(before I start this..just let me say that we live above our landlady and her husband)
We moved into our current residence last Summer, and the harrassment pretty much started right away. First it wasn't that bad..them just saying that we let our toilet run all night and it kept them up, so they'll fix it. Whatever. But we weren't even in here a month before our landlady started leaving rude notes on our door, banging on the walls if my son was playing and making any small amount of noise and calling and harrassing us about several different things on multiple occasions.
She takes any small step to make our life here as horrible as possible. Such as not fixing our broken air conditioning in the middle of July for 2 weeks, turning down our water heater, telling us we can't use our bathtub past a certain hour, asking us to baracade our child in the living room past a certain hour, letting neighbors and her company park right in front of our house so I have to carry my 30 pound child plus whatever I have with me way up or down the street. (we live on a very steep, very busy hill) They certainly aren't the quietest people, I hear them all the time. She even purposefully wakes up my 2 year old child in the morning if she thinks he made too much noise going to sleep the night before! (I know this because she admitted it me.)
This has been going on continuously for the past eight months, without fail. About a month ago she called to complain and I had had enough, so I let her have it. I didn't call her names or make it personal at all, although I can't say the same for her. I thought we came to an understanding at that point, there was only so much we could do without turning our lives inside out, or being unfair to our child, whom she says just makes entirely too much noise, (He's a toddler!!) when I hear her baby screaming ALL THE TIME, She said we could move out as early as March 1st if we wanted to, and we told her that we do not want to move while it is still cold out, but we would let her know when we find a place. Now, everytime she sees us or calls and harrasses us she says "Have you found a place yet? Because I have people who want to move in..blah blah blah..and we've just been telling her, "like we told you, we'll let you know.." (mind you, it was just March 1st yesterday) I gave her the rent check yesterday and she calls to ask us if we're moving out my the end of the month, and I lost it again. I told her "First of all, like we've told you multiple times, we will let you know when we've found a place. So if we haven't said we're moving it safe to assume that we're not moving!" and she goes off on a tizzy "well we can't take this anymore.." basically telling me in so many words that I'm a bad mother and since my child stays up late and doesn't sleep well that "he's certainly not going to be a scholar when he starts school!" Basically the conversation ended with "we do not want to stay here any longer than we have to, but we're not moving into a sh!thole just to appease you, we do not want to go through what you have put us through again, so we're being pretty selective, so just as before WE WILL LET YOU KNOW!" I guarantee you she'll be at it again by next week or sooner.
I want to know if this is considered harrassment? Are there any legal actions I can take against her, because although I know it will be a huge pain, I do not want her to just get away with what she has done to us, plus I don't want her to put someone else through this. I'm not specifically talking about taking her to court or anything, but if I have any kind of case, I wouldn't be opposed to doing that. But is there any kind of letter of harrassment or a cease and desist kind of thing? Thank you for any advice you can give. This is by far the worst experience in my life.
We moved into our current residence last Summer, and the harrassment pretty much started right away. First it wasn't that bad..them just saying that we let our toilet run all night and it kept them up, so they'll fix it. Whatever. But we weren't even in here a month before our landlady started leaving rude notes on our door, banging on the walls if my son was playing and making any small amount of noise and calling and harrassing us about several different things on multiple occasions.
She takes any small step to make our life here as horrible as possible. Such as not fixing our broken air conditioning in the middle of July for 2 weeks, turning down our water heater, telling us we can't use our bathtub past a certain hour, asking us to baracade our child in the living room past a certain hour, letting neighbors and her company park right in front of our house so I have to carry my 30 pound child plus whatever I have with me way up or down the street. (we live on a very steep, very busy hill) They certainly aren't the quietest people, I hear them all the time. She even purposefully wakes up my 2 year old child in the morning if she thinks he made too much noise going to sleep the night before! (I know this because she admitted it me.)
This has been going on continuously for the past eight months, without fail. About a month ago she called to complain and I had had enough, so I let her have it. I didn't call her names or make it personal at all, although I can't say the same for her. I thought we came to an understanding at that point, there was only so much we could do without turning our lives inside out, or being unfair to our child, whom she says just makes entirely too much noise, (He's a toddler!!) when I hear her baby screaming ALL THE TIME, She said we could move out as early as March 1st if we wanted to, and we told her that we do not want to move while it is still cold out, but we would let her know when we find a place. Now, everytime she sees us or calls and harrasses us she says "Have you found a place yet? Because I have people who want to move in..blah blah blah..and we've just been telling her, "like we told you, we'll let you know.." (mind you, it was just March 1st yesterday) I gave her the rent check yesterday and she calls to ask us if we're moving out my the end of the month, and I lost it again. I told her "First of all, like we've told you multiple times, we will let you know when we've found a place. So if we haven't said we're moving it safe to assume that we're not moving!" and she goes off on a tizzy "well we can't take this anymore.." basically telling me in so many words that I'm a bad mother and since my child stays up late and doesn't sleep well that "he's certainly not going to be a scholar when he starts school!" Basically the conversation ended with "we do not want to stay here any longer than we have to, but we're not moving into a sh!thole just to appease you, we do not want to go through what you have put us through again, so we're being pretty selective, so just as before WE WILL LET YOU KNOW!" I guarantee you she'll be at it again by next week or sooner.
I want to know if this is considered harrassment? Are there any legal actions I can take against her, because although I know it will be a huge pain, I do not want her to just get away with what she has done to us, plus I don't want her to put someone else through this. I'm not specifically talking about taking her to court or anything, but if I have any kind of case, I wouldn't be opposed to doing that. But is there any kind of letter of harrassment or a cease and desist kind of thing? Thank you for any advice you can give. This is by far the worst experience in my life.
