Here’s the deal: I signed a 12 month lease in January. A week ago, my local slumlord sent out a notice that a $20 surcharge will be added to eveyone’s rent due to increases in the sewage rates over the last couple years (water and sewage are covered by the rent; individual units do not even have seperate meters). They extend the carrot that “if water use goes down, this surcharge will be reduced or eliminated”, something I suspect will never happen. Can imposing a surcharge like this possibly be legal? I have the terrible sensation that it probably is not, and that they are counting on the fact that this is a poor neighborhood where people lack the legal sophistication to stand up for themselves. I was just wondering if anyone out there had had a landlord pull a similar stunt, and if there was anything to be done. Twenty dollars is not a lot of money, but it is not insignifigant, either, and there is a princple involved.
I don’t know anything about this subject, but I need to get my post count up. I think rental laws are mostly a state and city affair. So it might help others who are more knowledgeable about these matters if you told us where you live.
I’ve never seen a residential lease that would allow that. You need to read your lease, though.
Commercial leases commonly allow the leasor to charge for an apportioned amount of operating expenses that are above those of a base year specified in the lease.
I am NOT a lawyer, but I don’t see how this would be legal. If you pay the amount of your agreed upon rent (without surcharge) the landlord would have to try to evict you, which means the burden of proving you owed the money would be on him. I doubt he could do it. Meanwhile, you’re still in the apartment, and since you’re paying your rent, your credit shouldn’t be affected.
As to how to handle it, I’d pay the rent agreed upon in the lease, and if he brings it up go on and on and on about how you try to conserve water, etc. (and do it, too, no sense in wasting water). Every time he tries to come back to “well, yeah, but you gotta pay it”, just keep going on about not wasting water. Don’t bring up anything about legalities.
Also, be very careful when moving out, documenting the cleanliness of the apartment, lack of destruction, etc. He may try to get the money out of your security deposit when you move out, claiming damage of one kind or another.
If you lay low, some other tenants who are more into that sort of thing may complain more loudly, taking the heat off of you.
Good luck.
It is too clear, and so it is hard to see.
Yo neglected a major issue here: what does the lease say?
No. A lease is a lease and is a binding contract. It specifies a fixed amount of rent for a fixed period of time. Both you and the slumlord are bound by the same terms. Tell him to shove his ‘surcharge.’
“”
00
)(
~~
First, read your lease. See whether or not it supports your position or your landlord’s. If it supports his position, just pay the surcharge; chalk it up to experience and read your lease more carefully next time.
If it supports your position, write him a polite letter explaining your position and asking him to rescind the surcharge and explaining your reasons, including references to the relevant terms of the lease. He will probably refuse.
At that point you have two options. You can either pay the surcharge for a while and try to recover it (plus interest) in small claims court. Your second option is to see a lawyer.
Do not fail to pay even part of your rent without legal counsel. You risk being evicted and having serious negative information entered on your credit report.
I sucked up to Wally and all I got was this lousy sig line!
I am amazed that people are so sloppy about these things. I just got a call from a friend in NYC with exactly the same problem and when I asked her “What does the lease say?” she couldn’t even tell me if she had a joint lease with her room-mates, if she had an individual lease with the landlady, or if she was subletting from one of the room mates. In a situation like this, the answer is… go figure.
The place to find the answer is in your contract with your landlord and in the laws and regulations that apply. Whatever we tell you here is guessing and of very little value.
Having said that, I will add that most leases will have a clause allowing the repercussion of increases in taxes etc and most jurisdictions also have laws allowing this. You need to find out the particulars in your case. The more rent control there is the more likely the law will provide this as an unexpected expense can wipe out the landlord’s profit.
Once you understand your legal obligations you can negotiate. maybe you have the legal obligation but you can still talk nicely to your landlord and tell him why it is so difficult for you to come up with the money, etc, and could he consider splitting it. Remember that being nice is the key to successful negotiating. If you take an adversarial position you make it impossible for him to be nice to you and say he’ll forgive the increase.
Good luck.
I have read my lease, and it is as generic a rental agreement as you could hope to see; it clearly states that they will pay for the water and sewage.
The real problem is that when I say I have a slumlord, I mean a slumlord. He owns hundreds, if not thousands, of units around town, all in what I’ll describe as “low SES” neighborhoods. So I am not dealing with a man here, but rather a management company. They are not all real bright bulbs down in the office, and I am worried that they will not have the authority to say “you’re right, that is grossly illegal, just don’t pay it”. Instead, they will slap me with a $35 late fee (plus $7 dollars each day thereafter) which means I will have to do some serious jumping through hoops to aviod what will be a large bill, not just $20. I guess I will just go down tomorrow and talk to them. I am not really willling to move, so if they are mule headed, I will probably pay it for this month and start working on a serious arguement for next time. I half expect that they will not give me any trouble if I say anything at all, but will continue to suck in the fee from those people in my neighborhood who lack the poise, self-confidence, and legal know-how to stand up to the man. Of course, those are the ones least able to afford $20 a month–the recent immigrents, the high-school drop outs, the elderly. Up 'til now my slumlord was as good a slumlord as one could wish for–repairs got done in a reasonable amount of time, undesirebles were quickly dealt with (people who actually fire weapons), rent was reasonable and vandelism was kept under control. But this stunt turns my stomach.
Before you pay it, why not try to contact the area tenants council? These are typically nonprofit and understaffed, so reaching them may be a hassle, but they work for cheap. Alternately, you might look in the front of the phone book for a lawyers referral service. Sometimes these guys will discuss a case informally over the phone. I’m no lawyer, and I haven’t read the boilerplate, but it sounds like they’re reneging on an agreement that they wrote.
Manda Jo, if you really feel the need to meet with your slumlord’s management team, I’d recommend you bring in your lease. Act stupid, and ask them to show you where in the lease it shows you owe for this surcharge. If they point to the pet deposit, you point to the clause that says they pay for water/sewer. This will show them that you have the lease and know how to read it. You might make a note of the person’s name you meet with and the date. It will help if they decide to hit you with all those late charges you mentioned.
I do know something about this area, and Mr. Sleep’s point is correct. Where are you located, Manda Jo?
Believe it or not, I’m on the local Rental Commission (you volunteer, get no pay, but get to be called “Commissioner ----”, which gets potholes fixed damn quick, you bet… :D), and the most important thing is what juristiction you are in. Let us know, willya?
I am in Alabama. I think our rent laws are probably signifigantly less complicated than in places where you have rent control and such. . .
The situation has been resolved,however. (Atl east for now) I went down to the office to pay my rent and I had only to mention the surcharge before the two ladies there told me to “just ignore that. . .that is the stupidest thing we ever heard of. . .he can’t do that and if he wants to sue for his money let him. .” They have evidently been telling this to every one who has a lease. I was really impressed. So I didn’t pay it, and I suppose I may have a problem if the owner tries to evict everyone with a lease–but I do not think he will do so, so I am not going to let it bother me.
Manda JO you didn’t say what city & state & laws vary from city to city so it’s pretty iffy. Try you local library for Renters Handbook, which usually has your local laws.
$20/month isn’t all that much. We have a big big water shortage here with water rationing & extremely expensive water & we have to use less water or else.
Handy, $20 is a 5% rent hike; furthermore if the owner owns a thousand units (Which I think is a reasonable estimate) this is a tidy $20,000/month income he is picking up. If he is doing so illegally, and through exploiting the legal ignorance of people living on minimum wage, then that bothers me.
To genralize my question, does my location really matter? Is there anywhere in this country (or others) where it is legal to mandate a surcharge unless such a provision is explicitly spelled out in the lease? Especially since they did not attempt to charge me for my water use–I don’t even have my own meter. The same charge was being assesed against all renters. If this is legal anywhere, then it seems like there is no benefit for me in a lease at all in those places; it would just give the owner the right to prosecute me if I skiped town.