All Forum Posts by: Missy H.

Hi BP

I recently bought a duplex in March and inherited the tenant downstairs who has been there for about three years.  They are a nice older couple with a college age son.  They are respectful, keep a clean house and pay their rent on time.  It is an older house with old windows.   

A few months ago, the tenant (wife) asked me to replace the windows.  I told them no because the windows work and are not broken.  A few weeks ago, the tenant (son) asked me to insulate the windows because it gets cold in the winter and their gas bill is too high.  

I know that the previous owners did not insulate the windows because I did not see them on the windows when I initially inspected the property back in January / February 2016.

Would you insulate the windows?

Would you not insulate the windows?

Would you buy the kit for them and have them insulate their own windows?

Would you think about replacing the windows?

The upstairs tenant has not complained about the cold or the windows.  

Your thoughts are appreciated.

Thanks Missy

Are you talking about protecting the real property or the property in the condo?

If you are referring to real property, that is the condo itself, the best that you may be able to do is board up the windows to prevent broken glass and possible looting in the event of an evacuation.  Other than that, the water will get in no matter what.

If you are referring to tangible property, you may just want to rent a u-haul and pack up everything to move it to higher ground.  The cost of a u-haul will be much less than the cost of replacing everything.  I have lived through Hurricane Sandy both as a resident and as a landlord.  I have learned from my mistakes.

@Sai T.

My first concern is the high cost of the late fee.  Is that legally allowed in your state?

With that being said, late is late, but maybe you may want to reduce the amount of the late fee.

@Madeline Burke Does it have to be all or nothing?  Do you have roommates lined up?  If so, do they have furniture to contribute?  If you don't have roommates, maybe future roommates might have furniture that they would want to have with them.  I know that when I had roommates, allowing them to move some of their furniture in, if hey had any, would make them feel the it was as much their home as it was mine, instead of it just being a house where they slept.  

I would just get the basics: sofa, coffee table, a set of pots and pans, dishes from a local discount store.  Roommates won't take as good a care of your property as they would their own.  The only thing that I would really put thought and investment in would be bedroom furniture that is yours and yours alone.  

Good luck.

@Chris Ryan There are as many answers for your question as people who will answer you.  I would suggest that you do a search on BP for mold remediation.  There are so many different options and it is based on how much you can afford and what you want to do.

When I had to do mold remediation on my house after Hurricane Sandy,  hired a professional mold remediation company.  Some of my neighbors removed sheetrock and sprayed everything with bleach.

I don't mean to sound vague but a quick search will answer your question and give you options.

@Mindy Jensen, @Curt Davis

I use it all the time.  It is a horrible feeling to post a question or comment and not get a single response; especially if you are new to the site.  It is the first place that I go to when I log in to try and help someone out, then I move on to the other forums.  

Is it my computer or imagination?  The unanswered tab has disappeared from the tab bar.  Is there something that I am missing?  It was there this morning.

@Atwan Kwan

New York State Real Property law section 235 states "Any lease or rental agreement for residential premises entered into by one tenant shall be construed to permit occupancy by the tenant, immediate family of the tenant, one additional occupant, and dependent children of the occupant provided that the tenant or the tenant's spouse occupies the premises as his primary residence."

In your example, if John Doe is the only person on the lease, he can get married, adopt 5 dependent children, and move them all in; provided they do not exceed occupancy laws,

The rules are different if there is more than one tenant on the lease, but as you can see there is a law permitting immediate family members to move in.  It varies by state.

@Tracey Thornton

I had/have a similar situation.  I have owned my duplex for 10 years.  None of my previous tenants ever complained about bed bugs.  

In March a new tenant moved in upstairs.  In August a new tenant moved in downstairs.  Two weeks after the downstairs tenant moved in, the upstairs tenant said she has bed bugs. 

I called a bed bug company and we did a walk through inspection of both apartments.  The downstairs tenant said that she does not have a bed bug issue.  When we did the inspection upstairs, the place was a pig stye.  There were bags and bags of garbage piled up in the stairwell outside of the kitchen door.  It stunk!  She said that it was garbage from that week because garbage pickup is only once a week.  This was way more than one week of garbage.  She also has no furniture, except for beds.  All of her clothes are in plastic bags throughout the apartment.  The inspector did find evidence of bed bug by-product on the mattress but could not find any bed bugs, dead or alive.  Th mattress was also full of all types of stains from who knows what.  The inspector then advised her that if she saw "another" one, to either keep it to show him or take a picture of it.  After he left, I told her that her apartment is unsanitary and the garbage has to be disposed of.  She is young, maybe 28, but not that young that she does not know how nasty it is to keep all of that garbage piled up outside her kitchen door.  I also took pictures of every room in the apartment to document the condition.  Finally, i told her that I would give her one week to clean her apartment and remove the garbage.  After that time, I would come back and do an inspection.  If she still had bugs, I would call the inspector back.

So far, she has not mentioned anything else about bugs and I was there last week.  The apartment was also a whole lot cleaner that it was before.

My lease does say that any pest or rodent problem identified within the first month of move in is the responsibility of the landlord.  After a month, it is the responsibility of the tenant.   

Depending on state laws, you may not be able to evict her/him/them.  Some states allow for immediate family members to live in the house.  Of course there are still the occupancy laws which help to combat overcrowding.  However, with that being said there may also be a local or state law that states a room has to be a certain size in order for it to be habitable for two persons.  The same way that a room may be required to be a minimum number of square fee in order to be considered a bedroom.

As far as the utilities, if the tenants pay their own utilities, then I would not get involved.  It is a roommate problem, not a landlord problem.