Landlord wants to do "routine inspection", how do I say no? (San Francisco: renter, how much)

[SandyCo]

To the OP, no, you have no recourse but to move, unfortunately. I hope you can find another house close by so you can keep your children in the same schools. I know this is a tough rental market.

[Xanathos]

Originally Posted by CatBass

Took everyone's advice, and allowed the inspection. Scrubbed the place from top to bottom; looked great. Turns out she wanted to make sure everything was OK so she could put the house up for sale. My lease has run out, single family home not under rent control, so it looks like I have no recourse, right? I just wished they would wait until my kids finish up the school year. So hard to move them, and to find another single family home. For the record, I have been a very good polite tenant, and have put up with a lot of problems with electricity sparking and going out, doors that won't lock or stick, plumbing problems, heating problems, leaks, floods, mold, floors buckling, things breaking, etc. And I have been the one calling the repairmen, and waiting at home all day for them to show up. They gave me 60 days, and I've been looking every day since. Also, do I still need to give them 30 days notice? It's hard to get the finances together for a new deposit, and moving expenses, and pay double rent for a month.

What recourse, exactly, were you expecting? You let your lease lapse and were fine with month-to-month, knowing the risks, right up until those risks were realized and now you're in a spot. You have no rights to the property....you don't own it.

I mean, I get that this is the left coast and everything is topsy turvy, but it almost sounds as though you're fishing for a possibility that you could somehow keep control of the property and exert more rights over it than the lawful owner of it.

[CatBass]

Renters have rights too, you know. If this was San Francisco, they wouldn't be allowed to force us out until school lets out. I didn't let my lease lapse, they chose not to renew it. All I am saying is that I have put up with a lot, bent over backwards to accommodate them, and paid them a fortune for that pleasure. It is very difficult to find a home within the school district to accomodate a large family with pets on short notice. But my kid's anxiety over being homeless means nothing to them. They have decided the peak of the market is now, and they want to sell at top dollar. I mean, would it really kill them to wait two more months?

[Peasy973]

Don't know where the house but it might take 2-3 months for the owner to find a buyer willing to meet their price.

[Cloudwalker]

Stop with the left coast stuff. Housing is different from other commercial transactions, that's why it gets regulated more closely, everywhere. It is an investment to the owner, but it is also a home to the renter. I agree she doesn't have any recourse in this situation, but there's no need to get into a liberal-conservative why didn't you get off your butt blame game.

[Redford30]

I really feel for your situation. That sucks to be plucked out of the home while the kids are in school.
Having said that, if you take emotion out of everything and just look at how it looks on paper...the landlord is doing nothing wrong. The landlord has given notice. From a business standpoint, the landlord would want to sell early in the spring when the market is hot. I understand the market is always hot, but there are different degrees. If the landlord waits those extra 2 months, the number of home purchasers for this year drops. So that makes the chance of the home being purchased early and for market value or above, that much less. In the landlord's eyes, those extra 2 months of your family's comfort could mean $10-20k difference in price, or the ability to sell the home at all. (The 10-20k is just a very vague estimate, I just wanted to convey $$ versus comfort)

Again, I don't want to seem heartless because I do feel for your situation. Legally, the landlord is doing nothing wrong. Morally...it just sucks. If the almighty dollar didnt influence so much, the landlord would use his heart hopefully.

[Xanathos]

Originally Posted by CatBass

Renters have rights too, you know. If this was San Francisco, they wouldn't be allowed to force us out until school lets out. I didn't let my lease lapse, they chose not to renew it. All I am saying is that I have put up with a lot, bent over backwards to accommodate them, and paid them a fortune for that pleasure. It is very difficult to find a home within the school district to accomodate a large family with pets on short notice. But my kid's anxiety over being homeless means nothing to them. They have decided the peak of the market is now, and they want to sell at top dollar. I mean, would it really kill them to wait two more months?

Yeah. You have the right to live in a space someone else owns in exchange for paying them rent, and if they decide they don't want the property anymore, you have the right to attempt to purchase it (and if you have been a good tenant who has "bent over backwards" for the owner - gee, how magnanimous of you - she'd probably even cut you a bit of a discount).

You signed a business agreement. That agreement expired. One party doesn't wish to continue the agreement. You seem to think you should be able to force the other party into it because it's better for you. Seriously, the level of entitlement in that post is pretty up there. I don't know that having to rush cleaning the place up on a day's notice because you usually leave it trashed is "bending over backwards to accommodate them". I think the landlord probably hoped you just always kept the place clean. You make it sound like you were doing this woman a favor by deigning to live in her home. Come on.

And you've had however long since your lease expired to find a new place - you've chosen not to do so. The landlord probably wanted to sell even earlier, but held off because of the lease. She's not the bad guy here, you're just being way over-entitled about this, and the anxiety your kids are feeling are the result of your actions (or inactions), not the landlords. Don't want to have to move when a lease is up? THere's a workaround for that - buy a home. Or find an apartment, because those typically won't get sold to a new homeowner.

[Electrician4you]

Originally Posted by CatBass

Renters have rights too, you know. If this was San Francisco, they wouldn't be allowed to force us out until school lets out. I didn't let my lease lapse, they chose not to renew it. All I am saying is that I have put up with a lot, bent over backwards to accommodate them, and paid them a fortune for that pleasure. It is very difficult to find a home within the school district to accomodate a large family with pets on short notice. But my kid's anxiety over being homeless means nothing to them. They have decided the peak of the market is now, and they want to sell at top dollar. I mean, would it really kill them to wait two more months?

Your lease didn’t lapse. It simply converted from a year long term to month to month.

You paid them for the use of a property. I had a tenant tell me that he GAVE me 50k in money. Yeah you did. In exchange for living in a beach front property with everything taken care of at any time you called.

It’s a business deal.

Two more months may mean losing thousands of dollars.

Your situation is just a side effect of renting

[Cloudwalker]

"There's a workaround for that - buy a home". Now that is the definition of entitled, telling that to a single parent with kids in the most unaffordable market in the country. Get a grip.

[Xanathos]

Originally Posted by Cloudwalker

"There's a workaround for that - buy a home". Now that is the definition of entitled, telling that to a single parent with kids in the most unaffordable market in the country. Get a grip.

First off, being a single parent with kids is a personal decision. It's not the landlord's fault or problem if that's the situation (and I don't recall seeing "single parent"; all I recall seeing is "large family with pets").

Second, most unaffordable market in the country? You need to get out more. New York? More. San Francisco? More. Hell, SEATTLE costs more than LA at this point. LA's not "affordable" by any means, but it's not untenable.

The short and skinny here is everything the OP listed, these are what are known as "you" problems. As in, they're your problems, not the landlords. It's not the landlord's problem that you don't keep the house cleaned unless the landlord is coming over (well, it is, but for different reasons). It's not the landlord's problem that you've got pets and other landlords don't like them. It's not the landlord's problem that the kids are in the middle of a school year. The landlord's problem is the property, and the landlord no longer wants that problem. All that other **** is **** you should have thought about or planned for previously. Who is the OP to demand that the landlord keep shouldering it?

I'm slowly building up a little cadre of rental properties. Last I checked, my investment of hundreds of thousands of dollars each gives me certain rights over someone who just wants to borrow my place. If I ever had a tenant try to tell me I couldn't come into my property every 6 months at lease renewal time to do a quick walkthrough and ensure everything is in order, they'd be elsewhere. It's clearly spelled out in the lease. If they don't like the terms, they're free to go borrow someone else's place. They aren't doing me a favor by borrowing my place, and I'm not doing them a favor by letting them use it in exchange for money. It's a transactional agreement. Now, I'm human and would certainly accommodate things like what day to come check the place out so long as it's reasonable, but telling me to hang on to one of my investments longer if I decide I don't want it anymore because it's inconvenient for you to have me cash out? GTFOH with that.