Section 8 Inspection Failures

[Chan K.]

Hello Everyone,

I have a section 8 questions for the veteran. Apparently, the housing authority in my market (the MA / Massachusetts area) changed the section 8 inspector which based in TN somewhere. The new company seems a bit dry and rude.

In any case, according to the report, I have 5 failures. I think I am willing to repair 4 failures which make sense, but I would like to question and object to 1 failure. This 1 failure seems like a big renovation and required me to hire a contractor to work on the porch ?? (still need clarification). I called them and trying to clarify on the request, but the guy on the phone told me that he has to submit a form and send to the inspector just to have him call me back.. wow.. it is so bad. The prior/old company uses to just nicely go over what need to be fixed in a professional manner. So the failure mentioned that there are water coming to the porch and seem like a leak .. for god sake, it is just a porch and not enclosed, so water/snow are expected to come in. The tenant uses it for storage and I told them to stop using the porch. My rent was no longer offering this as part of the living space.

So my question is what would happen if I they still required me to do the major renovation, and I don't have the resource to do it or it does not make sense? will the tenant vacant or I evict them or the housing authority can still hold me/unit hostage somehow?

Usually, I fixed all the issues in the report in the past for all section 8 tenants. I don't really like this new company, and things that they ask seem unreasonable.

Thanks ahead.

[Karen Rittenhouse]

@Chan K. Exactly why we don't do Section 8 anymore - someone else has all the power and tells you as the property owner what you must do. 

The way it worked here was that we were required to fix any issues they found. If not, they would move the tenant. You might want to let the housing authority know you can't fix this particular issue and see what they want to do - either allow it and continue as you are or not allow it and move the tenant so you can find someone to rent who is not Section 8.