Photo by PoPville flickr user Brian Mosley
“Dear PoPville,
I’m sure that you have touched on this before, but hoping for a refresher. We own a condo in small building. We have wonderful tenants, however are looking to sell for financial reasons. What are the steps or recommendations on how to proceed with sale in a manner that is both fair and (of course) legal? Thanks!”
Photo by PoPville flickr user Jim Havard
Update: “All the desktops were stolen out of our lobby this morning… (this is with a key-card system and front desk staff watching the doors).”
“Dear PoPville,
I am the resident of a large apartment building in the H Street Corridor. When I signed the lease I was promised a tight-knit community and paid a hefty “amenities fee” ($700) for access to the building’s pool, gym, etc. (this is required).
Shortly after moving in I discovered that the building rents out apartments for the WISH Intern Housing program when I noticed all the expensive amenities being taken over by screaming, drunk college interns. After the interns seemed to disappear at the end of the summer, I noticed what appeared to be hotel guests with lots of luggage checking in at the front desk. (more…)
Photo by PoPville flickr user Erin
“Dear PoPville,
I have a question/issue regarding rent checks that I’m hoping others can weigh in on – either with any action we can take or with how they may have handled a similar issue.
My boyfriend and I have lived in a small apartment building in NW for going on four years now. It’s a good location for us and has what we need with no-frills which is totally fine with us.
Our issue over the last year and a half has been our landlord. Our building is owned by a small rental company/individual who still uses a dropoff/pickup method of paying rent by physical check every month. The problem is that our landlord will pick up the rent checks by the 5th of each month and then not cash them for sometimes (conservatively) 3-4 weeks at a time. We’ve gotten used to that quirk but what happened this month, and is not the first time, is the landlord cashed both the rent checks for two consecutive months on the same day. The first check was written over seven weeks ago, and the second one over three.
Is there any recourse for us to try and stop our landlord from doing this or is the company allowed to hold onto checks for that long, indefinitely, etc? (more…)
Photo by PoPville flickr user Pablo Raw
“Dear PoPville,
After three and a half years together, my boyfriend and I recently started looking for an apartment – our first shared space! – around Lanier Heights to build a home in for the medium term. We were very charmed by a one-bedroom unit at the Argonne, a recently renovated interwar building at 1629 Columbia Road NW, listed on both third-party websites and management company CIM Urban Real Asset’s own site at $2198. After a showing during which the agent consistently repeated this same amount, we decided to move ahead with the application process.
$340 in fees later, a surprise came buried in some pre-lease documentation which CIM is required by law to provide: the official rent for the unit was recorded at $3267, a grand and change more than the number which had been represented to us. I did a little digging to find out what might be lurking here: fortunately, owing to an excellent set of online resources and firsthand accounts from people who have been taken advantage of (including a 2015 PoP post) I didn’t have to search long.
The rent discount/concession scam has gotten enough press in the last few years that I imagined CIM might show some flexibility if we ask specific, informed questions that showed we had no illusions about what was going on. Instead, we were met with dishonesty and misdirection. The agent told us that the $3267 was a “maximum rent” level supplied by the city, characterizing it is as a bureaucratic or bookkeeping device out of the company’s hands. The lease we were forwarded made it clear this was not the case: $3267 was, on any plain reading of the main lease and “Lease Addendum for Rent Concession or Other Rent Discount,” in fact the official rent for the unit, modified by a $1069 “discount” offered by the company as a discretionary “consideration for agreement to remain in your dwelling and fulfill lease obligations.”
Being neither rich nor stupid, and having read about the nightmares of others who’d lost money and homes to the concession scam, we made our case carefully. (more…)
Photo by PoPville flickr user John Sonderman
“Dear PoPville,
My landlord recently filed in the fall for VAT exemption to our rent-controlled apartment. 4 things allow you to qualify to no longer be a rent controlled apt which one of them is:
Owned by a natural person (i.e., not a corporation) who owns no more than four rental units in the District.
Since our lease ends and goes month to month starting in Feb., he expects us to pay $200 more a month – around a 9% rent increase. Is there anything we can do since he JUST FILED to get it exempt which makes me wonder why file now? We had been living there for 2 years how is that fair? I wanted to ask the community if they had dealt with this before – living in an apartment for 2 years when your lease is about to be up and go month to month and they just spring this increase on you and if I have any options to fight it? Any guidance would be most appreciated!”
Photo by PoPville flickr user Jim Havard
“Dear PoPville,
My annual rent increase and lease renewal paperwork recently arrived. They are proposing a 15% increase, supposedly to bring our unit more in line with the market rate. However, we took over a former tenant’s lease last year and we know that they had been asked for only a 1% rent increase in the year prior. I am wondering if we have any recourse to get the building to adhere closer to that 1% (the unit is not rent controlled and never was)? The building has made no improvements so there is no other justification for the big hike.”
Photo by PoPville flickr user Eric P.
“Dear PoPville,
I leased an apartment in a large building last year for $1450 a month. I recently received notice that my rent is increasing to $1495, in accordance with DC rent control procedures. However, the same building is currently advertising units identical to mine for $1275 + one month free rent (so about $1160). I plan to approach management about signing a new lease at this lower rent (I’m month-to-month as of next January) but was wondering if the Popville hive-mind has any thoughts on whether I have any legal basis to insist my rent better reflect market value. Does DC law prohibit rent increases where market value is clearly lower than the current rent? Any thoughts would be appreciated!”
Photo by PoPville flickr user brunofish
“Dear PoPville,
My property management company Nest unexpectedly announced that they are changing our roommate swap policy. Now every time my group house changes roommates we will forfeit our portion of the security deposit instead of paying a flat $200 change fee. Nest argues that we are expected to come and go as a group, but this runs totally contrary to the group house dynamic in DC. No one who lives in the house even signed the original lease in 2013 — we were all added in addendums. This backdoor fee hike is asking a lot of us and I expect a lot of group houses will break apart before the new policy takes effect. My question to the community is whether there is anything in DC’s tenant law that would protect us from this unwelcome surprise?”
Full policy change announcement letter after the jump. (more…)
Photo by PoPville flickr user Andrew Pasko-Reader
“Dear PoPville,
I am moving into a 1-bedroom apartment next month. When I visited the apartment this summer I was told all utilities are included. When I received my lease, I found out no utilities are included. Plus, I will be billed for water, sewer, trash, and “central boiler”. Water and sewer bills will be billed based on sub meters. (I called DC Water, the building is not sub metered.) Trash and “central boiler” will be billed based on apartment SF and number of occupants. How common is it in DC for buildings to bill separately for water, sewer, trash, and “central boiler”? Is it legal to bill for water and sewer, if units are not sub metered?
FWIW, there are about 200 1- and 2- bedroom units in the circa mid-1980s building. I have asked for an estimate monthly billing for these four utilities.”
Photo by PoPville flickr user Olaf Zerbock
“Dear PoPville,
We’ve recently moved out of a rental unit in a Columbie Heights row home. We’ve been just shy of harassing our property management company to respond to our inquires regarding the status of our security deposit. Our Property Manager has not responded to us in over a month and if he does not follow up within next few days we are conferring legal action. I’ve been looking up statutes and it looks like if he fails to notify or pay us within 45 days we can demand release of the entire amount of the security deposit, according to DC regulations. Here’s the relevant rule: (more…)