New rental problems & health problems

[Joan.of.the.Arch]

This inquiry is on behalf of my college son. In May he began renting a house that he did not go to occupy until about two weeks ago. At that time, he found a roommate who also signed the landlord's contract on a single family house on the edge of campus.

There are bats in the house. Not just in the attic, but in the basement and in the walls, and in the living space. I'm afraid he has killed six of them in the house.

He is having tremendous hayfever and has tried several OTC medicines, none of them being very effective. He said no one else around him is having hayfever, so he believes he is allergic to something in the house. The bats and their detritus is a possibility, but he ran into a young woman who rented the house last year and she said they had a cat. She also said bats had been a problem in the house when she and her roomies rented there. My son's dad is very allergic to cats (hayfever & asthma), but son has not had much exposure to cats to find out whether he is allergic to them. Husband's father and sibs are all allergic to cats, too, having not just hayfever but asthma and in the case of one of the aunts and the grandfather, anaphylactic shock. My husband's only hospitaliztion and only ER visits have been due to cat exposure, so I pesronally am worried about this cat exposure my son might be having.

Oh, another possible cause of the allergies is that the basement was wet this summer. My son saw it wet and the sump pump was pushing out water when he stopped by overnight one night in July. Son's bicycle and his lawn mower stored in the basement only since the end of May had acquired spots of mold/mildew right on the metal!

Son's landlord sent his maintenance person to plug holes through which the bats might be coming and going. The maintenance guy said he had done the same thing in spring, but they must not have covered everything. So it is a problem the landlord knew about perhaps within a couple months of renting to my son.

When son began paying rent in May, he put some of his household items in the middle of the living room to store until he would move back in August. He put them there like that because landlord said he needed access to walls to paint between tenants. However, the painting did not get done. I'm afraid my 20 year old son has pretty low standards for what he is willing to consider clean ---so he did not notice if ordinary cleaning that should take place between tenants did take place--vacuuming, mopping, dusting, that sort of thing...and the sort of thing which might have removed some allergens from the house.

Son told me he slept in his truck the last two nights and his cutting back on exposure to the house let the hayfever improve a bit. Nonetheless, it is still bad enough, that he went to the pharmacy to get yet another OTC med today.

I want him to get the landlord to remove the carpet from his bedroom and I would love to go there and mop down everything including walls & celings if he wants to try to continue living there. But then, that seems like the kind of cleaning a landlord should have done before he moved in.

He thinks he needs out of this rental contract for health's sake. Do you think he has a chance of getting out of it? He also does not want to leave his roommate in the lurch, but really his health comes first. If roommate can live there without health problems, perhaps someone else could as well, and my son could look for another renter. (Or landlord could, or both could, whatever.) I promise you my son is not a complainer or a wimp when it comes to stuff like this. I mean, he is even willing to live with the bats , for gosh sakes, but he cannot live with the constant hayfever and medication.

Advice? Ideas?

[kork13]

At least to start with, I'd recommend your son sit down and talk with his landlord. It sounds like he's a private owner (correct?), so he'd probably be fairly understanding, esp. once your son can convince him of the serious health problems he's having. At that point, he can ask what options may be available, and what he can do to minimize harm (poor word choice, i know) to everyone involved, and I expect the landlord (as long as he's a reasonable gent) should be willing to work something out.

If he has to sleep in his truck and avoid the house he's renting, there's no point in him being there--if that were the standard of living he's after, he could do that at a truck stop off the freeway.

[PrincessPerky]

I don't recomend sleeping in the car..

I dunno about his state but painting and changing the carpet between tenants is state law. I would imagine a polite hint that it needs done would help.

Or if ou need out, use that hint so the land lord doesn't take legal action of his own. (the last thing he wants is his own breaking of the law on record)

I do hope though someone more in the legal know chimes in.

[geojen]

Each state has different laws that apply to renters. In WI, landlords do not have to paint and recarpet after every tenant unless the carpeting is "damaged beyond normal wear and tear." I do know that each state has a tenant bill of rights though, so you could easily find out what is required for each state. In addition, more college campuses provide free legal advice to students, so your son could take advantage of this to find out what his legal options are.

I've never seen a lease that can't be broken, you would just need to find a sublet. Look in the lease to see if there are any provisions preventing your son finding his own subleaser. Also, he should talk to the landlord and explain the situation. It is in the landlord's best interest to help you son find a sublet also.

About the bats, that is a problem that needs to be dealt with regardless, and it is the landlord's responsibility to do so. He wouldn't be allowed to rent a house that had a rat infestation, bats are no different. He also would not be allowed to rent out a house with mold in the basement, as that is a health concern. If I were you, I would sit down with the landlord and your son together. Perhaps this person does not view your son as an adult and therefore does not take him seriously.