Can anybody help me with landlord/tenant rights?

[oregonwoodsmoke]

I am sure OP has their issue resolved by this time. The landlord there was being inconsiderate, but it is not necessarily against the law to be a jerk.

However, when you rent an apartment, you are renting that apartment. You are not getting the rights to everything you see. If the basement was not listed as included in the lease, it is not included. If it was written into a month to month rental agreement, all the landlord must do is to give a 30 day notice that the terms have been changed. He can take the space back, or he can start to charge rent for the space. It belongs to him and all he has to do is give a 30 day written notice of the change.

The yard and area around the apartment apparently was not included in the lease and was retained for the landlord's use. It belongs to the landlord, he can use it as long as he has not given a lease to anyone for the yard. It appears he did not. Again, tenants do not automatically have control over everything they can see. Tenants should read their rental agreements very carefully before signing to make sure they are getting everything they think they are getting.

Also let me point out, the OP got free storage for the time he was there. But I see no thank you for the use of free storage, just whining because the freebie has been taken away.

[Minervah]

Yeah, the original post is two years old. I had a landlord who did this to me as well. I knew I wasn't going to win and she was a nut job anyway. The last straw was one day while she was working on the outside of the building and she decided to just come into my apartment while I was at work because she needed an extra ladder. She helped herself to my step stool and while she was at it a drink of water out of one of my glasses which she did not bother to wash afterwards.

The step stool, a nice Black and Decker, still has paint spots on it from where she spattered paint on it. When I came home and found out what she had done, I gave her He!!. She didn't bat a eye. After the basement storage thing, the ladder and the fact that when I lost hot water in the kitchen sink and she told me to wash my dishes in the bathtub, I decided enough was enough and moved. I found a much nicer place. Fair or not fair, it just wasn't worth the agro to fight with her.

Some things are just not worth the fight. Although my neighbors did call the building inspectors on her for the violations in their apartment. Then they moved out.