Tenant rights for a new Los Angeles renter

[Sunkul Soni]

looking for some help and insights from the community. My sister in law and husband recently moved to LA into a single family home which is broken out into two units (upstairs and downstairs). The landlord charges them a flat $1k a month in utilities along with $200 a month for lawn maintenance. As they've gotten settled the experience has become a nightmare. Every week something goes out in the home with the most recent being the lower outlets throughout the home. The LL is wanting to charge them back for the cost of bringing an electrician out to resolve the matter. At this time I think the apartment itself is not legal as it appears to be zoned a SFR. He has not provided any copies of utility bills and apparently is the "gardner" that is billing them $200 a month. The tenants downstairs from them dont raise a stink as the boyfriend doesnt have his green card so they're not going to anything to rock the boat. What are their rights as tenants and what can they do at this point? Its too much to deal with a LL weekly if this keeps up and I've only shared the most incident. Please provide thoughts and insights into what she can do.