Our landlord has gone kind of crazy, we allowed them to come stay at the place because they had their parents things still in the house and we thought we’d let them come pickup things, workout what they want to do with the stuff. We thought we’d be…nice people.
They seemed very happy with everything but then after they got home, they sent us nasty letters, told us we will be paying for termite damage repairs, told us it’s our fault tiles broke off in the bathroom, they told us they’ll be hiking the rent on us by 3.5万 a month and they want a larger deposit from us and that we need to pay to use the driveway. They’re basically being totally irrational and unreasonable.
They also think we’re only renting a tiny portion of the house. It does say in the contract we’re renting 5 of 8 rooms. However the next line clearly says we’re renting the building also including the carspace, so why they think we can’t use the car space now, I have no idea.
We do want to move but it’s not easy as there is nothing else available in the town we’re in right now but my wife has to be here for work, we are looking to try get out of this situation as fast as we can but it’s not going to be a short term change. There are other personal reasons why moving at the moment isn’t easy I can’t go into. We have a clearly written contract which is for 2 years, we have one year left, with a fixed price on the rent, we also have email correspondence telling us they want us to live here for a “long time”. We’ve also personally invested a lot in the place, cleaning it, removing termited and bug infested items in the basement, getting services repaired and connected.
I don’t want to have to get lawyers involved here but maybe it’s the best course of action to take as I think they need to get a few things straitened out. It sounds like it would be good for a lawyer to speak with them and explain their position and responsibilities as a landlord because they clearly don’t know what our rights are. They’re acting like this is just a once sided relationship and everything is our fault.
Clearly, if we knew they were insane, we never would’ve rented the place or let them come stay, too late now.
It sounds to me like they’ve decided that we’re not paying enough rent and they want us to pay for their broken old house. Which we’ve actually offered to buy several times, we’d pay easily double the market rate for the peace of mind of having a solid place to live.
Has anyone been through similar things and how did you resolve it, did you get a lawyer involved and was it worth doing?
PS. If anyone knows a good lawyer who speaks English that deals with these types of matters, I’d love to know about it, I’d just like to speak with them to understand our rights a bit better.
Thanks all.
Edit: I just want to say that I have no anger towards these people, even though they’re causing my partner extreme stress. I don’t want to “get back at them” or anything, just want to get it resolved so we can live in harmony here. At least for the rest of our contract. Ideally we’d love to just stay here for many years and repair the house. Not sounding like it will happen now.
**Edit: Please stop making comments like “why on earth”, “just move”. I explained why I can’t do that within 2 weeks. I need time to do this. I wont’ be in the country for 8 weeks to start with, so I have this going on in the background, I can only start to begin to find somewhere else to go after that time. My partner has a business in this town, so we can’t just leave as she’s just spent a long time building it up.**
12 comments
It’s a classic scam. You need to talk to a lawyer as soon as possible.
Do not give in to provocations. Their goal is to make you look “bad” in the eyes of the law and inadequate. So the owners will be able to get what they want and evict you ahead of schedule, as well as earn money. Ideally, communicate with owner ONLY in the presence of a lawyer. Do not contact them without a lawyer at all. EXTREMELY important for you to ensure the safety of the documentation that proves their good attitude towards you at all costs. You should also not behave aggressively – this will give them additional opportunities to earn on you. Be polite and correct, do not break the law and follow all the instructions of a lawyer. This will protect against possible attacks.
Do not let bad people have a negative impact and influence on you. Your psychological comfort is very important. May everything be fine with you.
I had indirect experience with something similar a few years back. Acquaintance rented a part of a big old uninhabited (but still containing owners or owners family’s possessions in some areas) wooden house.
Everything was fine until the space was to actually be used and then the owner/landlord/busybody took every opportunity to snoop and spy and continually add conditions and restrictions.
After some failed negotiations, acquaintance said, “See ya” and that was that.
Lesson learned? Don’t rent out old properties privately. I don’t know the circumstances of your residence there (renovating, fixing, why?) but unless you have any really, really valid reason to live there, I would get the fuck out. Take the L, scrape up the cash and rent a place from a reputable (well, they’re all assholes, so relatively speaking) realtor.
Worst case, call the landlord’s bluff and get out when your contract is done.
Amazingly rich considering so many abandoned old houses outside of major cities
>Clearly, if we knew they were insane, we never would’ve rented the place or ***let them come stay, too late now***.
again, don’t know your circumstances… but why on earth would you have your landlord come and stay? Are you related? Are they friends? Cos that is straight up all kinds of weird…
One specific point is to only communicate with them by email or registered mail. Here, as with many other countries, if it’s not on paper it (usually) doesn’t mean anything to the courts.
Did you know that you have rights? The constitution says you do!
Whatever you’re going to do, it’s clear you won’t be staying much longer there, at most until the contract ends.
So plan your exit strategy, don’t buy more than needed, start selling the big stuff that you don’t plan to take with you.
I would recommend you to use any documentation that works in your favor in order to speak with a lawyer
It’s very likely that when you do bring in a lawyer; they’d back down.
After which, maybe take that year to look for a new place
Lawyer. End of discussion.
If you have a duly made contract, this can all be solved with a nice letter from a lawyer. Then you can live our your two years in peace as courts almost always side with the renters. DM me for a lawyer that can help you easily. They cannot unilaterally change the terms and I doubt they would fight about it in court if the contents are written in the contract (not the email which might be challenged but probably not successfully).
In the king term, start searching for a new place as they will definitely not renew your contract.
I know the go-to advice in this sub is to lawyer-up. But when you find out the price of having a lawyer present for every meeting, you may reconsider.
If you have solid rental contract, they can’t suddenly raise the rent by so much on a whim. Tenant rights are pretty good in Japan. I would just ignore them and only take action if they escalate. But what are they going to do seriously? Go to the police and force you to pay more rent?
Hopefully you took good photos of the place before you moved on. When you move out, they may ask you to pay for any obvious damages, but there are plenty of free rental assistance services in many cities that can help you. Termite damage doesn’t sound like something the tenant would pay for.