring is all exposed as it runs into the breakers. It's obvious to anyone that the wiring is scary and unprofessional. What's more I'm pretty certain things are bad enough with the wiring to start a fire should it overheat or do something weird at some point. Recently the landlord made an attempt to have some fix the wiring without giving any notice so I came home that night to find out I had no power and fortunately caught the person working on it in time. Though nothing is really fixed at this point and the work done just made the wiring scarier. I regret that I didn't talk to the landlord about this earlier but now I'm moving out and don't think this situation is a good one to pass on to other people. The landlord does know there have been some electrical issues but I have no idea when the "electrician" is coming back to hack the wires up some more. I'd like to do something about this before I move, any suggestions?

Comments

[bryant]

I am now curious as to who your landlord is, since that's an awfully familiar-sounding situation. But I expect there's more than one of those in Somerville.

I'd call Somerville 311 -- this is one of the many things it was designed for, and I hear they do pretty well on response.

[redcolumbine.livejournal.com]

Yeah, 311 sounds right - it seems like a Fire Department question to me.

[narya.livejournal.com]

Yeah - the right answer may be to get one of the building inspectors out to look at it.

(I'm assuming that whatever they are now supposedly doing either didn't require a permit or they didn't get one. If there is a permit taped to the door, try calling the number on it.)

[badseed1980.livejournal.com]

Wow, this sounds something like the situation in my boyfriend's apartment, though at least his outlets and lights work. He has a 65-amp electrical panel, but only two circuits: one 20-amp and one 15-amp. We basically have to use only one major appliance at a time.

[ayelle.livejournal.com]

I don't have any useful advice to add (what others said above makes sense to me), but having been in a similar situation some time ago, I remember that perhaps the most infuriating thing about it was that my insurance refused to give me a renter's policy on a place with such inadequate wiring.

We did eventually get them to fix the problems (in our case it was a question of badgering the management company persistently enough), but a lot of the time it felt like beating our heads against a wall. Ugh.

[surrealestate.livejournal.com]

Any tenant who thinks their apartment has serious issues that the landlord won't deal with properly can call the housing department, who will come inspect it and send the landlord a report indicating what they must fix and by when. In addition, the tenant is protected from retaliatory eviction and rent hikes.

You can certainly call them now if you'd like, but it probably would have done you more good to do it while you were living there. :)

tl;dr

[sparkgrrl658.livejournal.com]

"i'm moving out of my apartment and would like to avoid passing problems i've had due to old unprofessionally done wiring onto the new tenants. i've alerted the landlord but nothing is set in stone to be fixed. any ideas?"

Re: tl;dr

[jbsegal.livejournal.com]

Why would you bother making this comment?

The 1st thing many people here would do is ask for some details - or at least be interested in them.

Re: tl;dr

[pushupstairs.livejournal.com]

I think she probably made the comment because the post was extremely long-winded, hard to follow, and otherwise poorly written.

Re: tl;dr

[jbsegal.livejournal.com]

... and already receiving helpful comments.

Noting that the original poster's writing needed work would've been fine, in my opinion, but an overly short, snarky comment that the post was too long and that they didn't read it - when obviously they DID - seems gratuitous and mean-spirited.

Re: tl;dr

[dillonpuff.livejournal.com]

AND MY AXE

Re: tl;dr

[ron_newman]

That was unnecessary.

Re: tl;dr

[sparkgrrl658.livejournal.com]

i don't think so, see my above response.

[pearlythebunny.livejournal.com]

The City has those NIT guys. I don't know exactly how the system works, but if you think the house is dangerous, I'd think they'd send someone out to look at it. I'd call 311, and explain the situation.

[darkprincess74.livejournal.com]

Speaking to the people that thought the post was overly long I debated making it shorter but I felt that without adding a lot of detail about the situation it might not sound as bad as it really is. Every apartment I've lived in has quirky things about it and I didn't want people to think that that's whats happening here. In fact there are other things that make it quirky but the heat and electrical rise above the normal quirkyness to the level of danger and unreliability. I appreciate the comments though.

[sparkgrrl658.livejournal.com]

my comment was intended to be short and to the point, but not snarky, just to help you get your post read by as many people as possible. apologies that some took it that way and it derailed the comments a bit :)

[firepail.livejournal.com]

Some paragraph breaks or something would really help, I had a hard time following it. Yes, details help us understand the predicament, but it became a forest/trees situation for me.

I don't think there is anything you can do to protect future tenants of that space, it is something they would have to pursue as the resident of that dwelling.

[hakamadare.livejournal.com]

I'm moving out of my apartment soon

if you've already moved, you're SOL; my experience is that Inspectional Services will not respond to or investigate complaints from people who are not current residents of the property in question. however, if you know you'll be moving out soon (and especially if you already have your next living situation already set up), now is an excellent time to make your complaint.

the Inspectional Services Department's website is here (http://www.somervillema.gov/Division.cfm?orgunit=ISD), and their phone number is 617-625-6600 ext. 5600 (or, as other posters have recommended, you can just call 311). i'd recommend that you write a list of all the issues (ideally with dates and times) and have it handy when you make the call; make a copy and give it to the inspector when he arrives. the inspectors tend to be busy, so the more advance notice you can give them, the better for everyone.

in terms of ethics, i think it's appropriate that you make this complaint, especially if you have complained to the landlord before (if you can provide written evidence of such complaints, do so). the landlord has an obligation to maintain the building, and dealing with problems like this is what the Inspectional Services Department is for.

-steve

I'd be good if you did follow up with this

[spaz-i-mota.livejournal.com]

Although I'm sure you wish you had done more while living there, it's be very nice of you to document these items in writing to your landlord and in the ways people mentioned above.

We've all lived in shady apartments, unfortunately, but it's nice if you can stop this specific situation from falling into someone else's lap.

To touch on the renter's insurance issues mentioned above. I ended up having to shop around for insurance that would cover "knob and tube wiring with only 60amp service" because my original company wouldn't cover me. I found Liberty Mutual will.

[ayelle.livejournal.com]

> I ended up having to shop around for insurance that would cover "knob and tube wiring with only 60amp service" because my original company wouldn't cover me. I found Liberty Mutual will.

Ah, thank you -- useful to know if I (or others) end up in that sich again. At the time, I had had a good relationship with the insurance company in question for years, whereas my relationship with the management company was new, so it seemed natural to blame them and not pursue the insurance issue. In retrospect, if the management company had not come around (and to be fair, they did... and it only took a few &*^% months) it would have been smart to shop for a new insurance company.

If the OP's move-out date is Aug 31st (which seems possible) now does seem like a good time to pursue the electricity issue -- there's probably time to make reports and get stuff in writing, for the sake of the next tenants, and then move out and be done with the situation. It's completely illegal for landlords to take reprisals, of course, but that doesn't mean that they won't try anyway, or that it's not a gigantic PITA when they do.

[amethystmoon.livejournal.com]

wow, sounds like an apartment I had once... down to the 1 apartment being split into 2 without telling the city.

[lena-a-mermaid.livejournal.com]

Call the city building inspector and report the conditions and the landlord if he does not fix the issue.

[0bsessions.livejournal.com]

That's it. You're fuckin' banned from redsox. I won't stand for people using acronyms I'm not familiar with.

[m00n.livejournal.com]

The Massachusetts Department of Public health has fairly detailed guidelines about the kinds of conditions that landlords (and tenants) are supposed to maintain in their buildings.

You can see the summary version here (http://www.sec.state.ma.us/cis/cissfsn/sfsnidx.htm). The last time I looked into this, I recall that the process was basically as follows: You write a letter to your landlord detailing all of the problems and asking that they be fixed. If the problems are not fixed in a "reasonable" time, you send them another letter. if they still don't fix the problem, you can call the Department of Public Health and they will come and inspect the building. Only certain sanitary code violations (yes, electrical problems fall under the category of the "sanitary" code in most case) require the landlord to take immediate action but it sounds like yours might be a good candidate.

I agree with the other commenters that you should call 311 and report/ask about this, but in addition to that you should probably contact the DPH and see if they will inspect the place as well. At the very least you should find out if you can get on the record as saying that this landlord is a problem so that future plaintiffs have an easier time taking him to court if they need to.