Tenant With No Air Conditioning Does Research, Revenges With Fines

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mattstaff
Apr 15, 2021 6:30 PM EDT

This tenant decided to take matters into their own hands, regarding a busted A/C situation. As it turns out, their research ended up resulting in a satisfying tidal wave of fines that came crashing back down on the very people that wouldn't fix the thing to begin with. Addressing the concerns of tenants can end up sparing these cheap landlords and property managers in the long run. 

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  • 01
    Text - r/ProRevenge u/RuralRogue · 3h + JOIN No Air Conditioning, enjoy the fines Back in 1993, I had just graduated from college. Since there wasn't any jobs anywhere near my home town, I moved to the Dallas area. I had a small bit of money left from college, but I knew it wouldn't last. I found and rented the cheapest apartment that I could find.
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 02
    Text - A bit of background on this apartment complex. It used to be a nice complex and it used to be in a nice area. That was no longer the case. The area was completely rundown with most people either being unemployed, like me, or doing some sort of menial job. The actual apartment was not really an apartment. The original design for the complex had mainly 3 bedroom/2 bath apartments. At some point, they took the master bedroom, one of the bathrooms and one of the closets and made that into a s
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 03
    Text - I'm sure some of you are reading that and trying to figure out where the kitchen was located. Short answer, it wasn't. The "kitchen" was the closet. It had been a small walk-in closet. They put an apartment sized refrigerator in it with a microwave on top of it. That was the kitchen. I didn't particularly like it, but I was broke. What could I do?
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 04
    Text - I was looking for jobs for a few months and having no luck. I spent much of my time in that little apartment. The trouble came in March. It started getting really hot. By mid April, it felt like I was cooking during the day. My apartment had air conditioning, but it was blowing nothing but hot air. I went to the manager to complain. I was told that they didn't turn on the compressor until June. No way I would be able to make it until June. I had to do something.
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 05
    Text - I found a way to keep cool. One of the few places with working air conditioning that didn't mind me loitering was the public library. We were actually close to a huge branch. I could grab a book and just sit there for hours. But, it was still stifling when I went home.
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 06
    Text - Since I was at the library anyway, I started doing research on apartment regulations. It wasn't too difficult. Heck, I had essentially done the same thing for years as a full time student. It was just research. The housing codes were located in a row of large books (back before the internet). I had nothing better to do, so I started going through them. After a few days, I found some things that I thought might help and called the housing authority. They came right over to my apartment the
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 07
    Text - Infraction 1: If the temperature with the apartment was above a certain level, air conditioning had to be available. I think it was 80 degrees and it was 83 degrees in my apartment when they showed up. Infraction 2: AIl apartments regardless of size had to have a working stove. Remember, I only had a microwave which was not considered a stove. Infraction 3: All apartments regardless of size had to have a working sink in the kitchen. Again remember, I didn't have a sink in the kitchen. I h
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 08
    Text - The housing authority people said they'd take care of it and left. Within another week, I got a notice from the apartment that they were going to put in a stove and sink. And, best of all, the AC started getting cool. It doesn't end there though. I was there when the workers were putting in the stove and sink. I was playing some video game. One of the workers saw it and started up a conversation since he liked video games. I found out some interesting things.
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 09
    Text - First, the wiring wouldn't handle the stove, so they had to do something to get it to work. They put one hole in my apartment and I heard them putting some more holes in the apartment next door. Don't forget, those two apartments used to be the same apartment. The fuse box was in the other apartment. Second, the flooring in the closet was carpeting. That was deemed unsafe to put a stove on, so they had to tear it out (just in the closet) and put down some type of tile.
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 10
    Text - Third, the closet did not have any place to attach the sink, so they had to go through the wall again to get to the bathroom to connect to the plumbing in there. I'm unsure how that worked since directly on the other side of the wall was the bathtub. There was no exposed plumbing there.
    via u/RuralRogue
  • 11
    Text - All told, these changes cost about $10K (including parts and labor). I'm going by what I was told. I have no direct knowledge and the guy giving me this information was one of the regular workers and not any sort of management. But, I did find out one other thing. It wasn't just my apartment. It was all of the efficiency apartments. All 20 of them. If the numbers that I was given can be believed, that'd be approximately $20OK. All because it was hot.
    via u/RuralRogue

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