Leak/Flood damage

[tdevil]

I am a landlord and I currently rent out to a group of students.

A leak occurred for a few weeks, the anglestop near the toilet was leaking very slowly. The tenants claim that a few puddles appeared in the bathroom, they did not report these to me. They do claim to have cleaned up the puddles, and that the puddles went away and came back.

Eventually water leaked through the drywalls and floor to the unit under them. Once the bottom unit complained to them, they brought it to my attention.

The tenants claim to not have noticed any leakage signs. Eventually the leak dripped into the downstairs unit and both units had serious repair done. About ~10k worth.

They do not have renters insurance (not sure if that would cover it) but basically I had to cover it.

Does this constitute as negligence and should they be responsible for the repairs?


Thank you all in advance for any advice.

 

[Gail_in_Georgia]

Your tenants noticed a leak and did not report it. They were negligent in failing to do this and thus are responsible for the damage their negligence caused.

I'm not sure why tenants don't notify landlords early on about such things. They may fear that they will be blamed for the initial issue, they may feel it's not their responsibility to report this, they may worry that the landlord will be angry if they bother them. However, this minor issue (likely a simple issue with the bolts holding the toilet to the flange) was ignored until it became a major repair cost, one that the tenants are reponsible for.

Gail

 

[tdevil]

Gail

Thank you for your response!

I also suspect it would fall under tenant negligence.

Is their enough evidence to show tenant negligence? They told me that they thought the puddle was from them showering and they had notified me as soon as they the unit underneath them complained about the leak.

I suppose the question is then, if they didn't cause or recognize the leak therefore they didn't report it; is this still considered negligence?

 

[Gail_in_Georgia]

There is the concept of "due diligence", i.e., tenants are expected to report potential repair issues even if they did not deliberately cause these themselves.

For example, they may not cause a leak under a kitchen sink when a pipe becomes lose or develops a hole; i.e., they didn't hit the pipe so it became lose nor drilled a hole in the pipe. However, they chose to ignore the fact that the pipe was leaking until considerable damage was done. Are they responsible for this damage? The real issue is did they provide the degree of diligence they should have by reporting the leak when they first noticed it.

And yes, perhaps the leak your tenants reported did come from poor use of a shower curtain (instead of a leaking toilet). Does that make them any less liable for the damage done to the downstairs unit? Actually it would make them MORE liable since the damage was done due to their neglect to keep the shower curtain fully closed when showering.

They themselves report seeing standing water on the floor in the form of a "few puddles"; this would indicate this was noticed more than once.

Gail

 

[floodedinsb]

Similar Situation?

Hi I had a similar situation happen to me. In my story, I am the tenant of the downstairs unit. I discovered a major flood late one night and reported it immediately to the management company. She informed me that she would be by in the morning w/her maintenance man. In the mean time, my friend and I cleaned up as best we could and moved all of the furniture out of the way. We also turned off all the water in the bathroom because we couldn't determine where the leak was. When they came to take a look they pulled the carpet up and I gave them my boyfriend's industrial sized fan to help with the drying process. Later on in the day when my friend came over to see what had happened, he noticed that despite our efforts to move my things out of harms way, the maintenance man had placed two of my plastic tubs filled with my freshly laundered clothes on top of my bed and propped the drenched carpet over them... So my clothes, mattress, memory foam pad and all of my bedding was soaked! I hoped it would dry over the next few days and be fine but the first night I tried to sleep in bed, I had a severe allergy attack due to the mold/mildew... I contacted the manager who arranged for my mattress to be cleaned. This consisted of two men hosing off my mattress in the parking lot with a pressure washer and leaving it drenched propped up against my door in the shade... After several days, I tried it again and it was worse. When I contacted the manager yet again, she told me that they weren't responsible because the flood just "happened" and that she only had it cleaned as a courtesy. Would I be wrong if I deducted the price of a new mattress and pad from this months rent? Sorry for the long post... I cut out as much as I could...

 

[mightymoose]

Yes, you would be wrong to deduct from the rent.
If you can not settle with the landlord then take the matter to small claims court. You will not need an attorney for small claims.
You can also check to see if your renters insurance will cover this under flood damage.

Your landlord is responsible for the actions of the maintenance man. You are responsible for proving your actual damages.

 

[floodedinsb]

Thank you. I'm so glad I asked first...