'He begged me to settle out of court': Tenant gets even with shady landlord after he went against city laws with outsized rent increase

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Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
Nov 13, 2023 2:00 PM EST

Getting even with a landlord is the kind of rare occurrence one can only dream of in this life. If I had the opportunity to get back at some of my landlords knowing with certainty that the odds were in my favor and that I wouldn't be negatively affected in any way, you bet I would enact my own form of petty revenge. For me, the most egregious case of prior shady landlords would be the manager of my first New York apartment. This dude refused to acknowledge our leaking problem and insisted the roof was fixed until the next time it rained and everything started leaking all over again. We even filed a useless complaint to the city that went nowhere. Thankfully, it wasn't long before I moved out of that mess of a home, but if I could help whoever is currently living there get even with this guy, I would be first in line to do so.

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  • 01
    "[!] gave early termination notice, landlord freaked out"
    via Tingey Injury Law Firm

  • This thread was posted to Reddit's r/pettyrevenge subreddit by u/livelifeup, who successfully took their former landlord to court after a rent increase so astronomical it actually went against the city laws. Keep scrolling below for the full story from OP's perspective and for the best reactions in the comments section. For more stories about shady authority figures, feel free to take a look at this post about this team of employees who maliciously complied with their new manager's rules.

  • 02
    I screwed my horrible landlord out of tens of thousands of $ Will keep it short. Landlord already charged above market rent. Increased massively when renewing when my family was experiencing medical issues and we couldn't move and I begged him not to. Turns out city has against that size of rent increase. I waited till my family health issues resolved, gave early termination notice, landlord freaked out as it's really hard to rent in winter. I replied with lawyers notice on illegal rent increase
    via u/livelifeup
  • 03
    Moved out, landlord had to re-rent for $1k lower per month (real market value) and settled out of court for two months rent, and return of my deposit in full. Cost him about $20k for being an
    via u/livelifeup
  • 04
    Edit: I didn't imagine in my wildest dreams this would blow up. I just wanted to share my victory against an oppressive landlord (don't want to share everything he did). Thank you all for the support! For some folks mentioning it's not revenge, just enforcing my rights, that is fair - it hust feels like revenge after all his harassment
    via u/livelifeup
  • 05
    Edit 2: Also to clarify, it's probably more than 20k. 2 months rent and my deposit was 15k. 5k per month rent. The 1k lower per month he'll have to swallow till summer then he can fleece the next person. I live in a very high cost of living area.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 06
    00 StandOutLikeDogBO 15 hr. ago Landlord should've known the law and shouldn't have been a 778 ♡ Reply Share
    via u/livelifeup
  • 07
    livelifeup OP 15 hr. ago He played every card from I didn't know the law to the law doesn't apply, Tried to settle for pennies, I told him I'll see him in court. He sobered up fast once my attorney sent him a notice. He didn't fix the heat on time, plumbing issues took a month to fix. He broke so many laws he finally realized he lost one and settled. Felt so good taking that check from his furious face. 655 Reply Share
    via u/livelifeup
  • 08
    Andylanta 15 hr. ago . around and find out.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 09
    conditerite 11 hr. ago where I live when the landlord does something like repairs the roof roof they can charge the tenants in the building the full cost of the repair but they have to divide it up by the number of tenants and then divide it up across 10 years, so in my case that added about $4.50 to my rent each month for 10 years.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 10
    when the 10 years had passed, I sent my landlord a note telling them they needed to reduce my rent by that $4.50 and they basically told me to ...... off. So the next year I get my next rent increase and once again I remind them that they need to lower the rent by $4.50 and that now I had paid 24 times that amount that I shouldn't have. And they say was the reply from them.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 11
    and so it went for the next couple years at which point I was four years paying them $4.50 more per month. At this point they tried to once again do a capital improvement pass through for having some sort of plumbing in the building and instead of just accepting the new increased rent, I filed a complaint with the city rent agency which set a hearing to settle the dispute.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 12
    The hearing was in a small room with the rent board judge and me and my landlord the rent board judge asked my landlord questions and they answered them. Then the rent board judge asked me questions and I answered them. We did not communicate with each other only to the judge. I also had to provide a very detailed questionnaire across the 16 years that I've been living there with all my rent payments. After the hearing the rent board looked through every single rent increase that the landlord ha
    via u/livelifeup
  • 13
    and made sure they all were done correctly. it turned out that they had made many many mistakes over the years, including giving rent increases in fewer than 12 month intervals, and a lot of arithmetic errors, and then of course the four years I had been paying the increased rent for the roof $4.50 a month. But the biggest shocker of them all was that the date that that roof had been done years earlier was actually prior to my moving into the building. The judgment came out that nearly every ren
    via u/livelifeup
  • 14
    essentially to what it had been when I first moved in over 15 years earlier. On top of that there was a sum of about $5000 that they had to refund to me. They don't mess with me anymore, and I've been living there for 27 years..
    via u/livelifeup
  • 15
    CheckIntelligent7828 14 hr. ago That's awesome. I'm a landlord (one property, not some big corporate thing) and I love hearing about bad landlords getting their due. Well done, OP.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 16
    livelifeup OP 14 hr. ago Thanks, in 12 years of renting I only ever moved to get a bit more space, never due to landlord or financial issues. I respect good landlords and never cause any issue. Even this guy I paid on time till the moment my lease was up despite having sent notice of intent to sue.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 17
    Piddy3825 14 hr. ago petty revenge - best served with financial penalties...
    via u/livelifeup
  • 18
    coralcoast21 13 hr. ago . This happened decades ago. My roommate and I were signers on a lease with the option to sublet an extra room to a 3rd roommate. Our lease was up and roommate one was leaving. 3rd roommate and I made a month to month deal with the landlord in writing (document created by LL attorney)
    via u/livelifeup
  • 19
    2 weeks into the first month she gave us notice to be out in 30 days. While it was permitted in the terms of the month to month lease, it was suspect. I mean why pay your lawyer to create the document? Then it dawned on me. Her primary job was a telecommunications company who was going on a strike that was expected to last months. So she was not able to cover the mortgage on her expensive primary residence and planned to rent that out and live in the cheapo rental property.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 20
    I knew the game. The security deposit would not be refunded no matter how clean the house was if she was this shady about the notice to quit. So I bought a money order for the last month's rent. Only I separated the carbon (told you, decades ago) between the check and receipt. I made the receipt payable to her and deposited the check back into my bank. "Oh no! You didn't get the MO? here's a copy of my receipt." "Still don't have it? Oh my goodness, let me initiate a trace"
    via u/livelifeup
  • 21
    That gave me time to secure new housing. After that I didn't care. She needed an address to serve me, which I carefully concealed (decades ago...much easier then) oh she tried. She called me telling me that my bank statement, package from hometown, tax refund, etc had come to old address and she needed my new one. I just kept refusing until she gave up.
    via u/livelifeup
  • 22
    I was managing a collection agency at the time. So reverse engineering my job was quite effective at keeping her at bay.
    via u/livelifeup

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FAILS landlord petty-revenge-reddit FAIL petty revenge petty scam entitled reddit thread Reddit entitled people apartment
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