Florida:Reimburse Hotel stay for Broken AC

[Himateja Madala]

I had a situation where AC stopped working in one of my rental unit. The unit was 1 year old and broke unexpectedly. I contacted the company and they came out to look into the issue and said some parts were missing. The unit was new and hence under warranty, i could not call any other company because that would void my warranty for the life of the unit.

HVAC company ordered parts but because parts were out of stock we had to wait a bit and AC was fixed after 7 days.

Event reported:Monday

First Visit by HVAC company :Wednesday

Issue fixed: Next week Tuesday

Tenant moved into a hotel for those 8 days and now asking me to reimburse a bill of 1000$.

What is the landlord's responsibility. Is broken AC considered a emergency ? I believe the temperatures were 85 to 90 during the time.This was just before Hurricane Ian.

I didn't provide any written approval that they could stay in a hotel. I told them they could use some fans.

Also i made my best effort to fix the issue at the earliest.Pls advice

Lease mandates tenant have liability insurance but i believe tenant doesn't have renters insurance.

[Nathan Gesner]

Quote from @Himateja Madala:

I disagree with Bjorn. 

Unless the state law requires you to compensate the Tenant, you have no obligation. It's not your fault the A/C broke and you fixed it as quickly as you could. The Tenant can only withhold rent if you fail to repair. Even then, they have to follow a process of giving notice and allowing you time to repair, just like you have to follow rules if you want to evict.

https://www.rentce.com/does-a-....

The house was still fully functional, so you don't owe them for loss of refrigerator, bathroom, or yard. They could have talked to you before running to a motel. They could have rented a couple window A/C units. There's no reason for you to compensate them $1,000 for a week without A/C.