Landlord evicts tenant to convert his apartment into an office, tenant fires back with dozens of fines: ‘Take 1.5 month’s rent from me, lose a year’s rent!’

Author image for Ben Weiss
Ben Weiss • Writer and Editor
Jun 26, 2025 2:00 PM EDT

It's remarkable how so many landlords still think they can get away with unauthorized nonsense. That's why knowing your rights is of the utmost importance as a tenant. No matter where you live, you could end up with a landlord who, out of sheer hubris, may think they can get away with just about anything.

In this case, we have a tenant who thought he had a decent relationship with his landlord, until one day, the landlord's wife decided out of nowhere that she wanted to convert the tenant's apartment into a home office. This would end up being just one of many egregious acts that the tenant would use to his advantage. Just when this landlord thought he had succeeded in getting rid of the tenant, the tenant managed to find a better spot within the same complex. Now, the landlord had to keep dealing with the tenant every day for the next five years. Keep scrolling through for the full story and for the subsequent consequences. 

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  • 01
    IKEA wehkamp.nl wehkamp.nl
    via Michal Balog

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • Asking your tenant to fix up one or two flaws in order to get your security deposit back is one thing, but the list of renovations that this landlord asked of the author before kicking him out was extensive and ridiculous. The fact that this tenant took it all in stride and maintained the quiet goal of striking back down the road when the time was right takes far more patience than I could ever possess. 

     

  • 02
    i had a landlord who was pretty absent. i lived in this building (a high rise, like 20 stories) for 10+ years. he, despite living next door to me, was absent and cold personally but cool enough. rent was good, our agreement was NEVER bother him about anything unless its an absolute emergency.
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 03
    shower head wonky? go buy a new one. fridge breaks? get it fixed, or dude just buy a new one. take it out of what you pay in rent. lost the receipt i DONT CARE i know more or less what a fridge costs just take it out of rent
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 04
    finally his wife decides she wants more rent, wants to rent the place out as an office (not legal) and wants us out asap. i agree to move out a month early and get a month's rent back + deposit.
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 05
    complete 180 on their part. "the place is ruined, can't give you until you fix all this stuff". 2 main things: my cats did scratch up the leather legs of the dining table,
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 06
    and the pull-up bar made 2 dents in the door frame of the kitchen, which was quite nice hardwood. they come to me with this list of TONS of stuff like oh you hang a photo frame here, this tile is slightly chipped.
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 07
    this is the busiest work time of the year for me but im trying to be cooperative, sure, i got the table legs re-leathered, spackle the photo frame wall hole. can't do anything about the door frame,
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 08
    take it out of deposit. patch the tile. like dozens of little everyday- wear-and-tear things, like you want me to change the window screens? these are all new screens and in nicer shape than when i moved in! but i did them all, i trusted the guy. gotta get my money
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 09
    at the end he should have been giving me 24k rmb (~£2500). he gave me FIVE. "i still need to use the money to fix all that stuff, if you can't accept the five, i can't give you anything at all." i was super pd off but took the five.
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 10
    now, people in the building are gossipy. i dont participate but i did tell this one older lady about my frustration. she told EVERYONE.
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 11
    the wife went from being the star of the "mommies group" of the building to nobody wanting to talk to her. people shunned the guy,
    via redditsavedmyagain
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    Cheezburger Image 10521302784
    via Sander Sammy

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • 13
    too. i originally told them i was planning on moving to another city but an opportunity came up and i ended up renting a similar unit in the same building. so they thought they could just s me over and not have to see me, but now they still did. often.
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 14
    a year later the office calls me with some question about how to do something with the floor heating, i go... door frame is not fixed, still has dents, i call the guy like "what the C man" and he tells me to mind my own business
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 15
    5 years later... i see the light at my old place is still on at 3am. huh, that's odd. i go to check, the door is open, and the place is just trashed, ruined. cabinets broken, stuff on the walls "lazy landlord"...
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 16
    and the dents on the kitchen doc frame are still there. so the guy never fixed anything, just kept my money
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 17
    by this time smartphones were popular and we had a chat group for the whole building, so about 500 people. i took pictures and posted everything. apparently he had also nicked these peoples deposit, and there was a huge ruckus when they trashed the place, cops called. all these people
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 18
    chime in with complaints, and pictures. people sm in the hallways, leaving leaky rubbish outside the front door, videos of people using foul language in front of children, dirty footprints.
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 19
    he got fined a lot for 1: creating a public disturbance 2: degrading the quality of the living space 3: illegally renting a residence as an office and to top it off the building
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 20
    management wouldn't grant him permission to have workers in to fix the place, so it sat there empty for like 6 months. the fines were big, too.
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 21
    IndicaRain More petty than pro! But good story, what a ☐
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 22
    redditsavedmyagain OP i may not have been clear enough, i kept tabs on these people for 5 years, compiled all the complaints people had (they weren't upset about the place getting trashed, they were upset
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 23
    about the place getting trashed, they were upset about things like years of ciga tte in the hall and also had pictures), put all my pictures and theirs together, and wrote reports
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 24
    to relevant authorities. SAIC (state administration of industry and commerce, can't have an office here), local po-po (also, can't have an office here), tax bureau (gotta pay tax on rental income, and i knew he didnt)
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 25
    i work with publishing, im good with adobe illustrator. those reports, i am proud to say, were professional- grade. full colour pictures, screenshots, transcripts, printed on nice thick paper
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 26
    i'll take the criticism from the likes of u/TurtleSandwich0 and u/vacuousintent but i stand my ground, i combined my sneaky investigative skills,
    via redditsavedmyagain
  • 27
    document creation and layout skills (which i literally do professionally), and social organisation skills to gather evidence on this f↓ turn some chat group drama into a bomb report, and get his fined like a .... i'd argue it was pro, but admittedly quite petty at the same time
    via redditsavedmyagain

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pro revenge landlord revenge revenge-stories tenant petty revenge entitled people karma bad landlord entitled entitled people apartment
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