Rent Nightmare

[jpw]

Hi,

We moved into an apartment in Recoleta 4months ago. We found it on Mercadolibre with agents.

Problem is that when we came to sign a contract my husband wanted to check everything and discuss all but the agents kept rushing us saying that they are getting late for a meeting,they even gave us the contract in Spanish and didn't read it to us saying its the usual details, and as our previous rent experience was so impressive we didn't press hard on the details.

1) After a couple of days we found out that the bed frame was broken under the the bed, which I then informed the agency on phone and received no response then my husband put it on email after some wait and to that too we received no answer then I spoke to the landlord about it and he said we gave you the house in perfect condition and maybe you kids jumped and broke it. My kids are 6, 4 & 1 the bed is broken from below and looks broken for a very long time.

2) when we came to see this house I already informed the landlord that I have small kids so they are going to be loud and if that's not gonna be a problem to which he said, its ok he has kids too and that's definitely not going to be a problem, but ever since I've moved here every weekend in the mornings someone knocks on my door and tells me rudely to keep the kids quite.

3) Since last one month the heating is not working ever since the landlord came to fix something in it and it stopped working, the portero brought a guy a couple of times who said he cant fix it and later he called the landlord who doesn't answer his phone nor my emails and its been a month now and today when he came to take the rent he is saying he will send someone which doesn't seem likely its terribly cold here and its worse with small children.

4) Its a temporary rent and he tells me to pay for light bulbs and such which I never had to at my previous place which too was a temporary rent.

5) The tv cost written in the inventory is 3700pesos for a 29"inch tv but the tv given to us is 21" inch, and I have no idea how a tv that old is so expensive (sadly i didn't see that when we took the house) and now as the tv has some problem he is telling me to pay for it. its working fine only has some colors in one corner to which he's saying we hit it or it fell.


I need help, I hate confrontations and every month he comes for rent he puts some crazy cost on me, he even only pays 100 for the utility bills and the rest said we need to add which was informed to us but other things about the maintaince and stuff they never told us about. And the agency is not replying to us either we wrote to them many times. Apparently the lady who was our agent got pregnant ever since and is out of reach.

I want this nightmare to end before I have to leave for home after a month.

Any recommendations of lawyer or advise would be much appreciated!

 

[Girino]

Mamma mia, what a nightmare!
From my understanding, once you sign the contract, the agency is helpless and you have to deal with your landlord directly.

I'd say you should start looking for a new place. I think the neighbors complaining might be due to bad past experience with your landlord, and I believe the landlord doesn't care if you disturb your neighbors, as long as he gets his money.

We have found heating is not working in our place, too, but the landlord was helpful (also because he bought the place with a 10-years warranty and the repairing works come for free).
However, they started tearing the house apart yesterday, and I had no idea they would wrap everything, even the bed. I had so much trouble sleeping in that dust last night, plus there is no hot water (they took the boiler off) and no water at all (the building has a problem).

I am extremely angry and pissed off, I don't want to pay rent for living in a construction site with just electricity and my stuff wrapped. Also, they are making a mess and we painted and hired professional cleaners just 2 months ago when we moved in (to clean the moquette and the parquet floors), and now it is all dirty and covered in debris.
It makes me wanna scream so loud. I wanna move to another place and come back when everything is over and painted and clean.
They should at least have warned us that we should have looked for an alternative accommodations during the works.

We are expecting a week without hot water and three weeks of work - they have to tear up the walls, unplug the old tubes, plug in the new ones, re-do the walls, re-paint them and then clean.

 

[Davidglen77]

2) when we came to see this house I already informed the landlord that I have small kids so they are going to be loud and if that's not gonna be a problem to which he said, its ok he has kids too and that's definitely not going to be a problem, but ever since I've moved here every weekend in the mornings someone knocks on my door and tells me rudely to keep the kids quite.

Sorry to hear that you are having these problems. My advice is to send the landlord a carta documento regarding the items that are not working, however if you signed a contract that states certain things are working / not working or part of the inventory and it turns out they are not, you will have no legal recourse. No mediator is going to listen to "they rushed us", as a valid excuse for somehting you signed, except in very extreme circumstances. Why would you sign a contract in a language you can't understand without someone to explain things to you and not do a walk through and verify the condition of the property and the inventory?

Also things like "incidentals" light bulbs, batteries in remote controls, etc. you should cover yourself. There is short term rental, and there is tourist rental. You are apparently staying there for a while (not just on vacation) so unless the contract states otherwise, lightbulbs and other incidentals are your responsibility.

And now regarding your kids making noise. I love kids, and have nieces and nephews as well as lots of friends who have multiple children. However the times they have visited me, I don't allow them to run wild. Yes they can play, laugh, watch TV, listen to music, ALL WITHIN REASON and no screaming or stomping around. They can save that for the park or playtime outside. This is an apartment building and no matter what there are others that live here that may not enjoy their noise. This is part of teaching responsibility to your children and you being a responsible and considerate parent. Do you really think the landlord telling you "it's okay, I have children" means you can allow your kids to make noise at any time and any way they please? Well it does'nt. You are being a bad neighbor and not a great parent either allowing your kids to disturb everyone. It's your fault. And about the neighbors being rude and telling you to keep the kids quiet.....maybe YOU are being rude allowing everyone to be disturbed by the noise being made in your apartment? You need to look at your attitude and do some adjusting. I hope your problems get resolved, however keep your kids under control or your complaining to the landlord will be totally ignored. Good luck.

 

[French jurist]

If the discrepancy about the TV is a trap (no need to get paranoid but well....), make sure to keep screenshots of the ML description if the TV appears in it.

 

[Hybrid Ambassador]

If the discrepancy about the TV is a trap (no need to get paranoid but well....), make sure to keep screenshots of the ML description if the TV appears in it.

Hmmm, you supposed to have a 29 incher but instead you have got a 21?..tell the Landlord of the facts,otherwise when you are leaving, he can slap you with the cost of 29 " T.V. saying you replaced it for a 21 !..Too late now and feel sorry for your situation but
always read the entirety on the rental contract. Once it is signed and back to the landlords...You have no right, I'm afraid...Is there an Argentinean version of consumer affair bureau to go and complain ?

 

[French jurist]

If the agent says "sign quickly this paper stating everything is in perfect condition because I'm in a hurry", reply "ok, to make it quick, let's state everything is in average condition"... Magically, the agent will have more time.

Anyway, I made this mistake once too...

 

[garryl]

They are the daily problems exist in Argentina rental market, not necessarily a problem with the contract.
The repair can be like that, people come to fix it again and again, they are all handyman, not like the licensed heater or AC people in US. The size of TV could be just a mistake. The best way is to bring the landlord here, and talk to him, go over the mistakes, with a lawyer or Argie friends next to you. If you send official letter to your landlord, it will take forever to resolve, these are all annoying small problems, keep the communication channel open, and tough and reasonable. Good luck.

 

[jpw]

Sorry to hear that you are having these problems. My advice is to send the landlord a carta documento regarding the items that are not working, however if you signed a contract that states certain things are working / not working or part of the inventory and it turns out they are not, you will have no legal recourse. No mediator is going to listen to "they rushed us", as a valid excuse for somehting you signed, except in very extreme circumstances. Why would you sign a contract in a language you can't understand without someone to explain things to you and not do a walk through and verify the condition of the property and the inventory?

Also things like "incidentals" light bulbs, batteries in remote controls, etc. you should cover yourself. There is short term rental, and there is tourist rental. You are apparently staying there for a while (not just on vacation) so unless the contract states otherwise, lightbulbs and other incidentals are your responsibility.

And now regarding your kids making noise. I love kids, and have nieces and nephews as well as lots of friends who have multiple children. However the times they have visited me, I don't allow them to run wild. Yes they can play, laugh, watch TV, listen to music, ALL WITHIN REASON and no screaming or stomping around. They can save that for the park or playtime outside. This is an apartment building and no matter what there are others that live here that may not enjoy their noise. This is part of teaching responsibility to your children and you being a responsible and considerate parent. Do you really think the landlord telling you "it's okay, I have children" means you can allow your kids to make noise at any time and any way they please? Well it does'nt. You are being a bad neighbor and not a great parent either allowing your kids to disturb everyone. It's your fault. And about the neighbors being rude and telling you to keep the kids quiet.....maybe YOU are being rude allowing everyone to be disturbed by the noise being made in your apartment? You need to look at your attitude and do some adjusting. I hope your problems get resolved, however keep your kids under control or your complaining to the landlord will be totally ignored. Good luck.

As I mentioned in my post we had no trouble with my previous house where I took it for temporary rent 6 months and kept renewing contract the next 2 times each every three months so together 9 months and it went perfectly well and no complains no trouble about the kids, furniture or appliances, even the bulbs were taken care of by the landlord and we got our deposite back as we left. therefore we were unaware or rather are not familiar with this whole idea of temporary rent here.


An email was sent to both the landlord and agency, first month about the broken bed, also when my husband showed him the utensils and sofa broken the first day he said that's ok I know and little things don't matter. but now as I tried looking for points in contract and translated them it says that the things are all in perfect working condition. They are working but they are not perfect, like the washing machine wouldn't work unless I open and close its door 2 or 3 times and as per the building maintaince guy it had been broken and repaired before.

About kids. I don't blame you since you have none of your own. 7 years ago I would have written it the same way maybe worse "oh I loved kids too" I had nieces and nephews too but I could never get over the idea about them playing in the house or talking louder as the nun says "girls should- only be seen not heard", do you have anyone say something like that for kids?

They are good kids they don't misbehave or disrespect, are kind to strangers specially to old people, they have million questions in few minutes. but yes they play in the house since I don't get to take them to the park everyday, and they are all boys so they don't have quite tea parties with their dolls few hours they watch movies, little time on youtube and little time with their cars or toys. The landlord had seen them knew what they were capable of but at that moment all he could see was the money coming.

 

[camino no tomado]

I've only ever practiced in a common law jurisdiction, so I can't comment regarding the law in Argentina. But if there's one thing I've learned after working in a real estate practice for a few years, it's NEVER, EVER allow yourself to be rushed through an inspection. So many future problems can be avoided by taking a few extra minutes at this stage. If the agents were late for an appointment, too bad--their appointment at that moment was with you, and it shouldn't be rude to remind them of that.

PS: With his superior knowledge of the local culture, I suspect that Frenchie's suggestion to mark everything as average might be effective too.

 

[Davidglen77]

That's fine if you don't agree about the kids issue, and in this case I am not giving advice about how you should deal with your kids as I know not being a parent is much different than looking in from the outside. But we all were children, and in my house I was never allowed to do anything that would disturb my neighbors. However the advice in this case is regarding...YOU! You run your household, not your children (hopefully) and it's up to you to keep it under control. If you don't / can't then you will have the neighbors complaining. If you previously lived in a place where nobody complained, that's great, maybe it didn't bother THOSE neighbors. However it does bother your current neighbors apparently and it's your responsibility to avoid disturbing other people. They have the right to the quiet enjoyment of their homes and you DON'T have the right to disturb them just because you can't control what happens in your home. I went through this before, not me complaining, but I was on the consorcio of a building where I owned a unit. One of the renters had several beautiful children, who made too much noise. The neighbors complained and it eventually went to mediation because the family did not control their children. So the renter not only had to pay the legal expenses of the mediation proceeding, but also had to move as the owner of their unit would not renew her lease. So remember control what happens in your house and be considerate to your neighbors. Once again, just because your landlord says "oh, yeah, that's fine" still doesn't mean you have the right to disturb people.