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I returned from vacation after a 28 days, traveling through 24 hour fly time with my family (3 kids, one is toddler) and found my apartment sink overflowing (i live on 1st floor in a 4 story building). Sticking water made the situation worse as carpets in living rooms, bedrooms had mold and items on the carpet were all damaged (mold, fungus etc).
I had informed my apartment management about my travel and they did do an annual inspection during the same week when I went on vacation.
My renter insurance is covering my hotel+food cost for a week (and covering most of my personal property damages). My apartment property manager mentioned that they will pay accomodation cost for the hotel for another 5 days, while they are setting up a single bedroom furnished apartment for me to stay for couple of more weeks while the damanaged apartment is getting ready and becomes habitable.
I would like to know what compensation that I can claim from the management company.
1). My apartment management says I still need to pay rent because they are arranging alternate accommodation.
2). They haven't agreed to pay for the food yet.
3). My wife had to take time off from work for a week to deal with this mess.
4). This has been a lot of inconvenience and stress for me and my family.
5). Is this a case of liability or negligence on the part of my apartment management?
Appreciate any inputs on what compensation can I claim from the apartment management company.
Depending on your lease, your landlord could just tell you the lease is now void because the unit is no longer habitable. Landlords don't ever have to provide you with new housing. The fact that yours did, shows good faith and an attempt to mitigate damages.
Your landlord is at most liable only for abatement of rent for when your unit was not habitable. But, only above and beyond what your insurance wouldn't pay. And only until either your lease was voided due to uninhabitability, or until they provided you with another unit.
Your landlord is only required to abate your rent. Your landlord is never liable for your personal belongings or food or lost wages.
I don't see a case of liability due to negligence. Negligence is only found when there is a duty, a failure to meet that duty, which results in damages. Your landlord did an inspection and was unaware of a problem after that. Then, your landlord got right on the problem when he/she knew about it. So, I don't see negligence here, either.
In my opinion.
Here's some info from the CA Dept of Consumer Affairs:
I returned from vacation after a 28 days, traveling through 24 hour fly time with my family (3 kids, one is toddler) and found my apartment sink overflowing (i live on 1st floor in a 4 story building). Sticking water made the situation worse as carpets in living rooms, bedrooms had mold and items on the carpet were all damaged (mold, fungus etc).
I had informed my apartment management about my travel and they did do an annual inspection during the same week when I went on vacation.
My renter insurance is covering my hotel+food cost for a week (and covering most of my personal property damages). My apartment property manager mentioned that they will pay accomodation cost for the hotel for another 5 days, while they are setting up a single bedroom furnished apartment for me to stay for couple of more weeks while the damanaged apartment is getting ready and becomes habitable.
I would like to know what compensation that I can claim from the management company.
1). My apartment management says I still need to pay rent because they are arranging alternate accommodation.
2). They haven't agreed to pay for the food yet.
3). My wife had to take time off from work for a week to deal with this mess.
4). This has been a lot of inconvenience and stress for me and my family.
5). Is this a case of liability or negligence on the part of my apartment management?
Appreciate any inputs on what compensation can I claim from the apartment management company.
Thanks in advance
Your sink was overflowing? Did someone leave the tap on? Where did the sewer water come from?
Did you have someone coming in to your unit on a regular basis to check on it? I see that they did an annual inspection, but 28 days is a long time to be gone. If I'm going to be out of my unit for more than 48 hours I have to turn the water off at the main.
Was there any damage to surrounding units?
this happened to a neighbor of mine.. the pipe under his sink burst and he had 4 inches of water in his unit. He had no ins. He lost a lot of personal things. He had to stay in the unit during clean up and with the loud noisy blowers. The complex did pay some of the outrageous water bill and electric bill, but that was it. They were on it as soon as the leak was reported and one of their workers let it slip out that this was their fault because they didn't upgrade something. That was caught on his security camera, in his unit, without him even being there. lol So when he showed this to the landlord, she softened a bit and prorated his rent for the duration of the 'clean up'.
I agree with Snow on this..I'm not seeing any negligence on your landlord's part. Sorry.
I returned from vacation after a 28 days, traveling through 24 hour fly time with my family (3 kids, one is toddler) and found my apartment sink overflowing (i live on 1st floor in a 4 story building). Sticking water made the situation worse as carpets in living rooms, bedrooms had mold and items on the carpet were all damaged (mold, fungus etc).
I had informed my apartment management about my travel and they did do an annual inspection during the same week when I went on vacation.
My renter insurance is covering my hotel+food cost for a week (and covering most of my personal property damages). My apartment property manager mentioned that they will pay accomodation cost for the hotel for another 5 days, while they are setting up a single bedroom furnished apartment for me to stay for couple of more weeks while the damanaged apartment is getting ready and becomes habitable.
I would like to know what compensation that I can claim from the management company.
1). My apartment management says I still need to pay rent because they are arranging alternate accommodation.
2). They haven't agreed to pay for the food yet.
3). My wife had to take time off from work for a week to deal with this mess.
4). This has been a lot of inconvenience and stress for me and my family.
5). Is this a case of liability or negligence on the part of my apartment management?
Appreciate any inputs on what compensation can I claim from the apartment management company.
Thanks in advance
Sorry for your troubles. Hope things get better fast for you.
Here are my comments.....I think they are compensating you. Food? Did your electric fridge go out??
Personally, I think it is a wash.....Taking a mths long vacation, with no one to check on your apartment seems like it is sort of your fault and it depends why the sink was overflowing...Did you leave water dripping??
If they are fixing the apartment and your insurance is covering your personal property....I think that is about all you could expect.
If the water damaged is caused by their neglect, it may be a different story.
Taking time off is a personal choice....But you may check with your local agencies like Salvation Army or Red Cross to see if there is any help available....In my experience, if you have insurance there will be no public assistance that you qualify for. But, I'd at least try.
ETA: Please clarify where the sewer water issue comes in??? Was that coming up your sink?? If that is the case, then it would all be on the LL imo....
I returned from vacation after a 28 days, traveling through 24 hour fly time with my family (3 kids, one is toddler) and found my apartment sink overflowing (i live on 1st floor in a 4 story building). Sticking water made the situation worse as carpets in living rooms, bedrooms had mold and items on the carpet were all damaged (mold, fungus etc).
I had informed my apartment management about my travel and they did do an annual inspection during the same week when I went on vacation.
My renter insurance is covering my hotel+food cost for a week (and covering most of my personal property damages). My apartment property manager mentioned that they will pay accomodation cost for the hotel for another 5 days, while they are setting up a single bedroom furnished apartment for me to stay for couple of more weeks while the damanaged apartment is getting ready and becomes habitable.
I would like to know what compensation that I can claim from the management company.
1). My apartment management says I still need to pay rent because they are arranging alternate accommodation.
2). They haven't agreed to pay for the food yet.
3). My wife had to take time off from work for a week to deal with this mess.
4). This has been a lot of inconvenience and stress for me and my family.
5). Is this a case of liability or negligence on the part of my apartment management?
Appreciate any inputs on what compensation can I claim from the apartment management company.
Thanks in advance
1) yes you still need to pay your rent.
2) why should they pay for your food? You already said your renters insurance is covering it.
3) Welcome to being an adult?
4) See #3
5) If anything, its negligence on your behalf. You should have had someone atleast come inspect the property weekly or "house sit" so to speak.
Sink water was reverse flowing. I stay on floor 1 and my apartment building is a 3 story building. Hence the kitchen sink for all the 3 families are connected. Looks like drainage must have got blocked and the sink water and grease started reverse flowing from my kitchen sink outlet.
And Yes, my apartment management company is trying to fix things quickly in the apartment and trying to accommodate family temporarily. I wanted to know any tenant rights I can exercise.
By the way , when I informed that I would be out for 28 days to the management company they did make a note in their system. They took care of my mails and parcels. But not the actual apartment. I am not sure whether this is something they should have done. Thats why I was wondering whether liability and negligence can be considered here.
3 months ago I had similar problem where I noticed the sink watere not draining quickly and started reverse flowing and started filling the sink. Because we were at home and raised the issue -plumbing company fixed the problem quickly. They did tell me that this is a risk because we are staying at the lower floor.
WOW & hear everyone thought I was crazy when my sink did the same thing! Good Luck!! BTW I am glad you had insurance! At the time we didn't & had to Live in the apt Stink & ALL during them fixing it & Me cleaning it up! I was sick for a week after each incident! It happened 3 times in 30 days!
By the way , when I informed that I would be out for 28 days to the management company they did make a note in their system. They took care of my mails and parcels. But not the actual apartment. I am not sure whether this is something they should have done. Thats why I was wondering whether liability and negligence can be considered here.
3 months ago I had similar problem where I noticed the sink watere not draining quickly and started reverse flowing and started filling the sink. Because we were at home and raised the issue -plumbing company fixed the problem quickly. They did tell me that this is a risk because we are staying at the lower floor.
The main reason I and the owner I worked for ever wanted to know when someone was going to be gone for over 10 days, was so if we became aware of an issue, we knew we could go in without notifying the tenant. For instance, if a smoke detector was going off, or there was a leak to a downstairs apartment that had to be caused from an upstairs problem, etc.
But, this does not make the landlord/manager liable for knowing immediately when there is a problem, just because they know you are gone or they have the right to go in without notice.
So, no, just knowing you are on vacation does not make a landlord liable for knowing what happens in your unit while you are gone.
What a welcome home... it's the last thing you need or want to deal with.
Kuddos on having Renter's Insurance... it provides very much the same coverage in this situation had you owned your home and came back to a plumbing problem.
In reading the posts... I just don't see how the Owner is negligent... then again, I'm not a lawyer...
It would be different if the roof had a history of leaks and the Landlord was put on notice and did nothing...
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